Power Without Cords

Electric typewriters are steadily taking a bigger share of the typewriter market, but none of them can match the unusual trick of the new Smith-Corona portable, introduced last week; it can keep right on typing after its cord is pulled out of the socket. The source of its cordless energy is a compact, efficient power supply that has excited the inventive brain of U.S. industry: the nickel-cadmium battery. This versatile product can be recharged in an ordinary electric socket, can be made tiny enough to power a hearing aid, and is good for a total life of three or four thousand hours.

Smith-Corona's new typewriter is the latest of a stream of portable nickel-cadmium-powered consumer products that have helped to boost sales of the batteries to $20 million; the industry expects its sales to be $200 million within a decade, considers the rechargeable battery its equivalent of the electronics industry's transistor. "Now man is fettered by a cord," says Research Engineer Frank Kamen of Chicago's toolmaking Skil Corp. "We want to release his bonds."

Clippers & Trimmers. Like all storage batteries, nickel-cadmiums work by taking on a charge of electricity from an ^utside source and converting it into chemical energy for storage. When called upon, they gradually convert the chemical energy back into a steady current of electricity, which lasts long enough to run the portable typewriter up to ten hours before recharging is needed. Auto batteries use lead and acid as the elements to produce their chemical action; nickel-cadmiums use nickel and cadmium electrodes. European engineers after the war developed a way to make them compact in size and to seal them permanently so that no new battery fluid has to be added during their life. Today's vastly more sophisticated nickel-cadmiums need no maintenance, are shockproof and immune to cold, and can be recharged without danger of overcharging.

The runaway success of transistor radios showed the U.S. consumer's fascination with what is simple and portable, and attracted U.S. industry to the virtues of the nickel-cadmiums. Skil Corp. and Black & Decker sell cordless electric hand drills, hedge trimmers, grass clippers and other tools that are powered by a small nickel-cadmium power pack built into the tool or strapped to the user's belt. Remington, Schick and Norelco have battery-run shavers. Sunbeam has a cordless shaver and kitchen mixer, General Electric a toothbrush, Fairchild a home movie camera. Nickel-cadmiums also power a growing variety of other products, such as flashlights, cigarette lighters, radios, television sets and walkie-talkies.

Heated Clothes. Despite the widening use of the new power packs, one battery company executive admits that "the rechargeable battery industry is about at the stage where color TV was five years ago." The expensive raw materials and relatively low-volume production at present keep prices of the batteries well above what most consumers like to pay (Black & Decker's battery hedge trimmer costs $99 v. $39 for a cord model). But as demand grows, the industry looks for mass production methods to come into use and to bring drastic price reductions.

Demand seems certain to grow: eager research labs are rushing the development of battery-powered vacuum cleaners, refrigerators, vending machines, and even battery-heated clothing. And where nickel-cadmiums are not powerful enough to do the job, there is already a newer silver-cadmium rechargeable battery, which is even more expensive but packs a compact electrical wallop strong enough to drive portable industrial machinery.

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