Introduction and RK05J Drive cabling

[Joshua Stetson]

I think I lucked out on the foam, as that was one of the first things I
checked. I had to go through and replace all the form in my 8/e chassis and
that was a pretty disgusting process. These drives were used in a
production environment up until a recently and seem really well maintained,
and from the looks of it, a very clean environment. They were even shipped
to me with the heads locked properly. I'm still going to be super cognizant
of the foam when I pull the filters to check them though. Thanks!

On Fri, Jan 22, 2016 at 3:09 PM, Pete Lancashire <pete at petelancashire.com>
wrote:

> Be very careful of the filter assembly, make sure the foam seals are not
> deteriorated to where they can add to what ends up on the platter.
>
>
>
> On Fri, Jan 22, 2016 at 2:00 PM, Joshua Stetson <saburwulf at gmail.com>
> wrote:
>
> > Hi there, long time viewer, first time poster. First an introduction:
> >
> > My name is Joshua Stetson and I'm a software engineer by trade. My
> earliest
> > memories have always involved computers starting with a DOS based Zenith
> > 8088 where I played some of my first games.
> >
> > My first foray into "classic" computing was on a Commodore 64 which my
> > Uncle gave me while I was still in Jr. High. I'd already been introduced
> to
> > programming at an early age, so this machine was an absolute treat to me
> at
> > the time as it was my first step into assembly language. As time
> > progressed, my interests turned older and I began a collection of S-100
> > gear including an IMSAI 8080 and a SOL-20.
> >
> > Over the past couple of years, I've managed to work back even further,
> > piecing together a PDP-8/e system from various parts collected over the
> > past 4 years and now I have a fully working 8/e including 32kw of core
> and
> > an RK05E card set. I've been running the system using Kyle Owen's
> > os8diskserver and David Gesswein's sendtape utilities which both work
> > absolutely wonderfully. It was amazing to be able to run Adventure on a
> > native system!
> >
> > I'd like to send a shout out to Kyle for the os8diskserver, that is some
> > pretty awesome work there. David for his software and archive of DEC
> > documentation which was indispensable for helping me debug a few boards
> and
> > get everything running and tested. I also want to thank Vincent Slyngstad
> > for his help and support on some questions.
> >
> > Now to my ask:
> >
> > Recently I've found a pair of RK05J drives and a few disk packs. One of
> my
> > drives seems to be in fully working order, the other the blower is not
> > working, so I'm working on fixing that right now.
> >
> > I'm currently missing cabling for connect these drives to the RK05E board
> > set. If anyone happens to have an extra cable set they'd be willing to
> part
> > with so I can bring these beasts back to life, I'd appreciate it!
> >
> > Ideally I would like to find the following:
> > 7009026 Cable which is two ribbon cables with a M933B or C flip chip on
> the
> > other end
> > The interface cable between the two drives: BC11A
> > The terminator card M930
> >
> > At minimum, I'm pretty sure I'd only need the first cable to run one of
> the
> > drives, but I'd appreciate any help from those who have more experience.
> >
> > Also, I don't have a rack for this equipment yet, so I'm running it all
> > tabletop, but I'm in the market for a rack + rails (I only have the rails
> > for the equipment, but not the ones that mount to the rack itself. Any
> > leads on more 16-sector packs would also be appreciated! Also, still
> hoping
> > to get the extended arithmetic boards, RTC, and possibly a TSC8
> Timesharing
> > option as I have 4 SLUs and would love to try out some timesharing.
> >
> > On a side note, I'm looking to perhaps sell or trade my SOL-20 sometime
> > soon. It's 100% working as I restored it about 3 years ago. It works
> great,
> > but I'm looking to part with all of my S-100 equipment to focus more on
> > DEC.
> >
> > Thanks!
> >
> >
>