I've removed (as of tonight) all the parts out of the chassis, documenting where everything goes. I cleaned the chassis very carefully. Once the card cage/ backplane was out, it was obvious that these parts were in beautiful condition, if not more than a little bit dusty. A couple of bent pins in back were easily corrected, and the entire assembly sits waiting to be reinstalled in the chassis. The TU58, unfortunately, did not fare quite as well, as the mice had chosen it as their nesting place. After finally managing to get the tape that was in it loosened up, it came out coated with mouse fur and mouse droppings etc. The rollers are entirely wound up in this stuff. It sits in a box awaiting later attempts at cleaning. I hold out little hope. The power supply, which seems to consist of a controller and two actual PSUs, looks solid from the outside, and also what I can see of the inside. It appears to have large battery packs in the bottom of it. These, certainly, would be dead after all this time. Are they important? Maybe theyre not even batteries... The H7112A looks solid, but again, I haven't explored inside. Everything in the system has a light coating of New Mexico red clay dust. The blower/motor assembly from the bottom of the cabinet awaits cleaning. The blower itself turns freely, which I'm taking as a good sign. The cards are pristine, L0002, L0003, L0004, L0008, L0007, L0016. There are 8 memory boards (M8750), several bus grant cards, a card labeled "M9313" and one labeled "M9202." I also found in the bottom of the system an M9014 Unibus to H854 adapter that wasn't plugged in. I also have a DELUA. -----Original Message----- From: Zane H. Healy Sent: Tue 10/29/2002 9:35 PM To: cctalk(a)classiccmp.org Cc: Subject: Re: Bringing up a 10 years dormant VAX 11/750 Cool! Oh, SHUDDER! It sounds like you're in for an interesting restoration process. cleaning and Unless this is a powersupply that needs a load on it when you power it on (anyone know?), I'd recommend having it totally disconnected when you power it on. I'd also recommend you have someone else standing by with a C02 Fire Extinguisher for safety. As for how long it needs to dry before powering up, I'm not really sure, if you've got it in a warm, heated location, I'd say a week or two should be plenty (probably doesn't need that much but it's better to ere on the side of caution). Something to do in the mean time is to look for corrosion and to get everything good and clean. I'm most concerned about your powersupply and backplane. Also take a look at the rollers in your TU58. While the following is for a PDP-8, you might find it useful. http://pdp-8.org/revive.htm Definitly read up on what Aaron has to say about Backplanes. Zane