19 Dec
2005
19 Dec
'05
4:03 a.m.
Subject: Oldest machine (was: Re: Good haul of old pc stuph)
From: Jules Richardson <julesrichardsonuk at yahoo.co.uk>
Date: Mon, 19 Dec 2005 11:26:08 +0000
To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts <cctalk at
classiccmp.org>
PDP-8F manufacture date 1973. Running!
However will the owner of that nice looking PB250 step up.. he's back around 1961.
Allison
19 Dec
19 Dec
4:57 a.m.
Allison wrote:
That's what we like to hear! :)
Subject:
Oldest machine (was: Re: Good haul of old pc stuph)
From: Jules Richardson <julesrichardsonuk at yahoo.co.uk>
Date: Mon, 19 Dec 2005 11:26:08 +0000
To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts <cctalk at
classiccmp.org>
PDP-8F manufacture date 1973. Running! However will the owner of that nice looking PB250 step
up.. he's back around 1961.
Ahh, that's earlier than our Marconi TAC then (1963 IIRC, although designed in
the late 50's).
Not sure what we have that's earlier and qualifies. The Elliott 803 is late
1950's (1958 I think) but has a core fault so doesn't count as working until
someone finds the time to fix it! It's probably the earliest complete machine
that we have though; prior to that we just have small bits of some of the
earlier famous* machines.
*famous in the UK at least. I confess to being rather clueless as to what was
going on in the rest of the world between the late 1940's (post ENIAC) and
early 1970's. It seems that Japan certainly had a reasonably successful
computer development industry in the 1960's, but I've come across very little
documenting what was going on in the rest of the world during those years
(even in the US to be honest, other than knowing some of DEC's history)
cheers
Jules
11:41 a.m.
New subject: Oldest machine
Jules Richardson wrote:
Ahh, that's earlier than our Marconi TAC then (1963 IIRC, although
designed in the late 50's).
Not sure what we have that's earlier and qualifies. The Elliott 803 is
late 1950's (1958 I think) but has a core fault so doesn't count as
working until someone finds the time to fix it! It's probably the
earliest complete machine that we have though; prior to that we just
have small bits of some of the earlier famous* machines.
That may be easyer to fix than modern core memory , since I belive
modern core uses IC drivers and IC sense amps
no longer made.
Jules
11:51 a.m.
New subject: Oldest machine
woodelf wrote:
Jules Richardson wrote:
Yep. We've actually got one (possibly two) spare core stacks for the machine
too if there's something *really* toasted about the one in the machine (I
can't remember the nature of the fault myself now). The guy who looks after it
was a trained Elliott engineer, so I don't expect it'd be a complicated repair
either - it's just time consuming and there are always a million other things
to be done!
Would be nice to have it running again though. I only realised at the weekend
that there's a massive lighting strip built into the back of the control desk
- quite why you'd want to run it in an otherwise dark room I don't know!
cheers
J.
Ahh, that's earlier than our Marconi TAC then (1963 IIRC, although
designed in the late 50's).
Not sure what we have that's earlier and qualifies. The Elliott 803 is
late 1950's (1958 I think) but has a core fault so doesn't count as
working until someone finds the time to fix it! It's probably the
earliest complete machine that we have though; prior to that we just
have small bits of some of the earlier famous* machines.
That may be easyer to fix than modern core memory , since I belive
modern core uses IC drivers and IC sense amps no longer made. 
20 Dec
20 Dec
5:19 a.m.
New subject: Oldest machine
Jules Richardson wrote:
Would be nice to have it running again though. I only
realised at the
weekend that there's a massive lighting strip built into the back of the
control desk - quite why you'd want to run it in an otherwise dark room
I don't know!
Because it *looks cool*.
Old Hammond organs often have a wander light mounted inside, for working
on them.
Gordon.
7:44 p.m.
New subject: Oldest machine
On Tuesday 20 December 2005 08:19 am, Gordon JC Pearce wrote:
Old Hammond organs often have a wander light mounted
inside, for working
on them.
Oh? I've worked on lots of those, and don't remember anything of the sort...
--
Member of the toughest, meanest, deadliest, most unrelenting -- and
ablest -- form of life in this section of space, a critter that can
be killed but can't be tamed. --Robert A. Heinlein, "The Puppet Masters"
-
Information is more dangerous than cannon to a society ruled by lies. --James
M Dakin
22 Dec
22 Dec
1:20 p.m.
New subject: Oldest machine
Roy J. Tellason wrote:
On Tuesday 20 December 2005 08:19 am, Gordon JC Pearce
wrote:
I've seen it in a couple of them, and the guy I used to know who did a
lot of organ repairs said it was pretty common.
Gordon.
Old Hammond organs often have a wander light
mounted inside, for working
on them.
Oh? I've worked on lots of those, and don't remember anything of the sort...
23 Dec
23 Dec
9:28 a.m.
New subject: Oldest machine
On Thursday 22 December 2005 04:20 pm, Gordon JC Pearce wrote:
Roy J. Tellason wrote:
I did a lot of organ repair too, from around 1975-85 or thereabouts, and
that included a fair number of old Hammonds, and I don't recall ever bumping
into that. <shrug>
--
Member of the toughest, meanest, deadliest, most unrelenting -- and
ablest -- form of life in this section of space, a critter that can
be killed but can't be tamed. --Robert A. Heinlein, "The Puppet Masters"
-
Information is more dangerous than cannon to a society ruled by lies. --James
M Dakin
On Tuesday 20 December 2005 08:19 am, Gordon JC
Pearce wrote:
I've seen it in a couple of them, and the guy I used to know who did a
lot of organ repairs said it was pretty common. Old Hammond organs often have a wander light
mounted inside, for working
on them.
Oh? I've worked on lots of those, and don't remember anything of the
sort...
9:41 a.m.
New subject: Oldest machine
I've seen
it in a couple of them, and the guy I used to know who did a
lot of organ repairs said it was pretty common.
I did a lot of organ repair too, from around 1975-85 or thereabouts, and
that included a fair number of old Hammonds, and I don't recall ever
bumping
into that. <shrug>
10:23 a.m.
New subject: Oldest machine
Roy J. Tellason wrote:
I did a lot of organ repair too, from around 1975-85
or thereabouts, and
that included a fair number of old Hammonds, and I don't recall ever bumping
into that. <shrug>
Just how big are the organs that people are wandering around in, needing
a light?
My guess is a light would be aound if the organ was installed in the
1900's to 1940's
as you would have electricty for the organ and may not have great
lightiing around.
11:13 a.m.
New subject: Oldest machine
On 12/23/2005 at 11:23 AM woodelf wrote:
Just how big are the organs that people are wandering
around in, needing
a light?
My guess is a light would be aound if the organ was installed in the
1900's to 1940's
as you would have electricty for the organ and may not have great
lightiing around.
These Hammonds are the typical small console instrument. Tone generation
is accomplished electromechanically, using metallic spinning "tone wheels"
and magnetic pickups. Very clever for the time; the old Hammonds were very
light on active electronic devices (tubes/valves), save for the power
amplifier.
Cheers,
Chuck
12:04 p.m.
New subject: Oldest machine
Somewhat OT, but on the subject of "organs"...
A not-very-well-known infomorsel is that the organ maker Rodgers (now owned
by Roland) is named after one of its founders, Rodgers Jenkins, a
Tektronix engineer, who got interested in electronic tone generation after
building an electronic organ from a kit.
Jenkins was not the only one--Howard Vollum was a theatre organ aficionado,
who had a very sizeable Wurlitzer in his home (a birthday present from his
wife). I believe the instrument is now located in the Regent Theatre in
Melbourne, Australia.
--Chuck
11:52 a.m.
New subject: Oldest machine
On Friday 23 December 2005 01:23 pm, woodelf wrote:
Roy J. Tellason wrote:
Worst one I ever did in that regard was in a church in Westchester County, NY.
The only thing they could tell me over the phone was that it was "a 1940
Wurlitzer".
When I got there I found out that the "choir loft" (not very lofty as it was
on the same level as the rest of the church) had been built around the organ.
I got the huge bench out of the way with some help, stood the full-sized
pedalboard up, and removed the panels in the knee space, which did me no
good at all. Then I managed to move it a bit, enough to get the back off,
which also did me no good at all -- turned out this unit had *no* electronics
in it, the tone generators were a bunch of reeds in a box, and that wasn't
where the problem was.
Next step -- find the rest of it. There was this ladder in a little room
behind the altar off to one side. About 2 stories _up_ and it was bendy. I
went up there carrying my tube checker and a few tools and a flashlight,
pushed the hatch cover aside, and stepped out into the space where the tone
cabinets were, only to go *crunch*, *crunch* because the entire floor was
covered -- with dead bats!
A bunch of new tubes in the tone cabinets fixed the problems. :-)
--
Member of the toughest, meanest, deadliest, most unrelenting -- and
ablest -- form of life in this section of space, a critter that can
be killed but can't be tamed. --Robert A. Heinlein, "The Puppet Masters"
-
Information is more dangerous than cannon to a society ruled by lies. --James
M Dakin
I did a lot of organ repair too, from around
1975-85 or thereabouts, and
that included a fair number of old Hammonds, and I don't recall ever
bumping into that. <shrug>
Just how big are the organs that people are wandering around in, needing
a light?
My guess is a light would be aound if the organ was installed in the
1900's to 1940's
as you would have electricty for the organ and may not have great
lightiing around. 
10:13 p.m.
New subject: Oldest machine
Roy J. Tellason wrote:
pushed the hatch cover aside, and stepped out into
the space where the tone
cabinets were, only to go *crunch*, *crunch* because the entire floor was
covered -- with dead bats!
Stories like this make me glad I subscribed to cctalk instead of cctech ;-)
--
Jim Leonard (trixter at oldskool.org) http://www.oldskool.org/
Want to help an ambitious games project? http://www.mobygames.com/
Or check out some trippy MindCandy at http://www.mindcandydvd.com/
24 Dec
24 Dec
5:20 a.m.
New subject: Oldest machine
Jim Leonard wrote:
Roy J. Tellason wrote:
Indeed.
Gordon.
pushed the hatch cover aside, and stepped out
into the space where
the tone cabinets were, only to go *crunch*, *crunch* because the
entire floor was covered -- with dead bats!
Stories like this make me glad I subscribed to cctalk instead of cctech ;-) 
19 Dec
19 Dec
1:58 p.m.
New subject: Oldest machine
woodelf wrote:
That may be easyer to fix than modern core memory , since I belive
modern core uses IC drivers and IC sense amps
no longer made.
...along with things like quads of tiny pulse transformers hidden in DIP or
DIP-like packages.
3:51 p.m.
In my possession:
PDP8/e running
Microdata 1600 Reality ('71) multiple machines, running
In John Bohner's possession, and planned to be restored:
LGP-30 (mentioned elsewhere on thread)
Univac-III
Both are currently stored. The Univac-III is apparently described
in a book by Kevin Stumpf. From the condition, it certainly appears
to be restorable.
Jim
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16 comments
9 participants
participants (9)
-
ajp166＠bellatlantic.net -
bfranchuk＠jetnet.ab.ca -
cclist＠sydex.com -
gordonjcp＠gjcp.net -
hilpert＠cs.ubc.ca -
julesrichardsonuk＠yahoo.co.uk -
jwstephens＠msm.umr.edu -
rtellason＠blazenet.net -
trixter＠oldskool.org