Another Surplus Store Gone...

[server]

On Thu, 16 Jul 2020 11:50:23 -0400, Phil Hobbs
<pcdhSpamMeSenseless@electrooptical.net> wrote:

On 2020-07-16 11:27, jlarkin@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:
On Wed, 15 Jul 2020 19:26:55 -0700 (PDT), Michael Terrell
terrell.michael.a@gmail.com> wrote:

Mendelson\'s, in Dayton Ohio is gone. Everything has been auctioned off. It was a six story building that covered an entire block. Three floors were open to the public.

I used to love the junk stores. There were tons of them. Halted,
Haltek, Mike Quinn, Weird Stuff Warehouse. And the Foothill Flea
Market was fabulous. Pease, Williams, Alfke would be there.

When I was a kid I spent all my allowance ordering surplus stuff from
Fair Radio Sales. I think they are still in business.

There was a place on El Camino in Mountain View or maybe Palo Alto when
I was in grad school, run by a guy with the greenest teeth I ever saw.

I remember that one, on El Camino. I got my 200 amp filament
transformer there. They were near Eimac and had a lot of tubes too.

I got a bunch of 2N918s that I occasionally still use, as well as a
bunch of other stuff. I remember he had a barrel full of \'patented
noisy fans\'--substandard-grade equipment pulls, but very cheap.

Now I can get 40 GHz NPNs with betas of 500 and 1 kV Early voltage for
16 cents.

Cheers

Phil Hobbs

Halted had a dusty bin full of tunnel diodes. They didn\'t know what
they were and wanted 10 cents each. I got a bunch. Should have made an
offer for the whole bin.

But the combination of super-cheap new parts and equipment, and super
expensive real estate, killed them off. There are probably few
customers left too; all the kids want to do is type code.



--

John Larkin Highland Technology, Inc

Science teaches us to doubt.

Claude Bernard

 

[server]

On Thu, 16 Jul 2020 11:50:23 -0400, Phil Hobbs
<pcdhSpamMeSenseless@electrooptical.net> wrote:

On 2020-07-16 11:27, jlarkin@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:
On Wed, 15 Jul 2020 19:26:55 -0700 (PDT), Michael Terrell
terrell.michael.a@gmail.com> wrote:

Mendelson\'s, in Dayton Ohio is gone. Everything has been auctioned off. It was a six story building that covered an entire block. Three floors were open to the public.

I used to love the junk stores. There were tons of them. Halted,
Haltek, Mike Quinn, Weird Stuff Warehouse. And the Foothill Flea
Market was fabulous. Pease, Williams, Alfke would be there.

When I was a kid I spent all my allowance ordering surplus stuff from
Fair Radio Sales. I think they are still in business.

There was a place on El Camino in Mountain View or maybe Palo Alto when
I was in grad school, run by a guy with the greenest teeth I ever saw.

I remember that one, on El Camino. I got my 200 amp filament
transformer there. They were near Eimac and had a lot of tubes too.

I got a bunch of 2N918s that I occasionally still use, as well as a
bunch of other stuff. I remember he had a barrel full of \'patented
noisy fans\'--substandard-grade equipment pulls, but very cheap.

Now I can get 40 GHz NPNs with betas of 500 and 1 kV Early voltage for
16 cents.

Cheers

Phil Hobbs

Halted had a dusty bin full of tunnel diodes. They didn\'t know what
they were and wanted 10 cents each. I got a bunch. Should have made an
offer for the whole bin.

But the combination of super-cheap new parts and equipment, and super
expensive real estate, killed them off. There are probably few
customers left too; all the kids want to do is type code.



--

John Larkin Highland Technology, Inc

Science teaches us to doubt.

Claude Bernard

 

[server]

On Thu, 16 Jul 2020 11:50:23 -0400, Phil Hobbs
<pcdhSpamMeSenseless@electrooptical.net> wrote:

On 2020-07-16 11:27, jlarkin@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:
On Wed, 15 Jul 2020 19:26:55 -0700 (PDT), Michael Terrell
terrell.michael.a@gmail.com> wrote:

Mendelson\'s, in Dayton Ohio is gone. Everything has been auctioned off. It was a six story building that covered an entire block. Three floors were open to the public.

I used to love the junk stores. There were tons of them. Halted,
Haltek, Mike Quinn, Weird Stuff Warehouse. And the Foothill Flea
Market was fabulous. Pease, Williams, Alfke would be there.

When I was a kid I spent all my allowance ordering surplus stuff from
Fair Radio Sales. I think they are still in business.

There was a place on El Camino in Mountain View or maybe Palo Alto when
I was in grad school, run by a guy with the greenest teeth I ever saw.

I remember that one, on El Camino. I got my 200 amp filament
transformer there. They were near Eimac and had a lot of tubes too.

I got a bunch of 2N918s that I occasionally still use, as well as a
bunch of other stuff. I remember he had a barrel full of \'patented
noisy fans\'--substandard-grade equipment pulls, but very cheap.

Now I can get 40 GHz NPNs with betas of 500 and 1 kV Early voltage for
16 cents.

Cheers

Phil Hobbs

Halted had a dusty bin full of tunnel diodes. They didn\'t know what
they were and wanted 10 cents each. I got a bunch. Should have made an
offer for the whole bin.

But the combination of super-cheap new parts and equipment, and super
expensive real estate, killed them off. There are probably few
customers left too; all the kids want to do is type code.



--

John Larkin Highland Technology, Inc

Science teaches us to doubt.

Claude Bernard

 

[Phil Hobbs]

On 2020-07-16 11:59, jlarkin@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:

On Thu, 16 Jul 2020 11:50:23 -0400, Phil Hobbs
pcdhSpamMeSenseless@electrooptical.net> wrote:

On 2020-07-16 11:27, jlarkin@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:
On Wed, 15 Jul 2020 19:26:55 -0700 (PDT), Michael Terrell
terrell.michael.a@gmail.com> wrote:

Mendelson\'s, in Dayton Ohio is gone. Everything has been auctioned off. It was a six story building that covered an entire block. Three floors were open to the public.

I used to love the junk stores. There were tons of them. Halted,
Haltek, Mike Quinn, Weird Stuff Warehouse. And the Foothill Flea
Market was fabulous. Pease, Williams, Alfke would be there.

When I was a kid I spent all my allowance ordering surplus stuff from
Fair Radio Sales. I think they are still in business.

There was a place on El Camino in Mountain View or maybe Palo Alto when
I was in grad school, run by a guy with the greenest teeth I ever saw.

I remember that one, on El Camino. I got my 200 amp filament
transformer there. They were near Eimac and had a lot of tubes too.


I got a bunch of 2N918s that I occasionally still use, as well as a
bunch of other stuff. I remember he had a barrel full of \'patented
noisy fans\'--substandard-grade equipment pulls, but very cheap.

Now I can get 40 GHz NPNs with betas of 500 and 1 kV Early voltage for
16 cents.

Cheers

Phil Hobbs

Halted had a dusty bin full of tunnel diodes. They didn\'t know what
they were and wanted 10 cents each. I got a bunch. Should have made an
offer for the whole bin.

You\'d probably still be tripping over it.

The early-1960s Ge tunnel diodes all had ~200 pF capacitance. You
needed the ones with 200 mA peak current to get decent speed, and a
gizmo with many of those is going to get toasty. (Of course they were
competing with tubes.)

But the combination of super-cheap new parts and equipment, and super
expensive real estate, killed them off. There are probably few
customers left too; all the kids want to do is type code.

Dunno. Maybe they can\'t decide whether they\'re HW or SW types.

Simon\'s in that camp too.

Cheers

Phil Hobbs


--
Dr Philip C D Hobbs
Principal Consultant
ElectroOptical Innovations LLC / Hobbs ElectroOptics
Optics, Electro-optics, Photonics, Analog Electronics
Briarcliff Manor NY 10510

http://electrooptical.net
http://hobbs-eo.com

 

[Phil Hobbs]

On 2020-07-16 11:59, jlarkin@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:

On Thu, 16 Jul 2020 11:50:23 -0400, Phil Hobbs
pcdhSpamMeSenseless@electrooptical.net> wrote:

On 2020-07-16 11:27, jlarkin@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:
On Wed, 15 Jul 2020 19:26:55 -0700 (PDT), Michael Terrell
terrell.michael.a@gmail.com> wrote:

Mendelson\'s, in Dayton Ohio is gone. Everything has been auctioned off. It was a six story building that covered an entire block. Three floors were open to the public.

I used to love the junk stores. There were tons of them. Halted,
Haltek, Mike Quinn, Weird Stuff Warehouse. And the Foothill Flea
Market was fabulous. Pease, Williams, Alfke would be there.

When I was a kid I spent all my allowance ordering surplus stuff from
Fair Radio Sales. I think they are still in business.

There was a place on El Camino in Mountain View or maybe Palo Alto when
I was in grad school, run by a guy with the greenest teeth I ever saw.

I remember that one, on El Camino. I got my 200 amp filament
transformer there. They were near Eimac and had a lot of tubes too.


I got a bunch of 2N918s that I occasionally still use, as well as a
bunch of other stuff. I remember he had a barrel full of \'patented
noisy fans\'--substandard-grade equipment pulls, but very cheap.

Now I can get 40 GHz NPNs with betas of 500 and 1 kV Early voltage for
16 cents.

Cheers

Phil Hobbs

Halted had a dusty bin full of tunnel diodes. They didn\'t know what
they were and wanted 10 cents each. I got a bunch. Should have made an
offer for the whole bin.

You\'d probably still be tripping over it.

The early-1960s Ge tunnel diodes all had ~200 pF capacitance. You
needed the ones with 200 mA peak current to get decent speed, and a
gizmo with many of those is going to get toasty. (Of course they were
competing with tubes.)

But the combination of super-cheap new parts and equipment, and super
expensive real estate, killed them off. There are probably few
customers left too; all the kids want to do is type code.

Dunno. Maybe they can\'t decide whether they\'re HW or SW types.

Simon\'s in that camp too.

Cheers

Phil Hobbs


--
Dr Philip C D Hobbs
Principal Consultant
ElectroOptical Innovations LLC / Hobbs ElectroOptics
Optics, Electro-optics, Photonics, Analog Electronics
Briarcliff Manor NY 10510

http://electrooptical.net
http://hobbs-eo.com

 

[Phil Hobbs]

On 2020-07-16 11:59, jlarkin@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:

On Thu, 16 Jul 2020 11:50:23 -0400, Phil Hobbs
pcdhSpamMeSenseless@electrooptical.net> wrote:

On 2020-07-16 11:27, jlarkin@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:
On Wed, 15 Jul 2020 19:26:55 -0700 (PDT), Michael Terrell
terrell.michael.a@gmail.com> wrote:

Mendelson\'s, in Dayton Ohio is gone. Everything has been auctioned off. It was a six story building that covered an entire block. Three floors were open to the public.

I used to love the junk stores. There were tons of them. Halted,
Haltek, Mike Quinn, Weird Stuff Warehouse. And the Foothill Flea
Market was fabulous. Pease, Williams, Alfke would be there.

When I was a kid I spent all my allowance ordering surplus stuff from
Fair Radio Sales. I think they are still in business.

There was a place on El Camino in Mountain View or maybe Palo Alto when
I was in grad school, run by a guy with the greenest teeth I ever saw.

I remember that one, on El Camino. I got my 200 amp filament
transformer there. They were near Eimac and had a lot of tubes too.


I got a bunch of 2N918s that I occasionally still use, as well as a
bunch of other stuff. I remember he had a barrel full of \'patented
noisy fans\'--substandard-grade equipment pulls, but very cheap.

Now I can get 40 GHz NPNs with betas of 500 and 1 kV Early voltage for
16 cents.

Cheers

Phil Hobbs

Halted had a dusty bin full of tunnel diodes. They didn\'t know what
they were and wanted 10 cents each. I got a bunch. Should have made an
offer for the whole bin.

You\'d probably still be tripping over it.

The early-1960s Ge tunnel diodes all had ~200 pF capacitance. You
needed the ones with 200 mA peak current to get decent speed, and a
gizmo with many of those is going to get toasty. (Of course they were
competing with tubes.)

But the combination of super-cheap new parts and equipment, and super
expensive real estate, killed them off. There are probably few
customers left too; all the kids want to do is type code.

Dunno. Maybe they can\'t decide whether they\'re HW or SW types.

Simon\'s in that camp too.

Cheers

Phil Hobbs


--
Dr Philip C D Hobbs
Principal Consultant
ElectroOptical Innovations LLC / Hobbs ElectroOptics
Optics, Electro-optics, Photonics, Analog Electronics
Briarcliff Manor NY 10510

http://electrooptical.net
http://hobbs-eo.com

 

[server]

On Thu, 16 Jul 2020 12:12:41 -0400, Phil Hobbs
<pcdhSpamMeSenseless@electrooptical.net> wrote:

On 2020-07-16 11:59, jlarkin@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:
On Thu, 16 Jul 2020 11:50:23 -0400, Phil Hobbs
pcdhSpamMeSenseless@electrooptical.net> wrote:

On 2020-07-16 11:27, jlarkin@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:
On Wed, 15 Jul 2020 19:26:55 -0700 (PDT), Michael Terrell
terrell.michael.a@gmail.com> wrote:

Mendelson\'s, in Dayton Ohio is gone. Everything has been auctioned off. It was a six story building that covered an entire block. Three floors were open to the public.

I used to love the junk stores. There were tons of them. Halted,
Haltek, Mike Quinn, Weird Stuff Warehouse. And the Foothill Flea
Market was fabulous. Pease, Williams, Alfke would be there.

When I was a kid I spent all my allowance ordering surplus stuff from
Fair Radio Sales. I think they are still in business.

There was a place on El Camino in Mountain View or maybe Palo Alto when
I was in grad school, run by a guy with the greenest teeth I ever saw.

I remember that one, on El Camino. I got my 200 amp filament
transformer there. They were near Eimac and had a lot of tubes too.


I got a bunch of 2N918s that I occasionally still use, as well as a
bunch of other stuff. I remember he had a barrel full of \'patented
noisy fans\'--substandard-grade equipment pulls, but very cheap.

Now I can get 40 GHz NPNs with betas of 500 and 1 kV Early voltage for
16 cents.

Cheers

Phil Hobbs

Halted had a dusty bin full of tunnel diodes. They didn\'t know what
they were and wanted 10 cents each. I got a bunch. Should have made an
offer for the whole bin.

You\'d probably still be tripping over it.

The early-1960s Ge tunnel diodes all had ~200 pF capacitance. You
needed the ones with 200 mA peak current to get decent speed, and a
gizmo with many of those is going to get toasty. (Of course they were
competing with tubes.)

Some had switching rise times around 25 ps. In those days, nothing
else came close except maybe streak tubes. The fabrication process for
TDs was insane.

My senior EE project was \"The Tunnel Diode Slideback Sampling
Oscilloscope\", basically a fast 1-bit digitizer with feedback. I won
some silly IEEE award for that and had to read the paper to a bunch of
old fogies at a dinner.

Boff at HP accidentally discovered the SRD, I think roughly 1960, and
then we had fast sampling scopes.

But the combination of super-cheap new parts and equipment, and super
expensive real estate, killed them off. There are probably few
customers left too; all the kids want to do is type code.

Dunno. Maybe they can\'t decide whether they\'re HW or SW types.

Simon\'s in that camp too.

Being able to do both is cool. Almost mandatory.

The Brat wants to learn to code now. She\'s signed up for an expensive
online Python course from some college. After she gets into it a bit,
I\'m going to explain finite state machines to her. Maybe a company
lecture.



--

John Larkin Highland Technology, Inc

Science teaches us to doubt.

Claude Bernard

 

[server]

On Thu, 16 Jul 2020 12:12:41 -0400, Phil Hobbs
<pcdhSpamMeSenseless@electrooptical.net> wrote:

On 2020-07-16 11:59, jlarkin@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:
On Thu, 16 Jul 2020 11:50:23 -0400, Phil Hobbs
pcdhSpamMeSenseless@electrooptical.net> wrote:

On 2020-07-16 11:27, jlarkin@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:
On Wed, 15 Jul 2020 19:26:55 -0700 (PDT), Michael Terrell
terrell.michael.a@gmail.com> wrote:

Mendelson\'s, in Dayton Ohio is gone. Everything has been auctioned off. It was a six story building that covered an entire block. Three floors were open to the public.

I used to love the junk stores. There were tons of them. Halted,
Haltek, Mike Quinn, Weird Stuff Warehouse. And the Foothill Flea
Market was fabulous. Pease, Williams, Alfke would be there.

When I was a kid I spent all my allowance ordering surplus stuff from
Fair Radio Sales. I think they are still in business.

There was a place on El Camino in Mountain View or maybe Palo Alto when
I was in grad school, run by a guy with the greenest teeth I ever saw.

I remember that one, on El Camino. I got my 200 amp filament
transformer there. They were near Eimac and had a lot of tubes too.


I got a bunch of 2N918s that I occasionally still use, as well as a
bunch of other stuff. I remember he had a barrel full of \'patented
noisy fans\'--substandard-grade equipment pulls, but very cheap.

Now I can get 40 GHz NPNs with betas of 500 and 1 kV Early voltage for
16 cents.

Cheers

Phil Hobbs

Halted had a dusty bin full of tunnel diodes. They didn\'t know what
they were and wanted 10 cents each. I got a bunch. Should have made an
offer for the whole bin.

You\'d probably still be tripping over it.

The early-1960s Ge tunnel diodes all had ~200 pF capacitance. You
needed the ones with 200 mA peak current to get decent speed, and a
gizmo with many of those is going to get toasty. (Of course they were
competing with tubes.)

Some had switching rise times around 25 ps. In those days, nothing
else came close except maybe streak tubes. The fabrication process for
TDs was insane.

My senior EE project was \"The Tunnel Diode Slideback Sampling
Oscilloscope\", basically a fast 1-bit digitizer with feedback. I won
some silly IEEE award for that and had to read the paper to a bunch of
old fogies at a dinner.

Boff at HP accidentally discovered the SRD, I think roughly 1960, and
then we had fast sampling scopes.

But the combination of super-cheap new parts and equipment, and super
expensive real estate, killed them off. There are probably few
customers left too; all the kids want to do is type code.

Dunno. Maybe they can\'t decide whether they\'re HW or SW types.

Simon\'s in that camp too.

Being able to do both is cool. Almost mandatory.

The Brat wants to learn to code now. She\'s signed up for an expensive
online Python course from some college. After she gets into it a bit,
I\'m going to explain finite state machines to her. Maybe a company
lecture.



--

John Larkin Highland Technology, Inc

Science teaches us to doubt.

Claude Bernard

 

[server]

On Thu, 16 Jul 2020 12:12:41 -0400, Phil Hobbs
<pcdhSpamMeSenseless@electrooptical.net> wrote:

On 2020-07-16 11:59, jlarkin@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:
On Thu, 16 Jul 2020 11:50:23 -0400, Phil Hobbs
pcdhSpamMeSenseless@electrooptical.net> wrote:

On 2020-07-16 11:27, jlarkin@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:
On Wed, 15 Jul 2020 19:26:55 -0700 (PDT), Michael Terrell
terrell.michael.a@gmail.com> wrote:

Mendelson\'s, in Dayton Ohio is gone. Everything has been auctioned off. It was a six story building that covered an entire block. Three floors were open to the public.

I used to love the junk stores. There were tons of them. Halted,
Haltek, Mike Quinn, Weird Stuff Warehouse. And the Foothill Flea
Market was fabulous. Pease, Williams, Alfke would be there.

When I was a kid I spent all my allowance ordering surplus stuff from
Fair Radio Sales. I think they are still in business.

There was a place on El Camino in Mountain View or maybe Palo Alto when
I was in grad school, run by a guy with the greenest teeth I ever saw.

I remember that one, on El Camino. I got my 200 amp filament
transformer there. They were near Eimac and had a lot of tubes too.


I got a bunch of 2N918s that I occasionally still use, as well as a
bunch of other stuff. I remember he had a barrel full of \'patented
noisy fans\'--substandard-grade equipment pulls, but very cheap.

Now I can get 40 GHz NPNs with betas of 500 and 1 kV Early voltage for
16 cents.

Cheers

Phil Hobbs

Halted had a dusty bin full of tunnel diodes. They didn\'t know what
they were and wanted 10 cents each. I got a bunch. Should have made an
offer for the whole bin.

You\'d probably still be tripping over it.

The early-1960s Ge tunnel diodes all had ~200 pF capacitance. You
needed the ones with 200 mA peak current to get decent speed, and a
gizmo with many of those is going to get toasty. (Of course they were
competing with tubes.)

Some had switching rise times around 25 ps. In those days, nothing
else came close except maybe streak tubes. The fabrication process for
TDs was insane.

My senior EE project was \"The Tunnel Diode Slideback Sampling
Oscilloscope\", basically a fast 1-bit digitizer with feedback. I won
some silly IEEE award for that and had to read the paper to a bunch of
old fogies at a dinner.

Boff at HP accidentally discovered the SRD, I think roughly 1960, and
then we had fast sampling scopes.

But the combination of super-cheap new parts and equipment, and super
expensive real estate, killed them off. There are probably few
customers left too; all the kids want to do is type code.

Dunno. Maybe they can\'t decide whether they\'re HW or SW types.

Simon\'s in that camp too.

Being able to do both is cool. Almost mandatory.

The Brat wants to learn to code now. She\'s signed up for an expensive
online Python course from some college. After she gets into it a bit,
I\'m going to explain finite state machines to her. Maybe a company
lecture.



--

John Larkin Highland Technology, Inc

Science teaches us to doubt.

Claude Bernard

 

[Lasse Langwadt Christensen]

torsdag den 16. juli 2020 kl. 18.49.38 UTC+2 skrev jla...@highlandsniptechnology.com:

On Thu, 16 Jul 2020 12:12:41 -0400, Phil Hobbs
pcdhSpamMeSenseless@electrooptical.net> wrote:

On 2020-07-16 11:59, jlarkin@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:
On Thu, 16 Jul 2020 11:50:23 -0400, Phil Hobbs
pcdhSpamMeSenseless@electrooptical.net> wrote:

On 2020-07-16 11:27, jlarkin@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:
On Wed, 15 Jul 2020 19:26:55 -0700 (PDT), Michael Terrell
terrell.michael.a@gmail.com> wrote:

Mendelson\'s, in Dayton Ohio is gone. Everything has been auctioned off. It was a six story building that covered an entire block. Three floors were open to the public.

I used to love the junk stores. There were tons of them. Halted,
Haltek, Mike Quinn, Weird Stuff Warehouse. And the Foothill Flea
Market was fabulous. Pease, Williams, Alfke would be there.

When I was a kid I spent all my allowance ordering surplus stuff from
Fair Radio Sales. I think they are still in business.

There was a place on El Camino in Mountain View or maybe Palo Alto when
I was in grad school, run by a guy with the greenest teeth I ever saw.

I remember that one, on El Camino. I got my 200 amp filament
transformer there. They were near Eimac and had a lot of tubes too.


I got a bunch of 2N918s that I occasionally still use, as well as a
bunch of other stuff. I remember he had a barrel full of \'patented
noisy fans\'--substandard-grade equipment pulls, but very cheap.

Now I can get 40 GHz NPNs with betas of 500 and 1 kV Early voltage for
16 cents.

Cheers

Phil Hobbs

Halted had a dusty bin full of tunnel diodes. They didn\'t know what
they were and wanted 10 cents each. I got a bunch. Should have made an
offer for the whole bin.

You\'d probably still be tripping over it.

The early-1960s Ge tunnel diodes all had ~200 pF capacitance. You
needed the ones with 200 mA peak current to get decent speed, and a
gizmo with many of those is going to get toasty. (Of course they were
competing with tubes.)

Some had switching rise times around 25 ps. In those days, nothing
else came close except maybe streak tubes. The fabrication process for
TDs was insane.

My senior EE project was \"The Tunnel Diode Slideback Sampling
Oscilloscope\", basically a fast 1-bit digitizer with feedback. I won
some silly IEEE award for that and had to read the paper to a bunch of
old fogies at a dinner.

Boff at HP accidentally discovered the SRD, I think roughly 1960, and
then we had fast sampling scopes.


But the combination of super-cheap new parts and equipment, and super
expensive real estate, killed them off. There are probably few
customers left too; all the kids want to do is type code.

Dunno. Maybe they can\'t decide whether they\'re HW or SW types.

Simon\'s in that camp too.

Being able to do both is cool. Almost mandatory.

apart from a few small niches it you not going very far with out
software these days

A company like Sparkfun has managed to grow to 140 employees selling
componets, kits, breadboards etc. to kids (old and young) playing with
electronics and code

 

[Lasse Langwadt Christensen]

torsdag den 16. juli 2020 kl. 18.49.38 UTC+2 skrev jla...@highlandsniptechnology.com:

On Thu, 16 Jul 2020 12:12:41 -0400, Phil Hobbs
pcdhSpamMeSenseless@electrooptical.net> wrote:

On 2020-07-16 11:59, jlarkin@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:
On Thu, 16 Jul 2020 11:50:23 -0400, Phil Hobbs
pcdhSpamMeSenseless@electrooptical.net> wrote:

On 2020-07-16 11:27, jlarkin@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:
On Wed, 15 Jul 2020 19:26:55 -0700 (PDT), Michael Terrell
terrell.michael.a@gmail.com> wrote:

Mendelson\'s, in Dayton Ohio is gone. Everything has been auctioned off. It was a six story building that covered an entire block. Three floors were open to the public.

I used to love the junk stores. There were tons of them. Halted,
Haltek, Mike Quinn, Weird Stuff Warehouse. And the Foothill Flea
Market was fabulous. Pease, Williams, Alfke would be there.

When I was a kid I spent all my allowance ordering surplus stuff from
Fair Radio Sales. I think they are still in business.

There was a place on El Camino in Mountain View or maybe Palo Alto when
I was in grad school, run by a guy with the greenest teeth I ever saw.

I remember that one, on El Camino. I got my 200 amp filament
transformer there. They were near Eimac and had a lot of tubes too.


I got a bunch of 2N918s that I occasionally still use, as well as a
bunch of other stuff. I remember he had a barrel full of \'patented
noisy fans\'--substandard-grade equipment pulls, but very cheap.

Now I can get 40 GHz NPNs with betas of 500 and 1 kV Early voltage for
16 cents.

Cheers

Phil Hobbs

Halted had a dusty bin full of tunnel diodes. They didn\'t know what
they were and wanted 10 cents each. I got a bunch. Should have made an
offer for the whole bin.

You\'d probably still be tripping over it.

The early-1960s Ge tunnel diodes all had ~200 pF capacitance. You
needed the ones with 200 mA peak current to get decent speed, and a
gizmo with many of those is going to get toasty. (Of course they were
competing with tubes.)

Some had switching rise times around 25 ps. In those days, nothing
else came close except maybe streak tubes. The fabrication process for
TDs was insane.

My senior EE project was \"The Tunnel Diode Slideback Sampling
Oscilloscope\", basically a fast 1-bit digitizer with feedback. I won
some silly IEEE award for that and had to read the paper to a bunch of
old fogies at a dinner.

Boff at HP accidentally discovered the SRD, I think roughly 1960, and
then we had fast sampling scopes.


But the combination of super-cheap new parts and equipment, and super
expensive real estate, killed them off. There are probably few
customers left too; all the kids want to do is type code.

Dunno. Maybe they can\'t decide whether they\'re HW or SW types.

Simon\'s in that camp too.

Being able to do both is cool. Almost mandatory.

apart from a few small niches it you not going very far with out
software these days

A company like Sparkfun has managed to grow to 140 employees selling
componets, kits, breadboards etc. to kids (old and young) playing with
electronics and code

 

[Lasse Langwadt Christensen]

torsdag den 16. juli 2020 kl. 18.49.38 UTC+2 skrev jla...@highlandsniptechnology.com:

On Thu, 16 Jul 2020 12:12:41 -0400, Phil Hobbs
pcdhSpamMeSenseless@electrooptical.net> wrote:

On 2020-07-16 11:59, jlarkin@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:
On Thu, 16 Jul 2020 11:50:23 -0400, Phil Hobbs
pcdhSpamMeSenseless@electrooptical.net> wrote:

On 2020-07-16 11:27, jlarkin@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:
On Wed, 15 Jul 2020 19:26:55 -0700 (PDT), Michael Terrell
terrell.michael.a@gmail.com> wrote:

Mendelson\'s, in Dayton Ohio is gone. Everything has been auctioned off. It was a six story building that covered an entire block. Three floors were open to the public.

I used to love the junk stores. There were tons of them. Halted,
Haltek, Mike Quinn, Weird Stuff Warehouse. And the Foothill Flea
Market was fabulous. Pease, Williams, Alfke would be there.

When I was a kid I spent all my allowance ordering surplus stuff from
Fair Radio Sales. I think they are still in business.

There was a place on El Camino in Mountain View or maybe Palo Alto when
I was in grad school, run by a guy with the greenest teeth I ever saw.

I remember that one, on El Camino. I got my 200 amp filament
transformer there. They were near Eimac and had a lot of tubes too.


I got a bunch of 2N918s that I occasionally still use, as well as a
bunch of other stuff. I remember he had a barrel full of \'patented
noisy fans\'--substandard-grade equipment pulls, but very cheap.

Now I can get 40 GHz NPNs with betas of 500 and 1 kV Early voltage for
16 cents.

Cheers

Phil Hobbs

Halted had a dusty bin full of tunnel diodes. They didn\'t know what
they were and wanted 10 cents each. I got a bunch. Should have made an
offer for the whole bin.

You\'d probably still be tripping over it.

The early-1960s Ge tunnel diodes all had ~200 pF capacitance. You
needed the ones with 200 mA peak current to get decent speed, and a
gizmo with many of those is going to get toasty. (Of course they were
competing with tubes.)

Some had switching rise times around 25 ps. In those days, nothing
else came close except maybe streak tubes. The fabrication process for
TDs was insane.

My senior EE project was \"The Tunnel Diode Slideback Sampling
Oscilloscope\", basically a fast 1-bit digitizer with feedback. I won
some silly IEEE award for that and had to read the paper to a bunch of
old fogies at a dinner.

Boff at HP accidentally discovered the SRD, I think roughly 1960, and
then we had fast sampling scopes.


But the combination of super-cheap new parts and equipment, and super
expensive real estate, killed them off. There are probably few
customers left too; all the kids want to do is type code.

Dunno. Maybe they can\'t decide whether they\'re HW or SW types.

Simon\'s in that camp too.

Being able to do both is cool. Almost mandatory.

apart from a few small niches it you not going very far with out
software these days

A company like Sparkfun has managed to grow to 140 employees selling
componets, kits, breadboards etc. to kids (old and young) playing with
electronics and code

 

[Phil Hobbs]

On 2020-07-16 12:49, jlarkin@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:

On Thu, 16 Jul 2020 12:12:41 -0400, Phil Hobbs
pcdhSpamMeSenseless@electrooptical.net> wrote:

On 2020-07-16 11:59, jlarkin@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:
On Thu, 16 Jul 2020 11:50:23 -0400, Phil Hobbs
pcdhSpamMeSenseless@electrooptical.net> wrote:

On 2020-07-16 11:27, jlarkin@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:
On Wed, 15 Jul 2020 19:26:55 -0700 (PDT), Michael Terrell
terrell.michael.a@gmail.com> wrote:

Mendelson\'s, in Dayton Ohio is gone. Everything has been auctioned off. It was a six story building that covered an entire block. Three floors were open to the public.

I used to love the junk stores. There were tons of them. Halted,
Haltek, Mike Quinn, Weird Stuff Warehouse. And the Foothill Flea
Market was fabulous. Pease, Williams, Alfke would be there.

When I was a kid I spent all my allowance ordering surplus stuff from
Fair Radio Sales. I think they are still in business.

There was a place on El Camino in Mountain View or maybe Palo Alto when
I was in grad school, run by a guy with the greenest teeth I ever saw.

I remember that one, on El Camino. I got my 200 amp filament
transformer there. They were near Eimac and had a lot of tubes too.


I got a bunch of 2N918s that I occasionally still use, as well as a
bunch of other stuff. I remember he had a barrel full of \'patented
noisy fans\'--substandard-grade equipment pulls, but very cheap.

Now I can get 40 GHz NPNs with betas of 500 and 1 kV Early voltage for
16 cents.

Cheers

Phil Hobbs

Halted had a dusty bin full of tunnel diodes. They didn\'t know what
they were and wanted 10 cents each. I got a bunch. Should have made an
offer for the whole bin.

You\'d probably still be tripping over it.

The early-1960s Ge tunnel diodes all had ~200 pF capacitance. You
needed the ones with 200 mA peak current to get decent speed, and a
gizmo with many of those is going to get toasty. (Of course they were
competing with tubes.)

Some had switching rise times around 25 ps. In those days, nothing
else came close except maybe streak tubes. The fabrication process for
TDs was insane.

My senior EE project was \"The Tunnel Diode Slideback Sampling
Oscilloscope\", basically a fast 1-bit digitizer with feedback. I won
some silly IEEE award for that and had to read the paper to a bunch of
old fogies at a dinner.

Boff at HP accidentally discovered the SRD, I think roughly 1960, and
then we had fast sampling scopes.


But the combination of super-cheap new parts and equipment, and super
expensive real estate, killed them off. There are probably few
customers left too; all the kids want to do is type code.

Dunno. Maybe they can\'t decide whether they\'re HW or SW types.

Simon\'s in that camp too.

Being able to do both is cool. Almost mandatory.

The Brat wants to learn to code now. She\'s signed up for an expensive
online Python course from some college. After she gets into it a bit,
I\'m going to explain finite state machines to her. Maybe a company
lecture.

Mags is doing her BSEE part time while laying out boards for Cirrus
Logic and is enjoying learning Python. I\'ll have to learn it myself
pretty soon I think--it\'s getting harder to stick with Rexx, dear to my
heart as it is. There are just too many Python libraries that make life
easier.

Cheers

Phil Hobbs


--
Dr Philip C D Hobbs
Principal Consultant
ElectroOptical Innovations LLC / Hobbs ElectroOptics
Optics, Electro-optics, Photonics, Analog Electronics
Briarcliff Manor NY 10510

http://electrooptical.net
http://hobbs-eo.com

 

[John Robertson]

On 2020/07/16 8:30 a.m., jlarkin@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:

On Thu, 16 Jul 2020 10:27:51 -0400, Ingvald44 <noone@nowhere.com
wrote:

On Thu, 16 Jul 2020 02:15:56 -0700 (PDT), Michael Terrell
terrell.michael.a@gmail.com> wrote:

They had a website and the sold on Ebay. The website was meci.com. they weren\'t overpriced, or they wouldn\'t have lasted 75years.

I think Fair Radio Sales in Lima OH is still aliive. Maybe not for
long though. I have bought lots of Mil surplus stuff from them.

I bought a 4FP7 CRT from them when I was a kid, a WWII radar display
tube. I recently emailed them, and they still have some! I got one
just for fun. It glows in the dark.

When you say it glows in the dark I hope you aren\'t glowing yourself!

I recall when a surplus store in Toronto (1960s) was selling off old
foot X-ray machines - originally used in shoe stores!

John ;-#)#

 

[John Robertson]

On 2020/07/16 8:30 a.m., jlarkin@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:

On Thu, 16 Jul 2020 10:27:51 -0400, Ingvald44 <noone@nowhere.com
wrote:

On Thu, 16 Jul 2020 02:15:56 -0700 (PDT), Michael Terrell
terrell.michael.a@gmail.com> wrote:

They had a website and the sold on Ebay. The website was meci.com. they weren\'t overpriced, or they wouldn\'t have lasted 75years.

I think Fair Radio Sales in Lima OH is still aliive. Maybe not for
long though. I have bought lots of Mil surplus stuff from them.

I bought a 4FP7 CRT from them when I was a kid, a WWII radar display
tube. I recently emailed them, and they still have some! I got one
just for fun. It glows in the dark.

When you say it glows in the dark I hope you aren\'t glowing yourself!

I recall when a surplus store in Toronto (1960s) was selling off old
foot X-ray machines - originally used in shoe stores!

John ;-#)#

 

[Tom Gardner]

On 16/07/20 17:49, jlarkin@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:

On Thu, 16 Jul 2020 12:12:41 -0400, Phil Hobbs
pcdhSpamMeSenseless@electrooptical.net> wrote:

Dunno. Maybe they can\'t decide whether they\'re HW or SW types.

Simon\'s in that camp too.

Being able to do both is cool. Almost mandatory.

Yes indeed. It baffles me that more people can\'t slide
between hardware and software.

The Brat wants to learn to code now. She\'s signed up for an expensive
online Python course from some college. After she gets into it a bit,
I\'m going to explain finite state machines to her. Maybe a company
lecture.

Softies can think FSMs are something to do with parsing
in compilers. At that point I realise there is a PEBCAK[1],
and I\'d rather they stayed away from the K.

I once did a \"company lecture\" to a group that was building
a telecoms project. They were so deep in the shit[2] that most
of them hadn\'t even noticed they were implementing an FSM

[1] Problem exists between chair and keyboard.

[2] due to some truly dreadful technology plus dimwitted
misuse of standard tools.

 

[Tom Gardner]

On 16/07/20 17:49, jlarkin@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:

On Thu, 16 Jul 2020 12:12:41 -0400, Phil Hobbs
pcdhSpamMeSenseless@electrooptical.net> wrote:

Dunno. Maybe they can\'t decide whether they\'re HW or SW types.

Simon\'s in that camp too.

Being able to do both is cool. Almost mandatory.

Yes indeed. It baffles me that more people can\'t slide
between hardware and software.

The Brat wants to learn to code now. She\'s signed up for an expensive
online Python course from some college. After she gets into it a bit,
I\'m going to explain finite state machines to her. Maybe a company
lecture.

Softies can think FSMs are something to do with parsing
in compilers. At that point I realise there is a PEBCAK[1],
and I\'d rather they stayed away from the K.

I once did a \"company lecture\" to a group that was building
a telecoms project. They were so deep in the shit[2] that most
of them hadn\'t even noticed they were implementing an FSM

[1] Problem exists between chair and keyboard.

[2] due to some truly dreadful technology plus dimwitted
misuse of standard tools.

 

[Tom Gardner]

On 16/07/20 17:49, jlarkin@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:

On Thu, 16 Jul 2020 12:12:41 -0400, Phil Hobbs
pcdhSpamMeSenseless@electrooptical.net> wrote:

Dunno. Maybe they can\'t decide whether they\'re HW or SW types.

Simon\'s in that camp too.

Being able to do both is cool. Almost mandatory.

Yes indeed. It baffles me that more people can\'t slide
between hardware and software.

The Brat wants to learn to code now. She\'s signed up for an expensive
online Python course from some college. After she gets into it a bit,
I\'m going to explain finite state machines to her. Maybe a company
lecture.

Softies can think FSMs are something to do with parsing
in compilers. At that point I realise there is a PEBCAK[1],
and I\'d rather they stayed away from the K.

I once did a \"company lecture\" to a group that was building
a telecoms project. They were so deep in the shit[2] that most
of them hadn\'t even noticed they were implementing an FSM

[1] Problem exists between chair and keyboard.

[2] due to some truly dreadful technology plus dimwitted
misuse of standard tools.

 

[John Larkin]

On Thu, 16 Jul 2020 12:14:59 -0700, John Robertson <spam@flippers.com>
wrote:

On 2020/07/16 8:30 a.m., jlarkin@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:
On Thu, 16 Jul 2020 10:27:51 -0400, Ingvald44 <noone@nowhere.com
wrote:

On Thu, 16 Jul 2020 02:15:56 -0700 (PDT), Michael Terrell
terrell.michael.a@gmail.com> wrote:

They had a website and the sold on Ebay. The website was meci.com. they weren\'t overpriced, or they wouldn\'t have lasted 75years.

I think Fair Radio Sales in Lima OH is still aliive. Maybe not for
long though. I have bought lots of Mil surplus stuff from them.

I bought a 4FP7 CRT from them when I was a kid, a WWII radar display
tube. I recently emailed them, and they still have some! I got one
just for fun. It glows in the dark.


When you say it glows in the dark I hope you aren\'t glowing yourself!

The P7 phosphor has a fast blue component that energizes a slow (zinc
sulfide?) amber one. If you shine a light on it, it glows with some
decay time constant, roughly 30 seconds maybe. Nothing radioactive,
although there were surplus radioactive gadgets available when I was a
kid.

I recall when a surplus store in Toronto (1960s) was selling off old
foot X-ray machines - originally used in shoe stores!

Those were killers.

John ;-#)#

 

[John Larkin]

On Thu, 16 Jul 2020 12:14:59 -0700, John Robertson <spam@flippers.com>
wrote:

On 2020/07/16 8:30 a.m., jlarkin@highlandsniptechnology.com wrote:
On Thu, 16 Jul 2020 10:27:51 -0400, Ingvald44 <noone@nowhere.com
wrote:

On Thu, 16 Jul 2020 02:15:56 -0700 (PDT), Michael Terrell
terrell.michael.a@gmail.com> wrote:

They had a website and the sold on Ebay. The website was meci.com. they weren\'t overpriced, or they wouldn\'t have lasted 75years.

I think Fair Radio Sales in Lima OH is still aliive. Maybe not for
long though. I have bought lots of Mil surplus stuff from them.

I bought a 4FP7 CRT from them when I was a kid, a WWII radar display
tube. I recently emailed them, and they still have some! I got one
just for fun. It glows in the dark.


When you say it glows in the dark I hope you aren\'t glowing yourself!

The P7 phosphor has a fast blue component that energizes a slow (zinc
sulfide?) amber one. If you shine a light on it, it glows with some
decay time constant, roughly 30 seconds maybe. Nothing radioactive,
although there were surplus radioactive gadgets available when I was a
kid.

I recall when a surplus store in Toronto (1960s) was selling off old
foot X-ray machines - originally used in shoe stores!

Those were killers.

John ;-#)#