[Collins] Unbelievable

[Gerald]

On Wed, 2005-11-30 at 10:27 -0800, C E wrote:
> Jerry:
> Are you sure about that???? From what I gather, he
> commented positively about the tactile "feedback"
> mechanism the old IBM Selectrics utilized that
> "rewarded" a typist with a form of feedback-response
> for touching a key to produce a key strike. 

Yes, the keyboard pulled the key the rest of the way down once touched.
Then the Selectric pounded the page. 
> 
> Cal. P.S. I wonder if that product advertised on EBay
> comes in S-line gray or St. James Grey? 
> 
There was stronger feed back, heard all over every bull pen. The thwack
of the type bar or ball hitting the page. But engineers weren't allowed
to type (though I took my own for doing wire to-from lists and other
things that were much improved from being typed compared to being
scribbled) or to use a desk calculator unless we could shove the
department accountant from his desk calculator. Art found me using an
abacus to compute small differences of large numbers. I was computing
coil Q's measured by resonance bandwidth with coils several times larger
than the available Q-meters with Q larger than those instruments could
read. First he asked why I didn't make the computation with a slide
rule? I handed him my Dietzgen log-log-duplex Vector rule and asked him
to show me how to get those small differences. He declined but called
for computer programmers. That only made the task slower because to know
where to look next, I still had to compute Q but had to enter the data
into a data input sheet as well as my lab notes.

That contact and those actions lead me to believe Art thought he
shouldn't use a typewriter. I don't know if he even dialed his own phone
calls. When he spent time in the transmitter lab playing with measuring
vacuum variable capacitors with his 40' long HF slotted line, he kept a
VP for insuring the coffee was hot and a graduate ME as his lab tech. I
didn't get close to see if he took notes or had them taken.

One of the characteristics of the IBM Selectric (there IS one on my desk
but its buried under a foot of stuff and didn't work the last time I
applied power. It came from Collins Surplus in Cedar Rapids) is that it
hums impatiently waiting for the next key stroke (no matter how fast the
typist) then responds with a rapid clatter of mechanism each key stroke.
The previous type bar machines probably did the same but the duration of
the typing operation was longer and possibly less harsh. I found being
in the same room with someone else running a Selectric was a bit
annoying.

Few computer keyboards (save those from Northgate) are as satisfying to
use as the Selectric keyboard.

That ebay product package looked like it used the diagnostic panel
background color (from the 821A-1) also used for control panels in that
radio, an off white.

-- 
73, Jerry, K0CQ, Technical Advisor to the CRA
All content copyright Dr. Gerald N. Johnson, electrical engineer