I don't think that high a voltage 45-67.5v battery would be used in a pure solid state device. There is a large 9 volt transistor battery with button or snap clips on it, but it is about 2/3 the size of a lantern battery. The small 9 volt, we all know well...It has small snap buttons. There is a second size up of 9 volts which uses the same small button clip as the regular 9 volt and it is about 1.5 x 1.5 x 2.25" 4 of these $12.00 each batteries are used in all of my Keithley portable electrometers. The third 9 volt is the big boy and is about 2.5 X 2.5 X 3" and uses the larger diameter button snaps found on the 45 and 67.v batteries. I have an older scintillation counter by Princeton-Gamma Tech that uses this oddball $20.00 plus carbon-zinc battery.
Surprisingly, carbon zinc technology is good stuff and has a long shelf life. Alkalines are potent and rugged, but are all highly corrosive if left in most anything. There are no HV alkaline batteries in common use. (Over 9V)
I recently was stunned out of my seat when I investigated an old Los Alamos scintillation counter which used discrete CMOS 4000 series scaler electronics. (~35 chips). The 6 volt nicad pack was shot (unit manufactured in 1981). The scintillation head had a huge bundle of wires heading into a potted monolithic block. I figured this was the HV supply/switcher to make the HV. WRONGO!
I was amazed when I substituted a 6 volt DC supply for the dead nicads and started measuring the input to the discriminator circuit. The pulsed waveform was not there at the output of the preamp. I went to the shielded scintillation head output and the pulses were fine. It looked like the preamp on the scaler was shot. I went to turn off the power supply and found that I had never turned it on!!!!!!
I ultimately realized there was no 6 volt power connection in that big bundle of cables going to the potted block !! ?????? I just had to dig into the large potted (silicone rubber) block and found a real amazing thing......24 penlite cell sized 30 volt burgess batteries in a series connected conglomerate mass. There were no dynode resistor dividersneeded, as every two batteries went to one of the 10 dynodes in the tube directly. (4 used to lift the first dynode to 120 volts).
So, since 1981, the scintillator head's PMT has been electron multiplying 24hrs/day, 7days/wk, 365days/year with no off time. The weakest battery was 23 volts with over half above 29 volts. Not one bulging, discolored or corroded battery in the lot!! Not bad for 20 years on line. Good ole' carbon zinc!
Of course, we all know, or should know, that sitting in total darkness with only occassional nuclear events, the tube draws only a fraction of a microamp until snooping near a hot source.
Good luck in finding out what battery your snoopy requires.
Richard Hull
Created on Monday, January 29, 2001 3:57 PM EDT by Richard Hull