On 2/12/2014 7:17 PM, DerbyDad03 wrote:
philo wrote:
On 02/12/2014 06:03 PM, DerbyDad03 wrote:
Stormin Mormon wrote:
On 2/12/2014 8:03 AM, philo wrote:

That's weird, my UPS system will power my laptop for about a
year or so.


https://scontent-a-iad.xx.fbcdn.net/...86645054_n.jpg



http://www.columbia.edu/cu/computinghistory/tubes.jpg

They keep trying to upgrade my processor.

And your UPS would run this for at least TWO years.
http://www.wpclipart.com/computer/PC...cuum_tubes.png

Who needs those wimpy arse vacuum tubes. A real man works with
these...

http://www.qsl.net/oz1dku/loran%20PA%20tubes.jpg

These are water-cooled PA tubes for Loran transmitters. Filament
current 300A at 12.7V. Plate voltage 15,000 VDC. Output power
1.5MW.

When they went bad we hollowed them out, wired them for 120AC and
made 25 lb desk lamps out of them.




I guess they didn't come up with a transistor to replace that one

They did, but it was many years after I worked on them. The timing
equipment had _just_ gone solid state when I started working on it
but the transmitters were still vacuum tube.

In fact, when my class finished basic ET school, the guys that were
going on to Loran school were split into 2 groups: those that were
going to stations with vacuum tube timing equipment and those that
were going to stations that had been upgraded. I got lucky. The techs
at LorSta Sylt Germany were upgrading the equipment while I was going
to school in NYC to learn how to work on it. By the time I got to
Sylt the old equipment was in the hallway and the new equipment had
just gone on air.

As it turned out, I enjoyed working on the old transmitters more than
the new timing equipment so I spent most of my time in the
transmitter building, a quarter mile from the main station. At all
Loran stations the transmitter building, which was at the base of the
tower, was always placed as far from the main station as the tower
was high. Even though the towers were guyed to spin straight down if
they failed, they still placed them where they couldn't reach main
station if they ever fell over sideways.

The thing about the old transmitters is that they constantly needed
preventative maintenance and when they broke you actually had to
troubleshoot them instead of just swapping out circuit boards. There
was always something to do and you got to play with high voltage and
real tools. Besides, the station officers were mostly afraid of the
high voltage so they left us alone when we were out there.

My favorite troubleshooting time was when we had to find the cause of
an arc inside the transmitter. The transmitters had metal plates
covering various sections and sometimes they would arc internally
where we couldn't see what was going on.

We would remove the metal plates, turn off the lights in the
transmitter building, and run the power supply up to the normal 15KV
operating voltage. If it didn't arc soon enough for our liking, we'd
run it up to 20KV, wait a little while then run it up to 25KV. At
that voltage, anything that was going to arc usually did - and with
authority. Even though you knew it was coming, it still scared the
crap out of you.

You could attach a circular florescent lamp to a ball cap like it was a
propeller beanie and have enough light to work by when you were near the
transmitter. ^_^

TDD