Folks,
I have been trying to restore a manual card punch. The type with 12
"Buttons" or "Plungers" that operate a lever which pushes a punch "pin"
through a die to create a hole in a card.
Its almost identical to this one:-
https://www.computinghistory.org.uk/det/38019/ICL-Hand-Key-Punch-Card-Machi…
so despite lots of cleaning some of the pins stick down. Does any one
have any suggestions how to clean the small square slots?
Any idea how the holes were made?
Dave
G4UGM
How are small wire sizes specified in Europe? I have seen that EN 60228
defines wire cross sections down to 0.5mm2. What about smaller than that?
Does the standard go smaller? Stranded wire must consist of smaller solid
strands.
-chuck
Off topic, but perhaps edifying for all.
Folks,
Apologies for the list outage. Jason thinks this has been going on
since roughly 11/16. I guess the sense of relief at no inbound list
emails kept me from realizing there were no list emails. :)
I think it's better. Will keep an eye on it.
De
I found the picture on the front page of this web site humorous. It's a place that sells old Jeep parts. Note the computer surfing the web.
https://www.kaiserwillys.com/
Will
Today another giant in the ‘microcomputer’ industry has passed: Thomas
Eugene Kurtz a computer scientist, co-creator/inventor with John Kemeny of
the BASIC language that I grew up with. Somewhat dates me!
Happy computing,
Murray 🙂
To my knowledge Intel announced the C8086 processor in Nov. 1978. This
processor set the stage for the current technological age. It continues to
adapt and its future seems bright!
Happy computing,
Murray 🙂
Dear list denizens,
I've got a mental itch that needs to be scratched. Before me sits a
yellow 3-hole reel of IBM 556 bpi 1/2" tape. Fortunately, the leader is
intact and carries the number H241032488. Does this perchance give any
clue as to when the tape was manufactured? I know that IBM still
carried 556-tested tape in their catalog as late as 1966.
Any clues?
Thanks,
--Chuck
Bill
A few years ago I took your advice on interfacing a Fanuc tape reader without reels, it has happily read tapes to its host since then.
The interface card was the common A20B-007-0750/07B, with 24V, 5V & Gnd on CNT3, and IO signals on CNT1.
Notably the 24V currents can be high, eg 1A2 when in auto.
I now have a Fanuc A860-0056-T020 tape reader with reels on the bench and know that several years ago you used the same model.
Two specific questions:
- does the CNT1 connector harbour any surprises ? I presume at worst it is a superset of the A20B-007-0750/07B CNT1 interface
- how did you feed 24V into the beastie
o via CNT1 p23 and p24 ? ie on two ribbon cable cores
o I note that TP2 provides 5V/Gnd terminals, but 24V has no terminals ?
The Fanuc 6T "manual", helpfully available on your web site, indicates (Fig 3.6a) that the tape readers (with/out reels) are fed 24V and 5V over the ribbon cable. And, that the with reels motors run at 100V.
I would be very grateful for an indication of how you implemented the power hook up and intimation of the currents / power levels to be expected.
Hopefully, knowledge will keep the magic smoke inside the system.
Best Regards
Martin
A while back I started studying more about the Sharp PC-5000 (and had it up
and running at VCFSW in 2023). I'm now coming back to that project, and
one thing I was never able to find was a compatible 5.25 disk drive.
I've collected some information about this system at here:
https://voidstar.blog/sharp-pc-5000/
And I am hoping to put together a video about out. But one challenging
aspect is that its LCD screen is difficult to record (lots of
reflections). And despite having lots of schematic documentation now, I'm
still not savvy enough to try to export its screen content to an external
device that might have a backlight.
From my notes, as I recall.... The 37-pin connector at the back of the
PC-5000 is not the same as the 37-pin connector at the back of the IO card
with the original IBM PC 5150. I believe the Sharp product model number
I am looking for CE-510F (which might be the same as MZ-80B in certain
markets).
This isn't an urgent thing - the Bubble Memory modules of this PC-5000 are
still all working fine and make the system functional. But I do have a set
of disk with the system that might be interesting to try out. So just
broadcasting here, on the off-chance someone might be familiar with these
and know of a stash of accessories (most likely within a Japanese-speaking
community, where I think Sharp products were generally more popular).
Thanks!
Steve v*
Hi all,
I have a HP 1640B that I'm trying to get to work. However I can't find any information about it, and while the machine itself it straightforward enough (and I remember enough from when I was using it in my first dayjob) I can not find anything about how to use the GPIB interface that it has.
The reason I'm interested is, we've finally managed to add GPIB support to the PDP2011-MINC fpga implementation, and I'd like to test against a different target than the relatively modern Philips/Fluke counter I'm now using. And the 1640B is the only other GPIB instrument I have...
The HP doesn't seem to know the ID? command (that causes an error message on the screen). It does respond to a newline (the standard is-this-listener-present test that the MINC code implements), so at least something is working.
Does anyone here have any docs on the HP 1640B? It'd be very helpful at least to know which GPIB commands are implemented.
thanks in advance!
Sytse
