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May 1967 Electronics World
Table
of Contents
Wax nostalgic about and learn from the history of early electronics. See articles
from
Electronics World, published May 1959
- December 1971. All copyrights hereby acknowledged.
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Talk about ESD tolerant! Get
a load of that electron beam in the process of welding computer memory. Of course that isn't silicon
- it's magnetic core memory, the kind with tiny toroids with four extremely
small gauge wires running
through them for the read and write operations. If you want a computer memory that
will survive a nuclear EMP, this is your answer. Hook it up to your electron tube
computer and you'll be playing Pong* while all the other survivors are back to tic-tac-toe
with pencil and paper! Also news in this 1967 issue of Electronics World
magazine was final testing of the Tiros weather satellite, a million-volt pulse
generator, and a multi-satellite military satellite payload being launches by
the U.S. Air Force.
* I remember around 1975 there being a Pong machine in the bowling alley
where we would sneak over to while at the
electrical vocational school in Annapolis, Maryland.
Recent Developments in Electronics
 Electron Beam Welds Computer Memory
A sharply focused beam of electrons is being
used to perform tiny precision welds on critical electrical connections for computer
memory arrays. The beam welder is used to connect the terminals of ferrite core
planes with those immediately above and beneath them in the array. Using the electron-beam
technique, these precise welds can be done in a continuous operation rather than
singly as with conventional welding. The welds produced are uniform and look like
ball-shaped nuggets. This makes it easy to spot a poor weld during quality-control
inspections. During manufacture, the tips of a column of electrical terminals are
automatically and sequentially passed through the electron beam until the entire
side of the array has been welded. All four sides of the array are welded in this
way. The technique is now being used on the production lines at IBM's Kingston plant.
One-Man TV Studio
A new one-man television studio expressly designed for classroom
and industrial training was demonstrated recently. The console-size closed-circuit
TV unit brings multi-classroom instruction using audio-visual techniques within
the reach of every size school and plant. With this new equipment, a single instructor
can combine live instruction with video-taped lessons, films, slides, photographs,
charts, and other graphic material. The resulting program can be transmitted live
or recorded on video tape for later use. The teaching unit combines two TV cameras
and standard audio-visual aids with simplified up-front controls. The basic studio,
called WAVE (Westinghouse Audio-Visual Electronics), will sell for about $12,000.
A companion recorder for video and five different audio tracks is also available
separately. The studio is easily adapted to microwave transmission of programs to
remote areas or to CCTV.
Laboratory on Wheels
A 40-foot trailer, chock full of electronic recording equipment,
is helping nuclear physicists at the Argonne National Laboratories look deeper into
the atom. The traveling lab serves as a mobile recording center for advanced atomic
experiments conducted jointly by Argonne and the University of Chicago's Enrico
Fermi Institute for Nuclear Studies. The study is devoted to a detailed analysis
of the beta decay of the lambda particle and utilizes Argonne's 12 1/2 billion electron
volt proton accelerator, the second largest unit of its kind in the country. The
trailer, built by Brown Trailer Div., is equipped with a 5-ton air conditioner and
acoustical-tile ceiling to provide a cool, clean quiet environment for the lab.
"Canned" Weather Satellite
The engineers shown here are giving a new Tiros Operational
System (TOS) weather satellite its final check before "canning" it for shipment
to the Western Test Range in California. The satellite is to provide daily global
coverage of the earth's weather. Now in orbit, it is known as ESSA 4 and is taking
over from ESSA 2, which has been in orbit over a year. Additional Tiros weather
satellites are on the assembly line at the RCA Space Center in Princeton, N.J. for
replacement.
Eight Military Communications Satellites in a Pod.
A protective shroud
is being lowered over this group of communications satellites at Cape Kennedy prior
to launch last January. The eight were hurled into space by a single rocket to complete
the nation's first global military communications satellite network. The new Philco-Ford
satellites joined seven others that were orbited last June to form a radio network
that will permit the Pentagon to contact our military forces located in Vietnam
and elsewhere.
Optical Scanner Reads Weather Data
An improved model of a film optical sensing
device for input to computers has been completed by the National Bureau of Standards
for use with computers of the National Weather Records Center in Asheville, N. C.
The device reads data on past weather conditions from microfilms of punched cards
and selects data to be tape recorded. This permits ready comparison of past and
present weather data and should result in improvements in the weather predictions.
Million-Volt Pulse Generator
The generator shown here, when triggered,
can deliver a million-volt pulse with a risetime below 50 ns and an energy in excess
of 100 joules. The instrument was designed as a research tool for the experimental
scientist engaged in high-energy work. It also has uses in electronics, such as
for antenna and surge-protector testing. Special safety and interlock features are
incorporated to minimize danger to personnel. The generator, built by Instrument
Research Co., sells for $12,000.
Posted March 15, 2022
(updated from original post on 3/12/2012)
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