[Collins] Art Collins and Collins Radio

[Dr. Gerald N. Johnson]

On 7/7/2014 10:42 AM, Carl wrote:
>
>
>> Some of the field service engineers at Collins delighted at taking
>> design engineers to the field to work on their designs and expected
>> the designers to return home bloodied, burnt, or shocked.
>
>
> Sanders Associates was great for doing that. After a few years in the
> field I caused the engineers so much grief they brought me into the
> plant to join the national/international "firefighting" team. Lots of
> travel which I enjoyed and chances to learn a couple of new languages.

If you caused the engineers grief, they deserved more than a gente hint 
that their designs were hard to maintain. They needed kicks to tender 
parts to catch their attention and a good way to apply those kicks was 
to take them to the field and make them do the work. Applies in spades 
to modern vehicular design.
>
>>
>> I learned a lot about design for repair by fixing TV sets and radios
>> for about 6 years before my BSEE.
>
> I spent 30 years at various tech and engineering levels before actually
> taking several years off to actually sit down and earn some paper.
> Luckily I had several earlier credits applied which meant less time on
> campus and more time to make money with Radiokit and my amplifier
> repair/6M conversion business. It also allowed time to spend on the
> sunrise and sunset grayline for more 160/80/40 DXCC chasing. With
> summers off it didnt interfere with 6M DX either.

I did a little of that but progressing to the paper rapidly, I had Am 
Extra, First Phone, 2nd Telegraphy, and ships radar endorsement at age 
17. Both of us went to school with lots of curiosity way beyond the 
typical engineering student so we grabbed a lot more knowledge from the 
schooling than those students. I asked questions the instructors 
couldn't answer. One day I asked a grad instructor after he'd covered PI 
networks as low pass filters, how about impedance matching and he said 
it couldn't be done. I said ham transmitters have been doing it for 
decades and that was the end of that discussion.
>
>>
>> Working for myself was often a lot more fun that having to work with
>> management though a few consulting jobs were cut short by management
>> in the companies that hired me for special projects.
>
>
> In a few companies management was so incompetent that they soon folded.
>
>
> I didn't make as much
>> money as I could have working full time for some company, but I didn't
>> have to throttle any managers either.
>
>
> After I retired I did some prototyping, evaluations, wrote test
> procedures, etc for former companies. Mostly microwave and up as Id
> purchased or was given a fair amount of surplus test equipmen, wire
> bonder, B&L microscope, and more.

Its hard to do state of the art microwave (or LF) work these days 
without a wire bonder and the circuit board capabilities for packaged 
parts not significantly larger than bare chips. Hand soldering is difficult.
>
>>
>> In mm wave do you have an 1N53 or equivalent left over? I know a
>> couple millimeter types looking for those and I'm trying to get
>> signals and reception on 24, 47, and 78 GHz this summer. 24 I might
>> make, the others are still rather wild dreams.
>
> I disposed all, except what I wanted to use, of that mm wave stuff to
> other hams in the US, UK, Canada, Australia and more. A lot of it came
> from a MACOM test equipment repair/cal/storage facility a few miles from
> here that was closed during their cutbacks in the 90's.
> My last job was on the F-35 program in the 300 GHz area. Its too bad the
> rest of that airplane was such a POS and it was finally grounded last week.
>
There are some nice Macom diodes these days but they are about as big as 
a chad from an IBM card and sold in minimum lots of 100 for $2.17 each. 
I haven't yet developed the desterity under the microscope to 
contemplate placing them on a circuit board and I'm not willing to etch 
my own boards anymore.
>
> I've been sutdying a book on diode
>> multipliers from the late 90s. Spent some time in the library last
>> week searching for more recent information but didn't find a whole
>> lot. Came home with 190 MB of articles on weather radar and
>> multipliers in my thumb drive. That will take a few weeks to absorb or
>> find which ones are of no value.
>>
>
> Its amazing when you discover that mm wave and higher was actually
> explored by the "ancients" and those same principles are still in use.
> OTOH they didnt have Microwave Office and other highly advanced/secret
> design software at their desk (-;

Yes, this book has hundreds of references and searching the topic in the 
ISU library turned up only 8 or 9 more recent articles. Next time I go 
I'll have the references lists with me so I can look for articles 
referring to those. Way too much of this book is based on making diodes 
rather than using packaged diodes which makes a lot of it impractical in 
the hamshack. I've used enough vacuum apparatus that I probably could 
work up a vacuum system with vapor deposition and impurity diffusion to 
make parts but I don't want to do that. The army lab group I was 
assigned to was making silicon wafer vidicon targets, but I was mostly 
involved in testing, mot fabricating though I had my own vacuum system 
for a vidicon with replaceable targets and guns.

Modeling and design software is only as good as the equivalent circuit 
of the available parts. Sometimes those are too simplified to prove out.
>
>
>> After leaving Collins where I was a Jr engineer I've not had an
>> official title unless Pvt, PFC, CPL, and Spec 4 count. Titles don't
>> mean much in a one man company where I did the laundry, the floor
>> cleaning, answered the phone, typed the reports, did the research and
>> the field trips, did the testimony and the prototype assemblies,
>> sometimes the limited production runs. I did hire help a couple times
>> but I hadn't learned to delegate and my productivity fell because I
>> was mother henning the help way too much.
>>
>
> I spent a total of 28 years in the USN, mostly USNR, and retiring in
> 1987 which was a major factor to affording to take years off and attend
> university.The experience in training and leadership positions over the
> years gave me a different outlook than most in the civilian zoo.

My military experinece was not in command, but as indentured slave even 
though I had advanced degrees already. I did half an MBA while on active 
duty, the army paid 3/4 the tuition but the first seargent had me on KP 
and guard duty more often so I could get to classes. I was the only 
enlisted man in the courses taught at the Pentagon and Main Navy. I 
never went to class in uniform, arriving at the Pentagon at 5:30 PM I'd 
have been saluting constantly from parking lot to class room which makes 
it hard to carry books and open doors. I don't think I even admitted 
being in the army in those classes. Most were Lt Colonels and higher 
ranks that had a whole lot different attitude than 2nd Lts brown nosing 
for promotion. I still don't believe everything taught in those classes.
>
> Carl
> KM1H
>
73, Jerry, K0CQ, Technical Adviser to the Collins Radio Association.