Schedule December 2009

Wed December 02 - general

• Attendees: Ron Williams, Bob Erickson, Bill Flora, Frank King, Glenn Lea, Joe Preston, Bob Feretich, Judith Haemmerle, Don Luke, Stan Paddock, George Ahearn, Bill Newman, Jim Hunt, Robert Garner, Ed Thelen

• Y. P. Cheng [ left ] was a guest of George Ahearn. Y. P. used to work at IBM with George in IBM :-))

• Ron Williams reported that BOTH 1401s were down.
  - the DE machine apparently has a common fault in the 1401, as neither the 1402 Card Reader nor the 1402 Card Punch would work.
  - CT 1402 Card Reader has a sequencing problem related to the card run-out control

• Jim Hunt check the transistors in another BOX of SMS card spares. This box had only 1 bad transistor :-))

• Bill Flora [left] and Stan Paddock trying to determine the fault in the card reader run-out control logic in the CT 1402

• Joe Preston is working on a 729 tape drive. Part of the read/write assembly that should tip back, out of the way during rewind, isn't

  This worm gear assembly operates the tip back mechanism. When it was in the machine, it wouldn't rotate. But when taken out, rotates freely - something else must be jammed :-((

• Since everyone seemed busy, productively, or at least faking it well, Ed Thelen decided to go home and nurse his cold in private.

Thursday December 03 - Tape Team

Wednesday December 09 - General

• Attendees: Ron Williams, Bob Erickson, Bill Flora, Frank King, Glenn Lea, Joe Preston, Judith Haemmerle, Don Luke, Stan Paddock, George Ahearn, Bill Newman, Jim Hunt, Robert Garner, Ed Thelen

• Ron Williams greeted me with "We are going backward, card reader/punch doesn't work, and now we can't execute any instruction. The ?B? cycle doesn't work."

  And at the end of a hard day trouble shooting

• This is Joe Preston, Doctor of IBM 729 Mag Tapes Well, OK, the stethescope, with the sensing rod belongs to Frank King. A loud squeal started in one of the CT IBM 729 Mod II drives - hard to identify the source. Joe is probing.

  A better view of the diagnostic tool ;-))

  The squealing got oiled :-))

• Bill Newman trying to find why Channel A is dead in all three connected tape drives.

  A crack, alowing flexture, seems bad news.

  It is hard to see the crack full scale, across the whole face.

• Jim Hunt noted that resistor packs made life simpler to manufacture. These are the same SMS card types.

  Jim Hunt's home away from home :-))

• Too many weeks ago, the 077 collator started jamming cards.

  Left to right are Glenn Lea, Bob Erickson and Judith Haemmerle. Life ain't all roses, like with the Model T Ford, ya got to get out and got to get under.

Thursday December 10 - Tape Team

Saturday December 12 - 2nd Saturday

Wednesday December 16 - General

• Attendees: Ron Williams, Bob Erickson, Bill Flora, Frank King, Glenn Lea, Joe Preston, Bob Feretich, Sam Sjogren, Judith Haemmerle, Don Luke, Stan Paddock, George Ahearn, Bill Newman, Jim Hunt, Robert Garner, Ed Thelen

• CRISES, CRISES !!
  The Media announces CRISES to help sell there papers and shows -

  OK, we have a CRISES. An editorial CRISES. How should this web site present people?

  1. Robert Garner saw me taking the blue jeans butt pictures (below). He wants to show smiling faces. :-)))
     We are happy :-)))
  2. Ed Thelen (the writer of this) wants to show serious, frowning, sweating faces. :-(((
     We are busting our butts :-(((
  The fine print - well, OK, This isn't a crises -
  But you stopped channel surfing ;-|

• Glenn Lea and Joe Preston doing something in one of the CT 729 tape drives -

  We probably don't care which guy is which -

• I probably made an unwise remark - such as "I gotta fake that I am working". Glenn Lea said that he had a job for me. He would push a bolt down through a hole, and I would start threading the nut. :-((

  The screw is about 2 feet above the floor. :-(( I am laying flat on my back. :-(( Glenn has screwed the bolt finger tight, from above. :-((

  Here is Joe, with a little wrench. :-((

• In a show of cooperation, here is Don Luke "smiling"

  Maybe it is hard to smile when concentrating ??

• "It was working a little while ago - what coulda gone wrong?" :-((

  "Darned if I know" :-(( Bill Flora is scratching his head :-((

  Judith (background) clearly is not sympathetic with the gravity of the situation - OH - Frank King is telling a tale :-))

• Stan wanted to try his pseudo sort while the tape team was about. Cut off some highly used tape, and stick on a new leader foil.

  WOOPS - Something slipped. That doesn't look so good :-((

• Jim Hunt - I bet he isn't smiling either :-| Trying to memorize a diagram of how the logic gates are arranged in a 1401 -

  Smile for the camera ;-))

• Judith and Bob E - looking serious.

  Sam Sjogren and Bob Feretich of the tape team. They normally come in Thursdays, and are like to be here tomorrow. They are almost smiling, clearly skylarking, boondoggling, goofing off, and otherwise enjoying life ;-))

• Robert Garner, we clearly work hard - at least sometimes - such as when there is a camera about -
  We appreciate the bagels for lunch, but how about a raise or caviar or champagne in the New Year? ;-))

Thursday December 17 - Tape Team

Wednesday December 23 - General

• Attendees:

Thursday December 24 - Christmas

Saturday December 26 - 4th Saturday

Attendees:

Wednesday December 30 - General

• Attendees: Ron Williams, Bob Erickson, Frank King, Glenn Lea, Joe Preston, Don Luke, George Ahearn, Jim Hunt, Ed Thelen ('till noon)

• Randy Neff came in with this "printer art" advertisement for Alaska Airlines. Later I went to visit Randy at the Babbage Difference Engine.

• Last Wednesday, there was a big to-do about an SMS card whose output oscillated even though the inputs were regular looking. So, the card was saved for demonstration to the camera this week :-))

  Here is a good card in the slot in the 1401. The bottom trace is the output.

  And of course you must sync the scope to get a stable pattern. And this is the point Ron Williams uses for this situation.

  This is the bad card. It is working correctly !! ?? !! What happened?? Did sitting on the shelf fix it?? Did it heal itself ??

  George Ahearn has put the bad card on an extender for accessibility, (and the camera ;-))

  Vibration did not affect the output (the bottom trace). In desperation, we found a heat gun (unfancy hair drier) and warmed up the card. LOOK - the signal is not pulled far enough down from Zero, (and the following circuit is not being reset)

  The card is cooling down, and now is functioning (but just barely, there is little margin for error :-((

  Since the card will not give the "armadillo effect" today, for the camera. It is turned over to Jim Hunt for repair.

• Joe Preston is doing something with a 1401 cable connector cover. He works so diligently that I hate to disturb him. (He isn't like so many of the rest of us - telling stories while we sorta work ;-))

  So I can't tell you what (if anything) he accomplished ;-))

  ---------------------------------------------

• George Ahearn reports:
  Ron & I spent all day trying to get the DE system to read or punch cards. I t still refuses to do either. After replacing the transistor that produced the Armadillo trace we noticed that the 'A' Register gets a parity check during the processing of card rows. At the end of day we are persuaded that the address of the card read program is appearing in the 'A' Register along with the row count (ie 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 A B AB). Taken together that would result in a parity check. None of this is certain, only speculation. On Wednesday we'll get another crack at it. It won't be long before we will send the 1401 back to the factory for a replacement. Then the factory technicians can have a go at it. No, I'm being silly.
  The 1406 problem on the CT system was solved by Ron & Bob on 12-19. They replaced a bad card.