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Old 09-07-2015, 08:03 AM
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A big test equipment haul...

Went to an estate sale yesterday from a gentleman who was an EE at Motorola in the communications division.

I was at the sale on the very last day and they were practically giving stuff away. I got a big Tektronix 585 for $10 bucks and a huge HP VHF signal generator for $10 bucks and some old manuals and books. During the first days of the sale, they wanted $160 for the scope and $80 for the VHF generator. They were desperate to unload the remaining items in the last few hours of the sale, so all it took was me looking at something and the marked price was dramatically reduced.

So I couldn't refuse. I carried those back breakers out the basement and into the trunk of Fury they went with room to spare. That's a lot of weight back there - LOL!


DSC04127 by drh4683, on Flickr

DSC04130 by drh4683, on Flickr

DSC04132 by drh4683, on Flickr

DSC04135 by drh4683, on Flickr

DSC04133 by drh4683, on Flickr
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Old 09-07-2015, 09:54 AM
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Nice haul. Those HP generators were the standard in Comm/Nav shops in the Navy before the 8640 and the Wavetek modular stuff. Problem was, for stability, we left them on 24/7, to avoid drift. Wonderful generators once they have stabilized.

The Navy METCAL program procedure started out with "Step 1: Plug the TI power cord into a suitable power source and turn on TI using the power switch. Maintain power on condition for 24 hours before proceeding."

Interesting that yours has both the frangible "Calibration Void if seal broken" stickers, AND a "Calibration not required sticker" Go figure...

We had a bench set up just for the benchwarmers, like those and the USM-207 Nixie based Frequency/Period counters.

The SHF generator in the same series with a waveguide output was still in use in the early 2000s in some shops, for ILS receivers in the low-GHZ range. They too stayed on 24/7.

That 585 is a good scope - we used them with some funky plug-ins in the VAST shop in the 80s - nothing modern would do the trick, some kind of aberrant pulse modulation monitor, used only in a Vietnam-era groound track radar, similar to doppler navigation radar. Get you some 6DJ8s, the 6GH8s of Tektronix...

Cheers,
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Old 09-07-2015, 10:26 AM
dieseljeep dieseljeep is offline
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Mopar's were the most practical cars to work out of. I did 6 years of TV repair out of the trunk of my 64 Valiant coupe.
The station wagons were great for homeowners as they could haul 4X8's of drywall, plywood, paneling etc. Even the intermediates!
Try that with one of those wonderful GM wagons of the same era.
The Mopar wagons, even could haul more than the wagon-master, Ford.
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Old 09-07-2015, 12:23 PM
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Originally Posted by dieseljeep View Post
I did 6 years of TV repair out of the trunk of my 64 Valiant coupe.
Slant 6,or V-8?

Our family car was a 63 Valiant two-door with the small slant-6. Great car - 170,000 miles on original engine, only rebuilt because of an oil light that turned out to be a cracked oil pump. Bought it back from the insurance company twice, and ended up with my older brother, who swapped it for a 64 or 65 Dodge with the pushbutton tranny. Ah, Mopar excellence, easy to maintain and good on gas.
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Old 09-07-2015, 06:40 PM
dieseljeep dieseljeep is offline
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Originally Posted by Findm-Keepm View Post
Slant 6,or V-8?

Our family car was a 63 Valiant two-door with the small slant-6. Great car - 170,000 miles on original engine, only rebuilt because of an oil light that turned out to be a cracked oil pump. Bought it back from the insurance company twice, and ended up with my older brother, who swapped it for a 64 or 65 Dodge with the pushbutton tranny. Ah, Mopar excellence, easy to maintain and good on gas.
170CU slant six, three on the tree, no power anything.
I understand the smaller six, was a bit more reliable, but both were a lot more reliable than the competition.
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Old 09-07-2015, 07:09 PM
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170CU slant six, three on the tree, no power anything.
I understand the smaller six, was a bit more reliable, but both were a lot more reliable than the competition.
Yep, same engine, also three on the tree. Dad eventually pulled the 170 and swapped in a 225 that would not start - my brother had installed the 170 crank - and after swapping in the proper crank, she turned over first time, and 116 miles later, made a 660-mile trip to the 1982 Worlds Fair in Knoxville with not a single problem. My brother then got a (running, stock 302) 68 Cougar XR7 for 100 bucks and drove that, and eventually got himself that 64 Dodge with pushbutton tranny.

Dad put only one set of points in the 63 Valiant, as he built a transistor ignition for it right after doing the first tune up. He included a 3-pole switch so the standard ignition could be swapped in, if the transistor ignition ever failed. It never did. The Sept 1964 Radio Electronics magazine has a similar transistor ignition - dad's was so simple, I can still draw the schematic, 3 transistors (2N277s), equalizing resistors, and some isolation diodes - the rest is heat sink and wire. Fun stuff.

Cheers,
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Old 09-08-2015, 07:58 PM
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Nice scope ! I got a Hickock that looks almost identical - same number of knobs !
And the A delayed by b cool combo lock dial and the big fan & filter on the back....
Keeps the bench area warm in winters....

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Old 09-08-2015, 08:07 PM
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The big Plymouth is a great car to get stuff in. Nice deep trunk, although nothing can top a Ford when it comes to having a deep trunk since they mounted the fuel tank behind the rear seat.

I tinkered around briefly with the scope. It powers up OK, but can't get a trace to appear. The cooling fan doesn't go because the weight of the motor on the rubber motor mounts caused them to stretch a bit which results in a conflict between the fan blade and the fan housing. Not sure what's going on electronically why it doesn't want to show a trace. Doesn't look like anyone messed with it. It's got 1967 date codes on basically all of the parts. I'll have to spend some time and study it.

The HP 608D seems like it should work. Again, only briefly tried it. Very smart design on that unit. You unscrew the thumb screws on the back and the whole unit slides out of the cabinet like a file cabinet drawer as it has little metal rollers on the chassis that run on a track inside the housing. 1959 date codes on the HP unit.

Some twit at the estate sale tried moving it by the old leather handles and split one of them. Its a fresh crack, you can tell.

I currently have a Tektronix 535 scope from 1962 that came from the Navy. That's a great unit and I've had it for years. The 585 seems to be one of the longest production tube scopes. I read they were produced from 1959 thru '69. I think '69 or '70 was the very last year for the big boat anchor tek scopes.
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Last edited by drh4683; 09-08-2015 at 08:12 PM.
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Old 09-09-2015, 09:29 AM
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Originally Posted by drh4683 View Post



Some twit at the estate sale tried moving it by the old leather handles and split one of them. Its a fresh crack, you can tell.
replacements are available -

http://www.hardwareelf.com/elf/handles.jsp

http://www.brettunsvillage.com/trunk.../schandles.htm
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Old 09-09-2015, 01:06 PM
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Hey F-K Thanks for that link, I got an old tube tester with rotted leather handle
that needs replacing ! And they have rubber feet too, someone here was looking for
them a short time back, I think for a microwave....



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Old 09-10-2015, 08:29 AM
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Thanks, Brian. I'll bookmark those for future reference. They are handy. For now, I'll keep it original with it's cracked handle. Once folded down, it's not quite noticeable.

I didn't realize the 585 is an 85 mHz scope. This model is like the highwater mark in tube era scopes.
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