23 Jul
2005
23 Jul
'05
8:59 p.m.
Various SAGE histories have reported
"technicians running up and down
the aisles pushing shopping carts full of tubes". I don't know about
other air divisions, but I never saw it.
Perhaps when the systems were first installed - tube computers went thru
lots of tube during the first few months of life. Once the break in period
was finished, and all the weak tubes were weeded out, tube machines are
reasonably reliable. Most of the tubes in my SAGE junk appear to be
originals.
Of course, with 50000 tubes, some are still going to go bad over the
years.
Towards the end of the system's life, the
remaining SAGE systems had to
make due with tubes scrounged from previously deactivated systems.
It seems to me there are a few oddball types in /FSQ-7 hardware - probably
easier scrounged than getting them thru proper supply channels.
William Donzelli
aw288 at osfn.org