DEC Computer Lab for sale

[Vincent Slyngstad]

On 5/30/2021 6:22 AM, Eric Moore wrote:
> Hi, I have a DEC computer lab, but no cables. It works fine, but I would 
> love to pair it with an original-as-reasonable set of cables.
> 
> Are the mini-banana plugs the best modern replacement available? Are 
> pics of the original plugs available?

The mini-banana works OK, and I don't know of anything better that is 
still available.  A hundred of them (50 patch cables) won't be cheap.

https://so-much-stuff.com/pdp8/computerlab/computerlab.php
The photos get a little bigger if you click them.  Those bits of stamped 
brass or whatever they are made of were probably pennies each.

	Vince

> On Sun, May 30, 2021, 3:08 AM Vincent Slyngstad via cctalk 
> <cctalk at classiccmp.org <mailto:cctalk at classiccmp.org>> wrote:
> 
>     On 5/29/2021 10:52 PM, William Donzelli wrote:
>      >> While the mini-banana makes a passable (though expensive) modern
>      >> substitute, I believe the originals were hollow crimp-on taper pins,
>      >> #42107 or #42279.
>      >
>      > Really? I have loads of taper pin patch cables. I should try one out.
>      >
>      > The sockets just loom too big for taper pins.
> 
>     I have a few original cables.  They look to my untrained eye like
>     stranded hook-up wire with a crimp-on pin on each end.  The pins look
>     like brass, and are about the size of the ones in the DEC current loop
>     connectors, except brass and fatter as you move back toward the crimp.
> 
>     Like proper taper pins, they wedge nicely into the brass annuli on the
>     H-500.  They also work nicely in the earlier Logic Lab panels that took
>     the flip-chip modules.  I wish I could find a source for the pins, as
>     I'd like to make a pile of patch cables!
> 
>     Unless your taper pin patch cables fit, and you want to unload a bunch
>     of them :-).
> 
>              Vince
>