I was a repair and calibration tech for Tektronix in the 1970s. For EVERY piece of gear that came into the shop, its first stop was the wash rack. The gear was hosed down with soap using a sprayer nozzle virtually identical to the ones you see at the self-serve car washes, in a well lighted and mostly enclosed metal "sink" that had a large lazy Susan in the middle so that the gear could readily be rotated during the procedure. It'd then be rinsed off, and then blown out with compressed air. The next stop was the dryers, which were large heating cabinets that ran about 130 or so degrees (IIRC), and they'd stay in there for at least two days. The only rule was, any gear that had transformer cans, had to be positioned so that the opening in the can faced down to avoid any chance of a large amount of water pooling up inside and not drying out completely over the two days. Consequently, none of the techs ever had to deal with the "smell of dusty tubes," it was all squeaky clean before we did anything to it, even before we powered it on for the first time. I never saw or even heard of a case of something being damaged from the wash. Made it nice to work on the old tube gear given there were a lot of them still operating that had long been in dusty and dirty shops. Tektronix had its own ceramics shop to make the strips, so they were the only ones who used them-- and they also made it a breeze to work on. The ceramics shop eventually grew into making ceramic CRTs, another thing you were not likely to see in any of the competition's equipment, and they made their own bistable storage tubes, quite an achievement at the time. Tek gear was designed to be maintained, in the 7000 series for example, every transistor is socketed as well as all the ICs. And the 7000 series "digital" readout chips were actually analog, designed by Tek to "steal" the beam away from the trace momentarily and move it into the corners to draw the readout characters. The 7000 series displays are not raster scanned, they're actually drawn, which gives them their unique look.
No, I don't believe so-- as far as I know the water was right out of the tap and not treated. I suppose there could have been a water softener, I don't recall now, but I doubt it was distilled. And it was blow-dried off before putting it into the drier, mineral deposits weren't an issue.
Absolutely-- if you drop it in a puddle, that's what I'd do. With a phone though, you might want to open it up to clean the inside, which isn't always so easy...
@@racitup4114 Not really the same as a laptop or phone has a battery inside so there is always voltage flowing around circuits. As someone who deals with liquid damage Macs, water and electronics that are powered is not good at all.
Wow, I am a old engineer and I have owned a 555. The explanation of the filament regulator was excellent. Seeing the tubes with labels to, as that meant they were matched pairs. That family of scopes had issues with the HV rectifier tubes and I still own a drawer full of 15000 volt silicon diodes to replace them. Their yours if you like.
Is this the same tektronix that is nowadays building solid-state Bowling machine electronic parts for the Brunswick and AMF machines? I'm kind of thinking not, but stranger things have happened..
Tektronix built mostly Test & Messurement equipment, but as only a tiny part of what they once were, anything is possible. For years they were the largest employer in Oregon, 24,000 people, now less than 4,000 and shrinking.
My friend had one of these, mostly working. He collected scopes and test equipment. The trace on these things are really uniquely coloured, as you can see in the video. It's quite a piece of equipment.
I worked at Hirst Research Centre in Wembley from 1968 until 1975. We had 545's and 547's, and one 555 (there were more in other labs) which I got to use quite a lot. They were all still in use when I left and very reliable.
I had the privilege to repair these beauties and all the other Tek Osciloscopes of the day between 1978 & 1999 at Tek UK. The best job in the universe and to this day keep up with my fellow colleagues who I call my extended family. A time to celebrate but sadly never to return.
Yeah, it was a swell place to work. It was my first good job and I didn't know how good I had it until I went to work for a computer company whose techs had to scrounge for equipment-- was really spoiled by working at a tech bench that had everything you could possibly want, all the right tools for the job. Eventually I moved into software, and I guess it was a good thing as all the hardware engineers I knew back then were getting laid off once the IBM PC and its clones arrived, and we were no longer making computer systems of our own designs and the company I worked at after Tek. Software was the right place to be at that point, and I enjoyed doing it (still do to this day). But I do value my experience at Tek. I also tell the story of one point in the 1970s where Tek did a salary survey and figured out we were underpaid-- I remember many of us getting a SIZEABLE increase all at once to bring things up to what was competitive. I've never seen or heard of that being done anywhere else. And the profit share program was nice as well. Yep, they're one of a kind.
@@jacknedry3925 I take it you haven't yet worked for Google in Mountain View, California, or Johns-Mansfield in Denver. Both are awesome places to work (and I was a janitor). I since pulled a temp stint at Bourns in Riverside, California doing janitorial. There was this stray cat living in the parking lot. We called him "trimpot".
One way to think about the cost of a complete upper level Tektronix scope system, amplifiers, cart, probes, and mainframe, is that it would cost about the same as a nice suburban home. This held true until about the late 70s ~ early 80s when real estate values went nuts-high. My teen and young adult years were in the back yard of Tek starting in the late 60s. I got to see the scopes being made and got to meet many of the fine engineers that created this stuff.. In that period, the last of the tube units were still being made, and the new generation solid state product was coming to market, the 5000/7000 series mainframes, and the TM500 auxiliary instruments. It was amazing what they created, and now over 50 years later, I still use a lab full of analog instrumentation by Tek in the pursuit of making a living. I have dozens of major Tek instruments still working and keeping cal, at from 35 to 50 years old. Magnificent technical achievement was the norm at Tek until the founders died. That dual beam is a gem... I use my later period dual beam all the time, a 400MHz R7844, accompanied by a 7834 400MHz storage scope, a7704 with P7001 digitizer, and a 2247A portable. We also use TM500 scopes for general waveform monitoring. My 7704/P7001 was the personal property of its inventor, the father of digital oscilloscope processing, Hiro Moriyasu.
You are probably one of the few who would be capable of discussing gear of this caliber i learn so much from your Im retired ,just think of all the ones that get inspired by you
Mr. Harkins, rare is the day I don't watch at least an hour of Mr. Carlson's lab. He's the "Mr. Rogers" of us grown up nerds. "Inspired" doesn't begin to describe what his show does for me. It took me decades of part-time messing around to eventually get my ASE, General Ham License, private pilot's license, Captain's License, and now, at 53, I'm messing around with my other passion...electronicalisticisms. Best ten bucks a month i've ever spent being a Patron of this young man.
If I ever had some fantastic vintage gear, Mr. Carlson is the only man who I know would have a loving home for it! I felt that now the oscilloscope is finally come home! :-)
Actually while I am bored with most common circuit descriptions and usually turn it off. That circuit is mind blowing. Simple and effective! Took me deeper than I ever thought I wanted to go into the old tektronics scope.
I was a technician/instructor for RCA Service Co from 1954 to 1987. Such nostalgia for sure. In the 70's, I researched Tektronix oscilloscopes, and I was blown away at their circuitry. So I agree with what you and the author of this DIY video are saying. I doubt there are many companies as dedicated as Tektronix. It's no wonder that their scopes are found in most technical manufacturers, all over the world. Did Tektronix invent the "Trigger" Scope? I do not know, but it would not surprise me if they did.
Well that was a blast of nostalgia! My little company bought a used Tek 555 in 1968, and we were damn smug about having such a nice oscilloscope. As we could, we acquired several different plug-ins. I recall that Polaroid made an adapter that clamped onto that round bezel, allowing you to make hard copies of the waveforms using (IIRC) Polaroid 5" x 7" cut film. You could set the oscilloscope to Single-shot, open the camera shutter, trigger the scope, close the shutter and pull the film through the squeegee rollers. A minute later, you could see if you caught the event, or needed to try again. Tube test gear may still have its charms, but nobody who ever recorded a waveform this way ever wanted to do it again after experiencing the delights of dumping digital memory to a printer.
@@gyrgrls Please notify me when you perfect your time machine; 1960's me has a list of desired toys. (We better use precious metals so as to not disrupt the timeline.)
I had the privilege of testing Polaroid Type 410 (ISO 10,000) instant film when I was in 7000-series engineering. It was quite impressive although by that time not as necessary because the nuclear labs were buying our new 7104 1GHz mainframe on whose screen one could easily view a single-shot event at the maximum time-base speed, 200ps/div. Ordinary Polaroid was fast enough to photograph those 7104 traces.
Love that version! My dad had a R556 with some really nice calibrated plugins from NASA and I remember using the hell out of it as a kid! It was as amazing as that one for sure. It also had the blue phosphor interestingly enough, but it was a little different. Keep up the amazing quality content!
Great video. Nice to see someone that knows what saturable reactors are. I have two of those scopes. One to use and one for parts. My user is a little sick right now though. It has a wobbly power supply that I cant run down. Lukilly, I have a full set of manuals printed off from microfisch. No kidding about the room heater though.
Simply an amazing piece, a true master piece !!! And what a gift Paul, it is in the best hands it could be in!!! Plase keep it as safe as you can and try to get some spare tubes just in case to keep this wonder running for 100 more years ...and thank you so much to share this beauty with us
In 1963 my folks bought their first house for $2400. 3 bedroom 1 1/2 story on corner lot in a nice neighborhood. Things haven't changed much as far as cost of high end TE goes. You can buy a state of the art oscope or a single family home for about the same price.
Love old Tek equipment (they're works of art and exquisite craftsmanship) and have a ton of it. 4 mainframe scopes with 4 plug in's, 2 - 3 plug in, 465's, 647's, TM-500 stuff and over 30 plug in's for the mainframe scopes such as 7704, 7104 and 2, -7854 DSO's and a 676 curve tracer. HP stuff too, meters, VTVM's, frequency and function generators, RF generators (3) up to 13GHz, a 1959 130B, X,Y scope in working condition. RCA senior Voltohmest, analog VTVM, with a whopping 7" mirror display (I love this meter for checking scratchy pots), Systron Donner frequency counter (Nixie tube) and a Fairchild 7000 , Nixie tube, 5 1/5 digit DMM, Fluke DMM's, Hp power supplies, 6200B, etc X3. Govt liquidators was selling this stuff for a song, several years back. The 7104 mainframe cost the govt $30,000, I bought it for $50 and the calibration sticker was still good! I also bought metrology equipment, Voltage standards, oscilloscope calibration gear (much of it in wood cabinets that people passed up because they thought it was old - It very common for metrology equipment to be in a wooden case), tube tester, capacitor analyzer and conditioner. Theres lots more, Genrad decade resistor, decade capacitor boxes and inductor boxes. Hp attenuator, Weller, SMT workstation, Temperature controlled soldering iron, 5 Hexacon soldering irons from 40 to 200W. My go to scopes are the 465B with the penthouse and I have 2 spares for parts. I've run my own electronic musical equipment repair business since 1965. Specializing in vintage tube equipment restoration (but I work on digital stuff as well). On my main bench (I have 2 - one for amplifiers and the other for small pedals, tape decks. Bausch and Lomb stereo zoom microscope, I probably forgot half of the gear I have acquired since 1963. I really enjoy your site!
I’d like to see the schematics for this. The engineering on this is incredible. Back when engineers and designers had no computers for the most part either.
I have an old Tektronics scope built it 1966. Looks exactly like this / same style. . . ... Been in back of the garage for 15 years untouched. Turned it on, worked perfectly, every function. It's nice to find someone else who appreciates these thingss.
As a calibration tech worked on many 500 series o-scopes. In the early 80's when they were scrapped employees could purchase them for about 25 dollars. After awhile the lawyers said it was a legal liability and I rolled dozens off the loading dock into dumpsters.
I would also liken this oscilloscope to my two vintage Moog Modular Synthesizers. I still remember taking one to a friend who was experienced with electronics for his help (the power supply had a loose solder joint.) He admired the reverse-anodized aluminum panels (no silk-screening to wear off here!), the Allen-Bradley pots, the Switchcraft enclosed jacks, the precise pin-point wiring and soldering. He then turned to me and said, "this was built back when they knew how to make things right." With that assessment, he paid Bob Moog the highest praise he could offer.
And if they charged for that in today's dollars would you buy it? Thing is the reason they built it like that is that it was all they knew. I'm certain the people from that era would much rather have built it like today's because it works so much better and is so much cheaper to make. Remember that the next time fire up that all-plastic four pound DSO to do some finite element analysis or some such I don't know.
Not only were things built to last but they could be repaired by the owner or augmented or repurposed. Everything now is cheap and disposable and when it breaks you can't even get it open to see what's wrong. I pine for the analog days.
Its 1959.......Martin's thinkin "Tektronix 555 scope or the dual quad 283 Corvette?" Sadly he chose the vette and wrapped it around a tree. Shoulda got the scope. RIP Martin.
I was never aware of the 555. Very amazing! I was only aware of the 535/545/547 series...Wonderful example of some tremendous engineering from a bygone era.
We had one in the corner of the lab where I started working in the late 1970s. The "old timers" who used to use them said the after turning on the lights in the morning, you would turn on the 555. The go make coffee, drink a cup, chat with you buddies, and take your second cup back to the bench, because by then your 'scope had thermally stabilized. You could warm your sandwich up at lunch time be just placing it on the top ! A true engineering marvel !!
Yes. Although the tubes would age gracefully, the scopes required only occasional calibration. The regulated filament supply was to help avoid drift, greatly reducing the frequency of calibrations. Now we have solid-state more and more units, with the input stages often housed in assemblies similar to crystal ovens.
When I was going to high school in the early 70's we had two of these donated to our school by the Air Force as surplus. At the time we were using Heatkit OL1 units that a previous class from the 1960's put together and were not very good even by the standars of the day. The donated Tektroinx still had the DOD asset tags on them and the first time we used them were amazed on how well they worked. I still remember my teacher clling them the "Cadillac" of electronic equipment.
Wow what an amazing piece of art. The power regulator I believe solves a sixty year old mystery for me. When I was a student I worked in a lab which analysed rocks using a Watson victor arc spectroscope. It was huge all vacuum tubes and always powered on. It was supplied through a voltage regulator which was a heavy steel box with a cover full of holes. Inside I could see a very bright vacuum tube among a few other normal ones. No one knew how it worked It seems it was a saturating controller or possibly a motor driven variac using a 2AS-15. As the voltage sensor.
I got a good idea for you on a video for you. I think you might really enjoy. When I was in the signal core in the army my most was a 31m20, ( radio relay & carrier operator, and the radio I worked on was an (ANTRAC 24)! Stands about 4 feet high, big radio. It consisted of 3 pieces of equipment. R417 Receiver T303 Transmitter PP 685 Power supply If you can get your hands on one, I think you would love! It had 3 bands, VHF, UHF,1.2 GIG, MODULES, for both the R417, & the T303. 685 volt power supply, (835) rectifiers, & in the VHF modules used my favorite (4x150A & 4x150G) tube's! You would love this equipment! Like Tentronix's a lot! A real work for of art! Used to hook up a TCC 7 , 12 channel care to it! I had a.ball working with this equipment, 1968, Frankfurt Germany, 143 Sig Battalion. We supported the 3rd Armor devision. I worked Garrison VHF and and kept 3 shot's in to there target practice areas. Grafenver, Hartsville, & Wildflicken.The carriers at each end of the shot, tied into the switch boards. Had 2 relays per shot. They put the equipment in a module on a duce and a half, 3 men, a tent, and two 5 kw generators, that they would alternate,. 3 radios, two working & one for a backup. Loved it! I also had the repair mos, I also was 31 L 20. Love your showed, especially your attention to details. Keep up the good work! I got a Kenwood 751A, 2 M, all mode radio I need going over. You interested? I'd pay of course. Love that radio, especially for moon bounce! God bless! Keith Schneider N9HLS 825 32nd Ave. &97 Longview WA. 98632 360-747-3421 n9hls1@gmail.com 🙏✌️🖖🤞👍
I grew up in the 1950's very near the Tek plant on Barnes road in SW Portland, which was the old Pioneer to North Plains to Portland back in the 1840's . My parents would point out the plant when we went to the local family cemetery every memorial day or when visiting friends on the weekends. To think that scope was built in that building and would up in eastern Canada.... Small world!!
I was comment employed by Western Electric AT&T, starting in 1963, retired after 36 years. I used tectonic oscilloscopes through my entire employment, it was my right hand partner. The quality was Superior, than any other oscilloscope at the time in my opinion. I used it to check out program address and answer bus, binary bits, looking for irregularities in the shape of the pulse, and electronics switching systems, number one ESS, number for ESS, that was the first All Digital electronic switching system, and number five ESS, first All Digital fiber optic electronic switching system, also tsps systems, stands for Traffic Service position systems. When there was a problem and I suspected after diagnosing the problem I would pull out the tectonic oscilloscope, set up my sink pulse where I weren't to look at a binary bit, and then went from there. Would that help other technical Scopes I was able to isolate the problems 99.9% of the time. Today is October 20th 2022.
I was a repair and calibration tech for Goodrich for 30 years. The engineering department many Tektronix scopes. They took all the tube stuff out of service and put it all in storage. The electronic engineer in charge was near retirement. He hated the idea of trashing all tube stuff. Because he used it when it was new. The lab was moved to a new building about a hour drive away. The new lab was a shielded room. We did some vary sensitive electric calibration in there. The old lab storage room had to go. They gave me everything I wanted. :-) I was like a kid in a candy store. I went there on weekends to calibrate everything I took home. The boss trusted me to take a $35,000 multifunction calibrater to the old lab. :-) Among everything were three 545A and a 555. I calibrated them to the Tek manuals. I found a Tekronix main frame standardizer. We used it calibrate the mainframes before calibrating the plug-ins. That was needed for using many different plug-ins in many scopes. Some antique radio collector friends a I started the Buckeye Antique Radio Club in 1971. We have about 50 members. I live on a closed chicken farm near Akron Ohio. I built a 16 by 16 foot two floor building for my radio collection of 250 radios and one scope. Everything in here is older than 1925 except the 555. I converted my chicken coop into a four car garage for my antique cars and motorcycles. A 1903 one cylinder Oldsmobile. It looks like a buggy that uses a horse. A 1930 Model A Ford rumble seat coupe. A 1951 M-38 Military Jeep. A 1949 Simplex motorcycle and a 1950 Whizzer. He is right about the 555 scope. It make a good 2500 watt heater. :-)
Fantastic machine !!! the state of the art .. what else .....never never again that it's a pity !!! i'm 60 y old and i remember the Kudelski Nagra electronique and Stelavox and Studer / Revox And Ampex !!! oh my god !!! !!! some time i made a dream : please come back one minute just for my joy .... But nothing today just SMD composents just a bullshit of money !!! where is my passion where is my soul ???? i'm rest with my remembers Thanks a lot Mister for this video Thanks for the share !!! Eric from France God bless you and your family
For a very long time Tektronix dominated the test equipment market. Sadly, somewhere along the way, starting sometime in the 80s, they gave up their crown to HP/Agilent/Keysight. Tek still makes phenomenal equipment but there's something missing in their engineering and marketing approach that causes them to lose sales to Keysight. They should study Keysight's consistent success carefully, figure out what is the difference, and fix the problem. Today still I prefer Tektronix for oscilloscopes over all other brands. For spectrum analyzers I'd prefer Rohde & Schwarz.
The fans are usually gummed up because of cigarette smoke tar. Airplane gyros had the same problem...back in the day, people smoked like chimneys around these things and that's why the fans often bearings often gummed up and got 'stuck'. I build and re-build desktops, and I still see heavy smokers bring in machines that stink like hell, and the insides and the fans are literally "sticky" at the touch with the tar.
Wow! I thought that my Tektronix 502A was impressive with its 43 valves and a fan! At least its power unit is built in! You're right, it is beautifully built and mine had a little coil of spare solder inside.
Totally agree with you. Love it. You've probably heard it but the word Tektronix is synonymous with "intellectual integrity". I have always like that comparison.
To be fair, this cost as much as a house did back then. Innovation and quality driven by the demands of the cold war military-industrial complex, I can't get enough of this stuff! I own a type 549 myself! Sometimes, I like to take off the covers just to admire the construction. The Allen Organ company also made all-tube products that are known to run reliably for decades without tube failures, also easily containing a hundred or more tubes. They continued using all-tube power amplifiers after they went to transistorized tone generation circuits. I own many of them, and they are built with far higher quality than consumer grade equipment. The story goes that Jerome Markowicz, founder of Allen Organ, consulted extensively with RCA to engineer their products for maximum reliability and tube life.
I never got to work on one of these! I did service a few 545s and 535s, though at Lockheed (California). But I am willing to bet a dollar against a dog biscuit that this model could easily be blown out of the water today, with solid state technology.
Chris Cunningham, My home grown ham grounded grid amp had two 813 tubes with 100 W filaments... THOSE babies could warm up the shack for sure, back in the day! (1959) de KQ2E
Beschtlich diese Röhrenanzahl, und 4 Strahler. Schätze um die mitte 60er Jahre oder noch älter. Ich habe neben meinen Philips, und Hameg, noch ein Tektronix 343 was unter Rohde & Schwarz seinerzeit Verkauft wurde.
In the late 40's early 50's scientists at (Bell Labs I believe) worked on the problem of tubes wearing out due to low emission (If left on all the time filament failure was not a problem). They needed to have tubes that lasted hundreds of thousands of hours for computers and telephone repeaters that were under the sea. The scientists came to the conclusion that the cathodes in time got "poisoned' with silicon added during the manufacturing process, thus lowering the electron emissions. After developing new manufacturing processes that didn't use silicon, they were able to produce tubes that lasted 20 years or more in repeaters lowered to the bottom of the sea in overseas cables. The myth of tube failure was perpetuated by the television service industry because of filament failure caused by tubes that were wired in series across the AC line. The most common form of failure was thermal shock of the filament due to constantly being turned on and off (thermal cycling). I remember the tube failure and instability myth being promoted by writers in electronics magazines in the 70's to the 90s when they told people to avoid buying used test equipment that had tubes. I didn't heed this when I started out in the hobby and bought tube scopes, tube VTVM's and high voltage power supplies many of which I still have. My first scope was a tall skinny, dual trace, British made, Telequipment scope from the 60's that had only one trace which was quickly fixed with the replacement of a bad capacitor. That scope served me well until I sold it for the same money that I bought it for. I replaced it with solid state scopes which were much less forgiving and prone to catastrophic failure. One thing about tube equipment is that it's much easier to service than solid state gear. First generation solid state gear (1965-1975) is so complex, it's a nightmare to work on but repairable if you could find the problem. Once the complexity was reduced somewhat by IC's, you are plagued by the inability to get obsolete IC's or speciality IC's that were only made by that specific company hence the flourishing trade on ebay of test equipment boards. Not too many Mr. Carlsons out there that can actually figure out how a board works and design and build a better one than the original.
That's interesting about silicon shortening tube life, I never heard about that. I cant understand why silicon would be added in manufacturing tubes.Seems no place for such an element. I never had to work on the tube Tek scopes but did work on some Tek 465s,replacing switches and such. Paul Carlson is a Canadian treasure, no a global treasure. I have to agree that there's not many or even any like him today. Be well.
@@StewartMarkley Silicon was put into the Tungsten alloy to make it easier to draw through dies. It's mentioned in the Wikipedia article on Vacuum tubes under the subsection entitled "Whirlwind and special quality tubes".
Funny I still have a Tektronics 545A, same construction, tubes and ceramic strips, but the power supply is inside the main case. Like your 555, mine is still working perfectly also. It is not my main scope these days but it was sure nice in its day.
I am just watching this now and I am thinking that is a very clever regulation circuit Tek created for the filament voltage. The engineers at Tek were brilliant.
The silver solder was used to provide compatibility with the silver-clad ceramic material of the terminal strips. Common tin-lead solder would leach the clad silver and compromise the terminal strips' reliability.
At age 16 I worked for only a few days for an ex-Tektronix Engineer who opened his own electronics TV repair business. Unfortunately was still in high school and he was over 1.5 hours away and was just to difficult getting much work time in, was mostly drive time and could not afford to continue an apprenticeship with him. He was a brilliant man in his own right. And consequently choose another vocation, but always liked electronics having built kit Radio Shack Crystal Radios and other projects by age 7. Thanx for the video amazing unit indeed.
And, like he said, this is only the mainframe. No timebase or vertical amp included. These did cost a few hundred $ each as well. Some even way more, a sampling plug-in went for >10k. So a ready to use 555 was most likely between 4 and 5 grand.
I saw my first Tektronix, in the late 60'S. So, I got the schematic; and it took a long time to get it all. But I wanted to know EVERY thing; and what it did. It was one of the most exciting electronics; in my 33 yrs of working with electronics at RCA; and subbing on my own for 12 yrs. Total was 45 yrs. Wow, what you said brought tears of nostalgia. I loved that Oscilloscope. Thank you Paul. You are truly a "Cut-Above".
Former Tek engineer here (7000 series). I'm not sure when we stopped drawing the schematics by hand, it could have been just before I joined the company in 1978. The draftsmen were incredible and had excellent senses of humor. There are various cartoons scattered about the schematics from the hand-drawn era, the Wizard being one of the most common. I often wonder how many 500-series 'scopes from that era helped send Apollo to the moon and back.
We had one that was laying around unused about 15 years ago in hospital physics lab, superb condition too. I got it for free, wrestled it back in to my house and in the end just didn't have the room. Sold it on ebay for only £20, but went to an avid collector, so happy to know it was going somewhere worthwhile. (Although the guy did say his wife wsn't going to be best pleased....). Such a lovely scope..just way too big :)
I really appreciated watching this video. I have a Tek 545B and a Lavois 265, which was a virtually identical copy of the 545A, and was involved in the famous lawsuit. I used them for a lot of years and always marvelled at the flawless construction of these beasts. My favourite plug-in, was the diode checker. With it, I could check every parameter of a diode and I also used to use it to check the junctions on transisters that I sometimes used as diodes. Thanks for taking the time to explain these fantastic pieces of equipment to an whole new generation. Bob
I'm coming in here late in the game (about 6 years late) as I have finally retired and have time to spend on my interests, not to mention the extra time because of the corona virus. I first started using Tek scopes back in 1968 in my electronics class during 11th and 12th grades in Boulder Colorado which was fortunate to have a couple of scopes donated by IBM. I used a 547 and a 564 storage scope, but the 547 was the real workhorse scope. During my electronics career, I never had to work on a tube scope but did a little on some 465s. I always found their quality to be top notch and also their documentation. Much like what I experienced in the Navy riding an FBM submarine working on inertial navigation systems. Much later in my career working for the USAF in Nevada working on gear in places I cannot even mention. I just love this channel and spend lots of hours watching electronics geeks porn and reliving my past. Thank you Paul for your truly excellent videos. Between your videos and some audiophile channel videos I may never watch TV again. 😊
Just noticed on the top of my plugins there is a sticker saying "Turn off power before installing plug-in" so seems like they couldnt make their minds up haha
Hi Dave, Good vintage Tek scope tour, wish I had seen this before my 551 repair attempt. Made many mistakes along the way but I have a trace! Been at it for about a year, mainly my mistakes but got better with a 310A and 535A including a few plugins. Pity us rookie's don't see more quality "Mr Carlson" type videos on vintage Tek gear repair and restoration. Thank you and Regards.
That is one beast of an oscilloscope. The fan inside the power supply is rather interesting. I have an Telequipment D52 oscilloscope that is about 1959 vintage which is also dual beam. It only has a single timebase and is portable. Nothing like the weight of that 555. I haven't fired it up in quite a few years now. It needs the caps replaced as its voltage regulation isn't very good.
Great video! A bit of a nail-biter when you powered that beast up. Reality TV does nothing for me, but reality electronics lab... well that's a different story. I noticed the lab diagram specifications were for 117VAC, but voltage in most of the US (and Canada, I suppose) is 125. I know this sometimes cause minor problems for vintage tube audio gear. Are there any issues for the 555?
You want to over-emphasize the L in solder? Fine! I'm going ALL the way! From now on I'm ONLY going to pronounce the L and EVERY other letter will be silent. Now... where my L-ing iron? I got work to do.
Some of the Tektronix schematics would have little surprises hidden in them. Like a little race car running along one of the lines with a little cloud of dust behind it. (Just look up "Tektronix cartoons") The first time I saw one was when I was repairing a 565 at the transmitter site on Midway Island. Mercifully, Tektronix gave you a little supply of the correct type solder wrapped around a little holder inside the scope. You did NOT want to use regular solder.
Great video! Thanks. I actually had one of these expensive room heaters that doubled as an oscilloscope in 1980. I remember counting over 87 tubes in the main unit and about 18 tubes in the power supply. When I turned it on my lights would dim. It seemed like it was working just fine though. In those days I worked at Hewlett Packard (1975-2006) and a friend that also worked there gave me that scope. I also got to use HP scopes which were much smaller by then. I worked in the Electronic Maintenance Department and got to work on a lot of equipment, mostly HP test gear and personal computers and printers. It was a great experience because it was in the golden age of personal computer advancements and technology.
I repaired Tektronix scopes of that era for 20 years ((530x and 540x mostly) and I can tell you nothing is built like they are. A lot of the circuitry was developed by Tek engineers and it was absolutely brilliant. Peter Wright wrote a book on audio preamp design iin the early 2000's and he lauded the designers of these instruments for their meticulous work. I can vouch for the reliability of these instruments, we ran them 8-12 hours a day for 6 days a week and they ran for years before needing any attention.
After watching several dozens of your videos...and becoming a patron, its rare to hear you talk so glowingly about a piece of equipment. I'm glad it found it's forever home, and that you appreciate it like you do. Most people would probably turn it into a plant stand.
Nowhere in the name tektronix do I see "China'. Their name has always been associated with quality. That is one great scope. When you stop and think about it, you could have purchased 2 cars for what that scope cost back then. As for the tubes, they are more robust than what people think. I have a 1928 Atwater Kent that the tubes are as good as the day they where put in. I will enjoy more videos on this scope. Question? Did the lights dim across Canada when you powered up? LOL Brad
I agree, the stuff from earlier times sure seems to last! Atwater Kent was another great company, sure made lots of nice radios! LOL, the power meter on the side of the house has a scatter shield on it :^)
@@Roflcopter4b Individuality/smarts has nothing to do with it, it isn't about the chinese race what so ever. It has to do with a different niche of the market china fills.
@@rich1051414 There is no "Chinese race". You're outing yourself, you know. There are no races (or if you prefer, you could say there is exactly one). China is a huge country that manufactures a huge variety of things, filling just about every conceivable niche.
Very informative demo of these great Teks scopes. Took tube theory in EE class back in the 60s. Worked with a lot of Tektronix and HP scopes working for telecommunication giants over the years. he 555 is built like the Cadillacs back in the 50s. ($2600 in '59 is about $26,000 today (give or take a few).. and the new ones will be probably assembled in China. That 2AS-15 is a unique thermionic diode. and works as you explained. The failsafe device in this tube is this filament tensioning spring that makes the connection from plate to cathode if the filament opens up.
Interesting video. When I hired on as a civil service avionic tech for the air force in 1972, I remember seeing these O scopes sitting in the test equipment cage mostly collecting dust. The first scope I remember using was the 453.
This 555 has found it's rightful home. I love those porcelain wafers, I've never seen such things before. I'm with you on tube reliability Mr Carlson, a well designed tube circuit will be reliable if it's operated in the environment it was designed for. I guess this is the truth for solid state circuits too. Thanks for another fascinating video.
One of my professors at University of Pennsylvania's Moore School of Electrical Engineering referred to these things as "Stanley Steamers". We had plenty of them around the labs, and all of them were calibrated regularly, all of them still worked, and I never heard of anyone replacing a tube in one!
Quite a pedigree. You know of course, that ENIAC, the first truly programmable electronic computer (with a zillion vacuum tubes), WAS DESIGNED AND BUILT AT THE MOORE SCHOOL!
I had the pleasure of using a 555 back when I was in school. Aside from the quality of the components and construction, I belive the tube longevity was a result of the filament regulation. A lot of vacuum tube failures are a result of voltage surge on start up. I've worked with transmitting tubes that had regulated filament voltage for the same reason, but not using the saturated reactor method. Great video.
I grew up and took university classes at a tektronix campus in Oregon. The professor was an Iranian ex-Pat who worked on the engineering and finance side. He was a wonderful professor and we toured the local facilities on the weekends. He taught me more about financial modeling on the operations side than I ever wanted to know. Great guy and a great company. His wife turned me on to tube audio amps. To this day i still love tubes for audio. A good dinner and a glass of wine with your favorite bands on vinyl,CD or streaming is wonderful. Big brute force tube amps are fun. I have 2 sets of tube monos all class A at 100w and 250 watts that were made right here. In 15 years, I lost 1 input tube and a fuse. Everything else tests fine after 20+ hours of listening time a week. Never,have I lost a pre-amp tube and those pre-amps only get turned off and unplugged for trios lasting longer that 4 days. Tubes are really great. I own SS amps too, but simply preset tubes for most music.
Speaking of vacuum tubes, the old AN/FSQ-7 computers which drove the national SAGE air-defense system from the late 1950s to the early 1980s each contained something like 50,000 tubes, and they were installed in pairs for redundancy. Top that!
