[Test-Equipment] Proper service manual for Tek 475A SN B017608

[Pete Lancashire]

As to your S/N, its a pretty early one.

Tek's has a S/N "standard". Sadly it was sometimes not followed

The S/N's prefix character in most cases was where it was made

B for Beaverton Oregon (and Vancouver Washington)
R for Redmond Washinging (TDR's for example)

and so on.

Then the number were broken up in to two fields

The first 2 digits were the major revision level and the remaining 4 digits
where a somewhat consecutive serial number starting at 100.

For example the first 475's S/N would have been B010100. In some cases
B010101.

Sometimes the S/N would make a big jump, for example the S/N would be
rounded up, B241234 to B250000.

If a design went for say 465, to 465A then 465B, the S/N would be reset to
B010100.

At time on the surplus market you will find pre-production instruments

Enn - Engineering Prototype, basically anything can change
Ann - Base design frozen
Bnn - Almost production. May B'phase instruments were upgraded to
production and used in house
If there were a lot of changes, you could even see BB01, BB02 ...

There was a Cnn - but I;ve never seen any.

-pete




On Fri, Apr 4, 2014 at 4:05 PM, Pete Lancashire <pete at petelancashire.com>wrote:

> Sadly Tek did not do a good job with matching manuals to major changes.
>
> Internally one could find out when change inserts were published, or if
> you a big company you could subscribe to either get paper or microfiche.
>
> I'd check with Dave at Artek Manuals, another is to contact Vintage Tek,
> www.vintagetek.org They are a non profit and the last I heard wroking on
> compiling some sort of list.
>
> -pete Ex Tekkie
>
>
> On Fri, Apr 4, 2014 at 2:42 PM, Doug Hensley <w5jv at hotmail.com> wrote:
>
>> Does anyone know how to match a Tek serial number to the Tek Manual
>> productnumber?  I've been looking for a Tek 475A Service manual for my unit
>> which hasserial number B017608.
>> Those stating for B250000 on up are a no brainer, but I have not seen a
>> list qualifyingearlier serial numbers to date and/or product manual number.
>> Ideas??
>> TIA,
>> Doug W5JV
>>
>>
>> >>>>>>>> ZUI ZEW <<<<<<<<<
>> See my "For Sale or Trade List" at:  <<   http://www.w5jv.com   >>
>>
>>
>>
>>
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