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Advance / Wireless World

Advance/Wireless World desk calculator kit.

8 Digits,  red LED

4 functions.

252 mm x 200 mm x 72 mm (10" x 8" x 3").

Integrated circuit is Texas Instruments TMS1802 date coded week 38 1971.

Assembled from a kit produced by Advance Electronics in conjunction with the electronics and radio magazine "Wireless World". Details appeared in the September & October 1972 issues.
The cost was £39.25 Sterling [about US$100].

Advance Electronics of Bishops Stortford, England.
Further Advance calculators appear in the "British Calculators" section.

The circuit board showing the calculator IC, just above the keys, and far left the white, hybrid thick-film integrated circuit with the clock generator circuit, which helps to reduce the number of components.

Several electronics magazines featured calculator designs in the early 1970s, and several companies supplied calculator kits, including Heathkit (see the Heathkit IC-2009) and Sinclair. These gave some cost saving and also the satisfaction of having assembled the calculator oneself.
The kit companies usually had a scheme whereby you could return the calculator for sorting out if it did not work properly !

In Britain there was an extra price advantage for the kits since they did not attract the Purchase Tax which was applied to complete calculators. This advantage was lost from April 1973 when the all pervasive Value Added Tax (VAT) was introduced, which applied to almost all products.

Within a few years all there was inside a calculator was the integrated circuit chip, the display, and the keyboard. The assembly cost was very little so kits had no advantage and died out.

Vintage Calculators

© Text & photographs copyright Nigel Tout  2000-2008 except where noted otherwise.