Standard Motor Unit (Betta Bilda)

in storage
Standard Motor Unit (Betta Bilda) (i)
location:
in storage

A loose Betta Bilda Standard Motor Unit, Betta Bilda Accessory number 16, manufactured by Airfix in the late 1960s.

Description

The main motor unit is housed in an eight-by-six-stud block, the lower half of which is white plastic, an the upper half of which is moulded in clear plastic.

The idea of the clear upper section seems to have been that, since about half of the unit's volume consisted of a "gear train" of six red plastic gearwheels to reduce the speed of the high-rpm electric motor down to something more useful, one might as well make these gears visible to make the motor more visually interesting. If the motor was being used to power some form of model machinery (like a windmill), visible gears would also make the model look more complex.

The motor's external battery box is a separate white plastic block with a four-by-eight-stud top plate that comes off to allow the battery to be changed. Unlike the later Four Wheel Drive electric motor,the battery box desn;t have any form of on-off switch or reverser switch: instead the two individual push-fit wires (coloured red and white) that connect to the motor can be physically unplugged and reversed to change the direction that the motor runs, or one unplugged to halt the motor.

Illustrations

• 

  1968

• 

  1968

• 

  1968

• 

  1968

Suggested models

• 

  1968

• 

  1968

• 

  1968

See also:

• Four Wheel Drive Unit (Betta Bilda)