Violet ray tubes are quack medical apparatus dating from the 1920’s. This one no doubt was for hair restoration.
For more details and photos:
These come from a loaned set of tubes and power supply. It was lacking the Tesla coil handset that generates the high voltage attachment into which the tubes plug.
I don’t know the provenance of this set but it looks more like a 1950’s refurbishment rather than 1920’s at a guess. Despite the newspapers from 1935 in the case. There are some 20 attachments although a number have outgassed and no longer work.
The driving unit takes 240 V AC from mains to a multivibrator which interrupts current to the output to the handheld coil. The multivibrator is simply a relay which has normally closed contacts in series with a relay coil which makes it oscillate. A capacitor is across the contact to allow correct operation. A similar setup is here.
The multivibrator from the Violet Ray unit is being used to drive an older automotive ignition coil. This seems to do a similar job to the original antique handset.
This is a nasal attachment where the rubber bulb puffs air containing ozone through the second bulb, yellow tube and glass nasal prongs. Ozone is a toxic gas so this is not medically recommended.
Related pages
Try something else
External links
Photo Date: December 3, 2014