[Elecraft] OT: High school drafting class, ~1975

[Dave Fugleberg]

Thanks for the memories Wayne! My High School drafting class was just a
couple of years after yours, and I remember it fondly. Everything from
drafting pencils (with lead of various sizes/hardness) to technical ink
pens on vellum.  I enjoyed it so much that I persuaded the instructor to
let me check out one of the old drafting machines for the summer break (I
think it was a Universal).

Just a few years later, in my first real job as an electronics technician,
I was introduced to electronic schematic capture tools, specifically the
Daisy Systems Logician and some Mentor Graphics systems. I spent hundreds
of hours drawing and updating schematics for the EEs at that company. Those
machines were over $100 grand each at the time, with 10MB hard drives.
Then the wirelists went to automatic wirewrap machines, or later, to
specialized board routing/layout machines that were even more expensive.

Now we have free or cheap schematic capture software on PCs thousands of
times more powerful for use as hobbyists.  Amazing. Yes, a lot has changed
in less than 50 years.

On Sat, Apr 24, 2021 at 12:10 AM Wayne Burdick <n6kr at elecraft.com> wrote:

> OK, I've really dated myself now.
>
> Anyone remember "drafting"? A favorite class in high school: blueprints,
> mechanical drawings, schematics, straight edges, hand lettering,
> projections and elevations. We invented things to draw that weren't real,
> but looked like they should be. Did all the math by hand -- on a slide
> rule, if necessary. Day-dreamed about what we might one day build.
>
> 45 years later, we're using tools we couldn't have imagined. Modeling
> circuits and objects with millions of parameters and vectors, realizing
> them in virtual space, manipulating them in real time. Testing finished
> products before they're even assembled.
>
> The transformation is mind boggling. Yet the best part now, as it was
> then, is the occasional burst of creative energy that propels an idea
> forward. The feeling of pieces falling into place. Or forcing them into
> place out of sheer necessity.
>
> Most of the time, we think of our new tools and techniques as advances in
> the state of the art. Things we can't live without. But those same defining
> moments happened just as often in simpler times.
>
> Case in point -- my first real project, a rendition of W7ZOI's
> Micro-mountaineer. Carefully documenting it took several sheets of
> 4-squares-per-inch grid paper, which may still be in my cellar, beneath a
> lifetime of such drawings. With the schematic, I took a lot of pride in
> making the circuits look well-organized, as if that would somehow improve
> my odds. On the PC board, I drew large traces and pads with the etch-resist
> pen, as if that would somehow appease the electrons.
>
> I etched the PCB, soldered two dozen parts, and connected a 12 V lantern
> battery. Thanks to my paranoia about what would happen if I did it wrong,
> I'd taken my time and done it right.
>
> I was rewarded with a hiss of band noise and a few CW signals on 40 meters.
>
> Here's to those moments, and to that timeless pursuit: turning
> abstractions into reality.
>
> 73,
> Wayne
> N6KR
>
> ______________________________________________________________
> Elecraft mailing list
> Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft
> Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm
> Post: mailto:Elecraft at mailman.qth.net
>
> This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net
> Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html
> Message delivered to dave.w0zf at gmail.com
>