RL11 cable kit?

[Roe]

Does anyone have a spare RLV12 rear bulkhead cable kit? I want to button up my BA123 pdp11/93, and I can't install the side panel with the RL02 cable sticking out of the controller.

Reasonable cash is available

Thanks!

 

[TiggerLAS]

If you can't find an actual I/O bulkhead like the ones they used on some of the later 11/23's
(with a male header on the inside, and an actual RL connector on the outside)
you can also try two other methods. . .

1.) A male-to-female ribbon cable (extension). The male goes through your I/O bulkhead,
and your old-style RL cable connects to that.
Not a pretty solution, and not RFI compliant, but by far the easiest to obtain..


2.) There is a shielded bulkhead connector (whose part number escapes me) that has male bergs
on each side. . . a ribbon goes from the controller to the berg on the inside of the I/O bulkhead,
and your old-style RL cable connects on the outside of your I/O bulkhead.




T

 

[Lou - N2MIY]

I can suggest a terrible awful option. If you have a hopeless RL01 or RL02, you could steal one of the berg to ZIF connectors from the back of it to use on your BA123. I am not usually one to give up on any piece of equipment, but I stole the two connectors off the back of an RL01 to use on my build of Reinhard's RL emulator. That RL01 has a bad upper and lower head. Of course I still have the whole drive, and if I ever come across a free RL01 upper and lower head pair, I can still restore that drive.

Another less horrible thought would be to take one of the connectors off the last drive in your drive chain, then replace the proper ZIF terminator with a homemade terminator made to plug into the 40 pin ribbon cable that want to the stolen connector.

I actually have one of those connectors that T mentions in option 2 above. They seem to usually have been used to pass signals from DLV11-J out to a rack mounted DB25 breakout panel (or at least that's where mine came from).

Lou

 

[iainmaoileoin]

bulkhead kit - what exactly are you looking for

bulkhead kit - what exactly are you looking for

If you tell me exactly what you are needing I can rummage around my boxes of bits. I have more RL02s than I
can afford to power up.

Is this the cable from the RL02 controller board to the connector that fits in a slot, from there you chain the drives?
I dont have one in front of me to check - but from last time I looks it takes an IDC ribbon cable - perhaps 50 ways?

 

[TiggerLAS]

See attached picture.

This particular example is for serial ports, but the theory is the same.

An "A" sized (narrow) bulkhead I/O panel, with a special connector on it.
You install the metal plate in your I/O panel, and it gives you a 40-pin male
on the inside of the chassis, and either a 40-pin male, OR
an RL-style connector on the outside of the chassis.

 

[iainmaoileoin]

OK, I understand a bit better.
I THINK I have a spare cable that goes from the controller card to an RL connector that goes through the bulkhead. I *DONT* have any spare metal-work.
I will send you a phone tonight or tomorrow and you can see if it is indeed the bit you are hunting.

 

[Qbus]

I used old 40 pin IDE drive cables that I salvaged from more modern systems to make the short jumper from the controller to the adapter that transitions to the RL type drive cable. For the adapter I used adapters removed from one of my junk RL drives. The junk drive provided two adapters with one being used on the Qbus system and the other on the Unibus system. The forty pin IDE cable is as common as dirt although with everything being SETA now would think at one point the old forty pin cables may become valuable, the RL drive cables and terminators show up on EBay from time to time but the forty pin to RL drive cable is not a common item. In all the time I have been playing with this stuff I have never seen one for sale.
Before I got couple spare drives and all the junk I have now I did build a twisted pair cable to go between the controller and the drive using 37 pin connectors. I cut up two old forty pin IDE cables, one for the controller and one for inside the drive and soldered them to 37 pin connectors on one end and had an six foot twisted pair cable that ran between the drive and controller. The RL drives don’t use all forty pins and all communications and control is over twisted pairs and that worked without issues so it can be done. Part of this involved removing the two adapters on the RL drive and installing two parallel 37 pin connectors on the back of the drive with one for the 37 pin communications cable and one for a 120 ohm per channel terminator and then running the new forty pin cable back thru the hole to the controller in the drive. Think I just built a little standoff for the 37 pin connector on the back of the 11/23 that I was using at the time.

 

[Roe]

If you tell me exactly what you are needing I can rummage around my boxes of bits. I have more RL02s than I
can afford to power up.

Is this the cable from the RL02 controller board to the connector that fits in a slot, from there you chain the drives?
I dont have one in front of me to check - but from last time I looks it takes an IDC ribbon cable - perhaps 50 ways?

Yes, thats the piece, but no worries - I have one RL02 drive for parts that I can cannibalize. Thanks!