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Powder Blue of 50s, 60s, and 70s; does it have an official name? Or even unofficial?

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olePigeon

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I saw a couple Honeywell 101 tape recorder at the recycler the other day in that distinctive powder blue color. I noticed that a lot of vintage mainframes, minis, computers, and peripherals were in that powder blue color (including cubicle walls and soldering irons.) Is there some sort of history behind that color? Was it started by IBM? Or is my bitty brain just noticing it now because I'm looking for it?
 
The picture I posted is of an early Hurco machining centre. "Hurco blue" was the color Hurco painted their machines for a long time. I don't know why.
 
Ah, so it does have a name. Commodore PETs were that color, too. So were a ton of those computers in that Russian mouse thread. I remember distinctly when I was a kid my dad showing me his work's mainframe when he worked at Rolm (remember those guys? hah!) All I remember about it was that light blue colored painted metal boxes with light blue colored "carpet" on it (some sort of ventilation, I guess) in a heavily air conditioned room. Even the cubicles were that color.

Hah, just found this picture after writing the above paragraph. That's a lot of blue. Something just like this:

mainframe-jobs.jpg
 
All that baby blue makes that picture look like a shot from the nerdiest baby shower in history. "Congratulations, Ma'am, it's an engineer!"
 
Commodore PETs are not blue. The labels on the early ones are, but that is a darker blue.

I sure wouldn't call anything prior to about 1975 "Hurco blue", in fact I would only call it that if it's on a Hurco machine.
 
I've actually been thinking a lot about distinctive colors of computers lately.

There is a darker blue and an orange that were prominent in that era, if my memory is correct.

The bluest of the blue themed pieces of computer equipment that I always think of were the standard peripherals for the Data General Eclipse.
 
I don't know about that. Every AMC I've owned has been some shade of brown. And no two alike. (mind you, two were black, which is a shade of brown, and even those two black paints were visibly different)
 
KC9UDX said:
I don't know about that. Every AMC I've owned has been some shade of brown. And no two alike. (mind you, two were black, which is a shade of brown, and even those two black paints were visibly different)
Click to expand...
Amazingly AMC's were available in other colors -- ranging from bug gut green to cherry red, but much like Noctua computer fans what was on the lot was always either brown or tan. The most bizzare yet common ugly tans being "Bengal Ivory" and "Misty Beige"

The latter of those being indentical to the paint Apple used on the metal bottom of the II/II+/IIe.

Oh, and if the blue has more saturation, it is probably something like Dupont 1685 (which was used on Jeeps)

Full index of common powder blues:
http://paintref.com/cgi-bin/colorcodedisplay.cgi?color=Powder Blue&tditzler=&rows=50
 
deathshadow said:
Amazingly AMC's were available in other colors -- ranging from bug gut green to cherry red, but much like Noctua computer fans what was on the lot was always either brown or tan. The most bizzare yet common ugly tans being "Bengal Ivory" and "Misty Beige"
Click to expand...

The sad part is, some of those non-brown colors are great paint colors. But beauty is in the eye of the beholder, and, for all I know everyone is right: there's something wrong with this beholder's eyes. I can't think of one AMC car that I think is ugly, yet everyone else says they are all the ugliest things ever made. Frankly, I don't even mind the bronze-orange-brown-tan-orange whatever it's called that my '81 is.
 
i suppose the tool and electronic engineers had blue painted benches/furniture. and so it inspired the companies to make their product compliment their environment, knowing that their environment is pretty typical. Then than became the expectation and stereotype.
if the bench companies succeeded to sell burnt orange then burnt orange would be sexier than ever..
 
KC9UDX said:
I can't think of one AMC car that I think is ugly, yet everyone else says they are all the ugliest things ever made.
Click to expand...

I'm the inverse of that when it comes to Camaros/Firebirds, especially the new one. I think they look like complete ass, yet somehow people are convinced they're cool.
 
Was IBM the original Blue computer? I would imagine most companies would color their stuff similar but probably not the same shade just to blend in with whomever was the leading technology at the time. Sorta like everyone calling their computer a bla II to capitalize on the Apple success.

The colors for an IBM repair kit on virtual page 139.
 
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Speaking of baby blue, they've nearly finished tearing down the HP Blue Box building. I'd rather they had renovated it, even it if it was just the shell of a building. :( It's always been there, sort of iconic as you drive by on highway 237. Same with the Moffet hangers. At least Google is keeping them around, even if it's for their silly private jets.

Sigh.
 
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