Gold Inca Transformers!

So, I have these two Inca transformers. Both of them came into my posession in the same week for only a couple of dollars each. I've never seen any other Inca anything. Anyway, I searched the net for info and came up empty. I e-mailed this one guy who had asked for info about his own Incas on a message baord a few years ago to see if anyone ever helped him. He forwarded me the weirdest transformer story that I have ever heard. By the way is anyone knows anything about Inca transformers I have a TJ12 and a GH31 that I'd like to figure out. Ok, so here is the story...

Regarding your Inca series Phelps-Dodge transformers.
Be prepared to make a fortune. As urban legend has it,
Phelps-Dodge are descendants of the tribe by the same
name. You may already know P-D dabbles in the copper
market as part of metals used in feedline
manufacturing.

But before that, well before that, an Inca General
named Rumiñahui fled the marauding Spanish and took
with him a large share of the ransom he had been
collecting for his King. He disappeared into the
remote mountainous region of Ecuador called the
Llanganati. The load of gold artifacts he took with
him is considered the largest undiscovered treasure in
Latin America, valued at two billion dollars.

Much of this loot was manufactured into transformers
with gold laminates, painted in the usual black
wrinkle or dark, nearly black varnish. Clearly it was
not an issue of rust or tarnish but rather a means to
camouflage the quantity of gold as innocuous "ham
radio" transformers that people would think are worth
maybe $1, or $2 if multitap.

Just as clearly as their black finish, this "iron" has
an unusually good grip on gravity. You may indeed have
the treasure, if these transformers seem particularly
heavy.

See you on ebay , perhaps.

Paul/VJB
Annapolis

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soooo...

Have you scratched one of the lams yet?

I think it was just a joke, a riduculously overwraught joke but a joke none the less. I'm not dismantling these guys on a wild goose chase. All of the wire taps on one of my two Incas (the TJ12) are gold colored wire and there is absolutely no corrosion or tarnish on the wires. So... maybe its true, but I'd rather see how they sound first. Can you make a transformer out of gold? Its probably brass wiring right? I have taken pictures and have arrows pointing to the wiring on one of the Incas, the TJ12.

Anyone know anything about these models? I think they are late 30's era and I want to build a mic pre with a design of that era to suit these guys. I also have this 500/500 ohm Daven attenuator that came in the same lot with the TJ12 that I may use for the Inca Pre. Help identifying the Incas as well as late 30's era mic pre design ideas are appreciated.

May be they were designed for telephone communications, like 300Hz-3400Hz?

You could email some of the vintage radio sites.... someone there might be able to help......my quick search found Inca related to ham gear.

In the Los Angeles area and probably other cities you may quite possibly run into vintage transformers made in those good old days with amateur service in mind. Naturally you will want to use them if possible, but how do you find out exactly what they can do and their terminal arrangements. I may be able to help you. I have a large collection of transformer catalogs. Thordarson, Inca, Peerless and UTC go back into the early 1930s. I have fairly extensive data on modulation transformers made by these people with terminal and impedance data that I believe is complete for all Thordarson and possibly all UTC transformers. Also a bit on Inca. I need the make, part number, what it is if you know (Power, modulation, choke etc.) and a SASE. Address to: Harry Wells AA6PP [address omitted .. ed.].

http://www.amfone.net/AMPX/99.htm

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Perhaps its not a joke. Perhaps what really happened was that Rumiñahui and his band of ancient electrical engineers became weary of the jungles of Ecuador as the intense heat kept taking the starch out of their white shirts and ties so they migrated north. In their travels they stumbled upon the great Wabash river and settled on its banks near the ancient village of Fort Wayne. Rumiñahui's descendant, George Jacobs, in 1912, sensing the need to hide the family fortune, and also having recently invented enamel wire insulation, established the Dudlo Manufacturing Company. Little did he know that this company would establish Ft. Wayne as the magnet wire center of the world. In 1917, the company started drawing its own wire, apparantly having run out of the stock that had been carried north in the great ancient migration, and by 1922 had become the largest manufacturer of magnet wire in the world. The great attraction this company created caused all sorts of ne'er-do-wells to join its ranks, hearing of rumors of great wealth hidden in its basements so George sold the company to some unsuspecting vagrant and established a new company called Inca Manufacturing in 1928. After disguising all the hidden riches as his inventory, he sold the company in 1930 to the Phelps Dodge Corporation.

So as you can see, there is a lot of truth in ancient legends.

Jeez this rings a bell... :green: I remember someone spinning me this yarn 25 years ago. How somebody stamped out their gold into transformer lams and painted it black as a way of hiding it. And somehow these ended up in production transformers.... and if you scraped the black off and you had the right one... it was gold underneath. :green: I'm in Australia.... that story has done the royal tour....

Edit: The chap had a transformer with him and got a tech to pull it apart and check the lams. Told us he was gonna keep buying more of the same brand coz he truly believed it was true. Somebody had found one and it was worth a fortune.... :roll: Go figure. I'm a bit gobsmacked seeing this post and being reminded..... I'd truly forgotten the spiel....

Here's a true story for ya'. There was a foundry in the UK (I think) that worked in precious metals. One day a fortune in silver ingots went missing. Alarm raised, police in, everybody interrogated because it had to be an inside job. Nothing found....nada.

Six months later the supervisor or manager was talking to the old storeman, and noticed some small dusty stairs he'd built to help him get stuff into a storeroom. Guess what he'd piled neatly?