[Amps] Bird PEP board

[n1rj@pivot.net (Roger D. Johnson)]

 The mystery of the "Battery Eating Bird" has been solved! I drew
out the circuit and found that each battery has a Zener shunt
regulator circuit associated with it. A 6.2 volt Zener through
a 150 ohm resistor! The damn regulator gobbles up about 18 ma
to regulate 2ma for the IC! The engineer that designed this must
have worked for Eveready. 
 I'm wondering if this circuit really has to be regulated at all.
If so, perhaps a low dropout series regulator would be much more
efficient.

73, Roger