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TV Typewriter replica project

falter said:
http://vintchip.com/MAINFRAME/HELP/KEYPUNCH/KEYPUNCH-1.jpg

That looks pretty close but no idea what actual model that is. But yeah.. if I have to.. I'll use whatever RE articles are available and construct a basic keyboard that externally will look like the prototype.
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It sure looks familiar...
Didn't we have this discussion in another thread? It also seems familiar...
Speaking of vague recollections, AFAIR IBM generally just used gray and blue keytops; that still looks like an MDS data entry keyboard.

Aside from the keytops, just what kind of keyboard are you looking for? I take it you're not going to build one from scratch as per the RE article?
 
The 024/026 keys were round,and they were black and grey, but the punched output was BCD (i.e. 6 bit code), not EBCDIC. The 029 keytops were rectangular, blue and grey and the output was EBCDIC. I used an RCA Spectra 70 keyboard on my TVT for awhile; the active devices were Fairchild DTL and a lot of diodes. Output was EBCDIC.

I vividly recall multipunching EBCDIC codes on an 026. Letters and numbers and simple punctuation were the same punches.

I had a short encounter with Univac keypunches around 1974 or so. They keys were round, but ivory and grey, IIRC. It was a bizarre system--you keyed in your entire card, which was punched when you hit "Feed" or some such key. No "chunka-chunka" as you typed.

I don't believe that any keypunch keyboard output was either BCD or EBCDIC. A trip to bitsavers would probably verify that. Could it be that Don's keyboard perhaps belonged to some other equipment?
 
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Chuck(G) said:
I had a short encounter with Univac keypunches around 1974 or so. They keys were round, but ivory and grey, IIRC. It was a bizarre system--you keyed in your entire card, which was punched when you hit "Feed" or some such key. No "chunka-chunka" as you typed.
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That was the big selling point for MDS and other 'electronic' keypunches, that you could correct your mistakes before punching; disconcerting though, if you were used to the electromechanical ones...

Could it be that Don's keyboard perhaps belonged to some other equipment?
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Like I said, my money's on Mohawk (MDS); those red and white keys don't look (Big) Blue at all. Wish I could find the one I'm thinking of, but all I could find was a later model with 'normal' keytops that I used in a homebrew Morse code keyboard (they've been rearranged and relabelled, but notice the red, white and blue keytops):

kbd6.JPG

(And the Feb/73 RE in the background ;-) )
 
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Well, the big image is definitely a MDS 1101/NCR 735 key-to-tape keyboard. Probably one of the most unfriendly-to-touch-typists keyboard ever made. It would have certainly been surplus gear by 1972 for Don.
 
Chuck(G) said:
Well, the big image is definitely a MDS 1101/NCR 735 key-to-tape keyboard.
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Yeah, and I think it was the earlier models of MDS keypunches and key-tape units that used the round coloured unlabelled keytops that the OP is looking for, in more or less the same colour scheme; just like typewriters almost everybody (except Teletype ;-)) went from round cylindrical keytops to the contoured ones we're used to today around the same time.
 
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This is a quote from the email Don sent me:

"The blue keyboards were rebuilds from IBM EBCDIC keypunch versions bought surplus. There were about 60 of them that rebuilt into 46 or so tvt keyboards."

So rebuild I suppose could mean repainting the keys and surrounds, etc, or reconfiguring. I've no idea -- I was born two years after the TVT article came out. The computers I knew growing up had regular keys. But I figure I can hybrid this if I can't find exactly what Don used -- with the keytops I purchased, repainting them the appropriate colors, recreating the black surrounds (figuring out the font for the key lettering might be tricky), etc. And then the guts underneath could be something created from other RE articles or something of close enough vintage to be reworked the way a hobbyist would have back in the day. Key for me in this project is to replicate, as closely as possible, the exterior appearance of the prototype TVT unit, and get the 'motherboards' as close to correct as possible. The actual internal keyboard workings are less important, though it'd sure be nice to find whatever Don used out there and make it that much more exact.

The site for the museum that hosts the original prototype has some great close up photos and dimensions, but no pictures of the interior. That'd be really handy right now.
 
I'm certainly not going to argue with Don Lancaster! ;-)

Doesn't really matter though what you use, inside or out, as long as it looks right. Have you actually got any keyboard at all yet?
 
Well, if Don says they were EBCDIC and IBM, that would mean (given the time frame) and 029 keypunch. (earlier IBM keypunches weren't EBCDIC).

So I remain puzzled.
 
No I havent gotten as far as a keyboard yet. Right now collecting ICs. I am having real difficulty on transformers and caps. I want to build it pretty much to original spec.. but I am completely lost, help abpve notwithstanding, on what I need. And where to get it. All that has to take place before I get anywhere on keyboards. But I figure if I know what to look for.. I might get lucky in between then and now and score something like what Don used. I just had no idea what I was looking for. Sounds like it's a bit mysterious. :)
 
My guess is that Don isn't familiar with the old "external BCD" 024-026 card code and thinks that it was EBCDIC. The two resemble each other for many of the keys example

The 029 card codes are EBCDIC and very close to the old BCD/BCDIC, but they keyboard doesn't look anything like what you're looking at here. Both feature a gap (in IBM gear) between I and J and R and S filled with special characters that distinguishes them from ASCII. However, various vendors translated them to their own internal representations (which is why I said "IBM").

It could be that the similarity would have mislead Don. Neither code is ASCII.

There were bound to be surpluses in 024/026 punches, because after the S/360, IBM no loner used them. A lot were sold to and refurbished by MAI and re-leased to customers with either older equipment or other vendors' gear. CDC, for example, hung onto the old BCD card code right into the 1980s. I suspect the 029s were still in use in the early 1990s.

To be sure, there were other much earlier IBM card punches, but none that would correspond to what you're describing. For example, here's an 031 duplicating card punch.
 
Chuck(G) said:
My guess is that Don isn't familiar with the old "external BCD" 024-026 card code and thinks that it was EBCDIC. The two resemble each other for many of the keys example

The 029 card codes are EBCDIC and very close to the old BCD/BCDIC, but they keyboard doesn't look anything like what you're looking at here. Both feature a gap (in IBM gear) between I and J and R and S filled with special characters that distinguishes them from ASCII. However, various vendors translated them to their own internal representations (which is why I said "IBM").

It could be that the similarity would have mislead Don. Neither code is ASCII.

There were bound to be surpluses in 024/026 punches, because after the S/360, IBM no loner used them. A lot were sold to and refurbished by MAI and re-leased to customers with either older equipment or other vendors' gear. CDC, for example, hung onto the old BCD card code right into the 1980s. I suspect the 029s were still in use in the early 1990s.

To be sure, there were other much earlier IBM card punches, but none that would correspond to what you're describing. For example, here's an 031 duplicating card punch.
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I'm thinking 40 years probably dims memories a bit. That first keyboard you posted sure seems fairly close. I'm assuming the odds of my finding one of those for sale somewhere, even Ebay, would be pretty dim, and very expensive?
 
Well, I don't know. At one time, they were very plentiful on the surplus market, as 026s and 024s were being scrapped in huge numbers. IBM realized that if they offered the 029 in BCDIC as well as EBCDIC, they could scrap the old gear altogether--which they did.

I suspect that there are some 026s still sitting in someone's barn or garage. You never know. As I mentioned, my keyboard at the time as a George Risk-manufactured one for the RCA Spectra 70. Try to find a Spectrola today... :)
 
I guess finding a keyboard by itself would be pretty tough. And even if I could, it might be *very* expensive. Look what they want for the complete unit:

http://www.ebay.com/itm/RARE-VINTAG...tage_Computers_Mainframes&hash=item23376c5d15

I'd kind of feel bad tearing one of those keyboards apart even if I did find it separate. I guess I'll just have to go for 'close enough'.

What I'd really like to get my hands on is the case design though. I really want to get close to the prototype look.
 
I suspect that there's some more detailed stuff on the 026 on bitsavers that might be sufficient. The problem with the 026 keyboard unit is that it's partially mechanical--there's a keyboard lockout solenoid for instance and a novel double-key exclusion mechanism that uses ball bearings (make a row of the things, with just enough slop in it to admit a single key lever).
 
Chuck(G) said:
...but that's not a keypunch as Don relates.
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Yes, I think we established that it's an MDS keyboard a while back; I believe in their early days MDS did make keypunches (key-to-card) that used a similar keyboard (and they did have EBCDIC versions: I still have several MDS EBCDIC encoder cards using diode matrices). The key-to-tape units used core storage BTW.

Anyway, Brad's been going on so long about these silly keytops that I dug around some more; look what I found:

MDSkbd3.JPG

As I'd said, I used to build and sell a custom QC terminal that had to work 24/7 in a very hostile environment; these keyboards use sealed magnet/reed switches made by MicroSwitch IIRC, so I picked up a bunch of them at the time. Looks like this is all that's left, alas.
 
I'm not sure if the OP is interested or if this is the right part, but i have tvt 6-5/8 band new in the bag with all the parts. Not sure what its worth but am willing to let it go.
 
MikeS said:
Yes, I think we established that it's an MDS keyboard a while back; I believe in their early days MDS did make keypunches (key-to-card) that used a similar keyboard (and they did have EBCDIC versions: I still have several MDS EBCDIC encoder cards using diode matrices). The key-to-tape units used core storage BTW.
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I'd be happier about the ID if Don, when presented by your photo, said "Yes!, That's the critter."
 
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