Collaborate Disseminate
Our friend [Fran Blanche] recently recorded what it was like to participate in an energetic round table at the recently held Vintage Computer Festival (VCF) East. Fran joined well known …read more Continue reading VCF East 2023: Retro Luminaries Take the Stage
Apollo astronauts used the DSKY (Display-Keyboard) to interact with the flight computer with a series of 2-digit codes punched into a numeric keypad. Above the keyboard was a high voltage electroluminescent (EL) display whose segments were driven by electromechanical relays; old-ass technology not seen in operation in decades.
[Fran Blanche] is working to re-create the DSKY’s display, and is raising funds to make her first prototype. She was actually able to go dismantle a real DSKY at the Smithsonian, and this drove her desire to re-create the DSKY’s unusual display.
As [Fran] points out in her video, cinematic re-creations typically …read more
Most of us who have dabbled a little in electronics will have made our own printed circuit boards at some point. We’ll have rubbed on sticky transfers, laser-printed onto acetate, covered our clothing with ferric chloride stains, and applied ourselves to the many complex and tricky processes involved. And after all that, there’s a chance we’ll have ended up with boards that were over or under-etched, and had faults. For many the arrival of affordable online small-run professional PCB production from those mostly-overseas suppliers has been a step-change to our electronic construction abilities.
[Fran Blanche] used to make her own …read more
Continue reading How Commercial Printed Circuit Boards Are Made
We’re not specialists, but the Maillardet Automaton is one of the more amazing mechanical machines that we’ve seen in a while, and [Fran Blanche] got to spend some time with it in an attempt to figure out how it’s mysterious missing pen apparatus would have worked. The resulting video, embedded below, is partially her narrative about the experiment she’s running, and part straight-up mechanical marvel.
If you need a refresher course on Maillardet’s Automaton, we’ll send you first to Wikipedia, and then off to watch this other video , which has a few great close-ups of the cams that drive …read more
Continue reading [Fran Blanche] Goes In-Depth with the Maillardet Automaton
