Towertalk
[Top] [All Lists]

Re: [BULK] - Re: [TowerTalk] Vacuum tube 100 years old today

To: Jim Miller <JimMiller@STL-Online.Net>
Subject: Re: [BULK] - Re: [TowerTalk] Vacuum tube 100 years old today
From: "Alan C. Zack" <k7acz@cox.net>
Date: Thu, 18 Nov 2004 10:08:11 -0800
List-post: <mailto:towertalk@contesting.com>
One of the projects I worked on at the former Rockwell Intl (now part of Boeing) was the MX Missile project. Down the hall from us was the Minuteman labs. Going to the Minuteman Labs was like going to a museum. The Minuteman guidance system used peanut tubes in it's circuitry.

Jim Miller wrote:

You might be right.  Everything I saw was solid state but there may have
been something in there that was tube.  It was the Minuteman system that we
were installing.

73, de Jim KG0KP

----- Original Message ----- From: "Steve Katz" <stevek@jmr.com>
To: "'Jim Miller'" <JimMiller@STL-Online.Net>; <towertalk@contesting.com>
Sent: Tuesday, November 16, 2004 3:30 PM
Subject: RE: [BULK] - Re: [TowerTalk] Vacuum tube 100 years old today




I was in missile class in the Air Force in 1963 and the lab and course

was


entirely in tubes even though the missile was entirely in transistors.
The
adaptation was very short (minutes, maybe and hour) and said that
transistors worked like tubes except at lower voltages and power levels.
That was all there was to transistors !!!  Not bad really for a class

that


hadn't been rewritten yet (and that may have been all the instructor

knew


at
that time).

73, de Jim KG0KP

[Steve Katz] I'll bet the missle wasn't "all transistors" in 1963. The guidance and targeting systems used high voltage microwave tubes throughout the 1970s, including SAMs and AAMs. Of course, a lot of those late 1950s designs didn't actually reach production levels until the seventies (no kidding). We were building (Army) Hawks designed in '63 at Raytheon/Martin (forebody/aftbody) in 1978; the Patriot didn't go into

full


production until after that, and its acquisition system still used
tubes...ditto the Sidewinder, Sparrow, etc.  -WB2WIK/6

--
__________________________________________________________________________


Alan Zack
Amateur Radio Station K7ACZ
Las Vegas, Nevada, USA
Quality Engineer, The Boeing Company, Retired
Aviation Chief Warrant Officer, U.S. Coast Guard, Retired
U.S. Coast Guard, Always Ready, Always There
Every hour, Every day, Around the Clock and Around the World
SEMPER PARATUS
http://www.gocoastguard.com
http://www.uscg.mil/d14/units/asbp/uscgasbp/
DEPARTMENT OF HOMELAND SECURITY

_______________________________________________

See: http://www.mscomputer.com for "Self Supporting Towers", "Wireless Weather Stations", and lot's more. Call Toll Free, 1-800-333-9041 with any questions and ask for Sherman, W2FLA.

_______________________________________________
TowerTalk mailing list
TowerTalk@contesting.com
http://lists.contesting.com/mailman/listinfo/towertalk

<Prev in Thread] Current Thread [Next in Thread>