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Post by Boomzilla on Jun 5, 2022 9:26:41 GMT -5
I also went through the transition from pneumatic control boards to CPU control. I didn't have to design any of the graphics, though! The plant I worked startup for did have an oxychlorination reactor train that was intended to be computer controlled. We had a mainframe with 8K of RAM and it used 8" floppy discs. Using Fortran 4 with data card entry, we never could get it to work right, so one of our engineers designed a diode-ladder system in his garage that we used instead. Fun times!
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Post by marcl on Jun 5, 2022 9:38:00 GMT -5
I also went through the transition from pneumatic control boards to CPU control. I didn't have to design any of the graphics, though! The plant I worked startup for did have an oxychlorination reactor train that was intended to be computer controlled. We had a mainframe with 8K of RAM and it used 8" floppy discs. Using Fortran 4 with data card entry, we never could get it to work right, so one of our engineers designed a diode-ladder system in his garage that we used instead. Fun times! Well that sounds like 80's! I worked for Honeywell in the 80's and they were a little past Fortran ... and I was doing mechanical stuff then. But yeah, 8" floppies. I remember they had to add a 1MB memory board to a processor until they optimized the code. This was like '86. The board was 14" square and cost $6k. Before the 90's it was all hardware character graphics, 8 colors. In the 90's the big players mostly went UNIX XWindows, but L&N picked Windows ... 25MHz 486 PC's to start. I designed the graphics but the "sell" for the system was the customer could create their own graphics displays ... ANYTHING they wanted! Easy for a salesman to say. Once they started staging the system they realized they had no clue how to translate the steel panel to four or eight 21" Sony monitors and control them with as many keyboards and trackballs. The salesman sold them the touch screen ... wow how cool is that! Then I asked them ... "so when you give the 7th grade tour of the control room and a kid points to the screen and asks 'what's this?' ... do you want that motor to shut off?" I made a few bucks for the company doing training classes ... and put a few bucks in MY pocket moonlighting on the test floor fixing and building displays for customer systems ... I called it "Graphics for GoreTex" |
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Post by Boomzilla on Jun 5, 2022 10:01:48 GMT -5
The craziest control system I ever saw was for a company that had twenty-something PVC reactors on site. A single control system ran them all & their programmer was a genius. He had so streamlined the system that the company laid off two operators per shift since they didn't think the manpower was needed. But the programmer kept all his code and programming notes on a paper notebook in his own handwriting (that nobody else could read). There was no management of change process, and the programmer tweaked the system at least weekly. There was also no offsite backup of the programming code, and the reactors were using new recipes (that required at least some reprogramming) on a monthly basis.
I pointed out to the company that if their elderly programmer had a heart attack or died in an auto accident, they'd be out of business within the next quarter. They didn't want to hear it (shoot the messenger syndrome).
Shortly thereafter, the site got struck by lightning. The battery backup for the control system burned out in the strike, and the backup generator was so badly damaged, it wouldn't run. The control system had no "telltales" to let the operators know which reactors were active at the time of the lightning strike. Over the next few hours, no less than six reactors blew their rupture discs from spontaneous polymerizations, and had the discs not worked, the reactors would have overpressured and exploded.
Even after the wake-up call, I don't know if they've changed their procedures...
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Post by leonski on Jun 5, 2022 14:37:33 GMT -5
From my start in semiconductor processing.....mid / late 70s, making low frequency quartz oscillators from grown quartz bar stock? Everything has been computerized to one extent or another.
For many years? The ONLY processor was the Zylog 8088 or similar. It took a while for that to change. A buddy of mine worked for Zylog up near Boise and they closed shop 4 or 5 years ago......maybe more?
Every machine in those days had its OWN SYSTEM. Usually a keyboard and a 1 or 2 line display. Buttons were 'dedicated' and maybe had a shift for a 2nd function. You had to know the protocol / sequence.
Our first FURNACES for oxidation / implant drives / and more.......for such processing DID have those dinner plate floppys. And they were fragile. I have NO idea how many double drives we went thru or how many
backup discs were made which would have ultimately proven unusable.
But I DO remember having to learn 'the language' Which was written one line at a time. Some computer language was needed, but it was simple stuff like 'goto' or 'return' or 'gosub'.......nothing too complicated.
The metal machines....those which put on the aluminim layer were made by Varian. And had a little touch screen with THERE own system.....and the 8088 or whatever. It was only later that the systems changed to
windows driven. But OUR company, which was expanding at the time, went to a lot of trouble to get the OLD STUFF so it all matched.
By that time? ALL recipes for machines was in a single system and everything networked. So you'd track a lot into the system and it would automatically load the proper recipe. This was cool, since for implant
alone...there were several hundred recipes....dose and voltage, mainly spread across the 3 implant species....Boron, Phos and Arsenic.....Screwing this up resulted in scrap.
Sure, Boom? Why not run it that way. The 'cowboy' mentality ruled early semiconductor processing. One time? The plant was taken down for some plumbing work. Necessary. However? The goofs connected the
nitrogen line to DI WATER which made its way to every furnace which idled at 700c or so. EVERY tube blew up in a cloud of steam. Tooks weeks to recover.....
Back in the 70s? I worked for STATEK who made low frequency quartz oscillators. We had laser tuners. I think 4 of 'em.....ALL DIFFERENT since they were essentially hand made artifacts. Boss of the company
showed up one day (a fiery redhead German, former paratrooper) and HE tossed his KEYS into one of 'em while insisting the documentation be rationalized in some fashion. Big flash / lights out and FINI.
Those were the good old days! Company party resulted in a few hospitalizations (broken leg) and maybe even a divorce or so.......Nothing like a drunken soccor brawl......
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Post by Boomzilla on Jun 5, 2022 14:56:38 GMT -5
Yes - employees did things in those days not even imagined today. We got a VCM plant up before the end of the year, saving the company millions and millions in taxes. Management took employees AND contractors out to the fanciest steak house in town. Waiter was going around asking how the troops wanted their steaks. One guy said "walk it through a warm kitchen!" Next guy says "knock the horns off and wipe the ass!" Waiter got to me and I asked for "medium." Waiter apparently thought I was the first sane one he'd come to, and asked me "What do you guys MAKE for this company, anyway?" I replied "Money."
Back in the old days, the troops would spend night shifts in the shop welding together stainless steel air boats (materials compliments of the company). Profitability was sufficient that nobody cared.
Toward the end of that construction year, the construction company realized that they'd be finished in early December and would have to lay off their employees right before Christmas, so they endeavored to slow down the finish as much as possible. One construction crew guy stole the steam turbine speed governor for the propylene refrigeration machine, buried it somewhere on site, and said he'd hold it hostage until New Year so he wouldn't get laid off. After the State Police arrested him and threatened to leave him in jail until he disclosed the location, he gave it up. Then the construction company was fired and the in-house maintenance crew finished the construction (thus the steak house invite).
Amazing times... But I don't particularly miss them. We were lucky we managed to avoid fires and explosions on that startup. We all worked between 12 and 16 hours per day, seven days per week. I'd come home, dream about operating the plant, and wake up more tired than when I went to sleep. At least we got overtime & double overtime. The engineers were on salary and although they might have been given a bonus, the operators made more (a source of significant distress).
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Post by leonski on Jun 6, 2022 0:42:05 GMT -5
The Statek brawl was my first company party......and for someone of age 20 or 21, a REAL eye opener. Some of these people were SUPPOSED to be adults.
Eurotrash at its best.
My SECOND company party, this time a pizza place was rented out. People would come in off the street and turn / walk OUT when they saw the behavior......
People under tables....the WORKS.
3 arrests were made here......One for pissin' on a bush outside. And one for stupid and a 3rd for smacking someone with a little baseball bat.......I drove THAT guy
home and later he turned himself IN......
Several divorces started here, too.
Bar Tab EXCEEDED the cost of pizza and other food.
than a few years later? The GIRLS held down the plant manager and gave him a HICKEY whIch I'm certain his wife didn't appreciate.
After that? I mostly avoided company parties. they got BORING once the lawyers got involved. sh**, I MISS the 70s.........
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Post by Boomzilla on Jun 6, 2022 7:05:53 GMT -5
We had a shift foreman arrested on the way home from the company party for driving down the interstate on the bare wheel rim of his truck (trailing a shower of sparks). There was another guy’s wife passed out in the truck bed (but neither the foreman nor the wife were aware of it). ‘70s indeed…
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Post by Boomzilla on Jun 6, 2022 10:52:02 GMT -5
Bit the bulllet and bought some hurricane gas for the generator = $224.54. Not too bad...
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Post by novisnick on Jun 6, 2022 11:21:40 GMT -5
Bit the bulllet and bought some hurricane gas for the generator = $224.54. Not too bad... I ran my generator this weekend. Mrs got home from work, took off her shoes and out went the power! Hour later we were back on line. I always keep 50 gallons of fuel on hand. |
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KeithL
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Post by KeithL on Jun 6, 2022 11:44:44 GMT -5
Ahhhhh.... the good old days.
Many moons ago I worked for a company that was subcontracted to the company that created what was said to be "the first computer automated test set" for the Navy. It ran on Windows 3.1
This was back when the Aegis class "missile / destroyers" were the latest and greatest warship technology. (You may have heard of the Stark... which was hit and damaged pretty badly by a rather low-tech missile... because their fancy anti-missile defense system was offline for service.)
In any case the company we were subcontracted to made the power supplies for the Aegis class destroyers. (Basically a set of 440V 1000A UPS's that could power all the fancy electronics from dock-side power, generators, or lots of batteries if necessary.) These were built by the company that developed them - and parts were always shipped back to them for repairs if necessary (the company was named ALS). They were the "sole source" for replacement parts and repairs.
And their techs did all of their repairs by hand - from paper schematics (not that unusual in those days).
Then one day the government noticed that the only company who could keep their shiny new ships running had been bought by a foreign holding company. And, back in those days, nobody really kept track, so nobody noticed until well after it happened that their "critical supplier" was now "foreign owned".
So they got a nice big contract to "develop and document an automated repair depot" - which included "an automated diagnostic test station" . (Basically to create a repair system, with documentation, that could be handed over to someone else if they went out of business or closed that plant.)
I don't know how big the whole contract was - but the little piece we got to help design and document it was several million dollars.
And, just for the record... All of the word processing for that entire project was done on a Wang Word Processor... With a whopping 4.7 MB hard drive... which literally required two people to lift.
And, yes, it had an 8" floppy drive we used for backups.
And massive workstations... with keyboards that actually had a magnetic reed switch under each key... and probably each weighed more than my current computer.
And the flowcharts were done on a half dozen PC compatibles...
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Post by housetech on Jun 6, 2022 12:27:58 GMT -5
Bit the bulllet and bought some hurricane gas for the generator = $224.54. Not too bad... I ran my generator this weekend. Mrs got home from work, took off her shoes and out went the power! Hour later we were back on line. I always keep 50 gallons of fuel on hand. I'm ordering a 15k to 17kw backup with duel fuel this week. |
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Post by Boomzilla on Jun 6, 2022 12:41:55 GMT -5
It occurs to me that the transition from paper-based engineering to computer-based is one of those HUGE transitions that few previous generations experienced. Maybe the transition from animal power to steam compares, but not much else.
Our children will experience a maybe bigger transition (in progress now) to the common use of artificial intelligence. Their children (if we survive) may experience the transition from being an Earth-based-only species to moving on out into the solar system & then the galaxy.
OTOH, I’m reminded of Greg Bear’s novel “Blood Music.” As the old folks say it goes to show you never can tell…
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Post by housetech on Jun 6, 2022 12:45:22 GMT -5
Keith-"And, back in those days, nobody really kept track, so nobody noticed until well after it happened that their "critical supplier" was now "foreign owned"." They still haven't learned anything, the ChiComs own US, we're so screwed if...
Oh the days of Fortran...fun.
When management found out I had a knack for Pneumatics, I got a so called "promotion". When it worked it was amazing, but those mechanical relays or valves got gummed up, nightmare. All it took was milliseconds delay and Houston, we have a problem. Then engineers decided to mix more microprocessors with pneumatics and we had to add diodes to stop the reverse emf and taking out the boards. Those days were not fun.
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Post by Boomzilla on Jun 6, 2022 12:57:07 GMT -5
Learning new technology never is...
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Post by housetech on Jun 6, 2022 13:03:21 GMT -5
All of the word processing for that entire project was done on a Wang Word Processor...With a whopping 4.7 MB hard drive.
I almost went to work for them... the memories.
When I worked at Kodak, they came up with 12 inch digital data disk to replace tape. That went over like a brick, not one of their finer moments.
I did enjoy working on Kodak's first laser printers, tough, but enjoyable. I was product advocate in Dallas.
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Post by marcl on Jun 6, 2022 14:21:55 GMT -5
It occurs to me that the transition from paper-based engineering to computer-based is one of those HUGE transitions that few previous generations experienced. Maybe the transition from animal power to steam compares, but not much else. Our children will experience a maybe bigger transition (in progress now) to the common use of artificial intelligence. Their children (if we survive) may experience the transition from being an Earth-based-only species to moving on out into the solar system & then the galaxy. OTOH, I’m reminded of Greg Bear’s novel “Blood Music.” As the old folks say it goes to show you never can tell… I agree it was a huge leap. From here on everything will be in some sort of computer. But in the early 90's when draftsmen still did everything on paper, when they finally got Autocad or something like that at the place I worked the guy would still work out whole designs on paper first ... and THEN put it into the computer system. |
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Post by Boomzilla on Jun 6, 2022 14:31:49 GMT -5
Habits have inertia…
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KeithL
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Post by KeithL on Jun 6, 2022 15:40:08 GMT -5
That was pretty common for a while... And I'll bet some folks still do their checkbook that way. 
I also remember when people were actually claiming that "there would be less actual paper" once everything was on computers.  It occurs to me that the transition from paper-based engineering to computer-based is one of those HUGE transitions that few previous generations experienced. Maybe the transition from animal power to steam compares, but not much else. Our children will experience a maybe bigger transition (in progress now) to the common use of artificial intelligence. Their children (if we survive) may experience the transition from being an Earth-based-only species to moving on out into the solar system & then the galaxy. OTOH, I’m reminded of Greg Bear’s novel “Blood Music.” As the old folks say it goes to show you never can tell… I agree it was a huge leap. From here on everything will be in some sort of computer. But in the early 90's when draftsmen still did everything on paper, when they finally got Autocad or something like that at the place I worked the guy would still work out whole designs on paper first ... and THEN put it into the computer system. |
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KeithL
Administrator
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Post by KeithL on Jun 6, 2022 15:46:18 GMT -5
And remember when it was so cool to "turbo" a PC - so it would run at 8 mHz instead of 4.7 mHz. And when the IBM PC-AT was a big deal because it actually came with a 10 MEGABYTE hard disk. (And even though a single photo from my current camera wouldn't fit on that now... it held every program I owned back then... AND every picture I had.)
Actually the first "real" computer I owned was an Apple II+ It came with 16 K of RAM... but it was upgradable... to a whole 64 K.
I also went through the transition from pneumatic control boards to CPU control. I didn't have to design any of the graphics, though! The plant I worked startup for did have an oxychlorination reactor train that was intended to be computer controlled. We had a mainframe with 8K of RAM and it used 8" floppy discs. Using Fortran 4 with data card entry, we never could get it to work right, so one of our engineers designed a diode-ladder system in his garage that we used instead. Fun times! Well that sounds like 80's! I worked for Honeywell in the 80's and they were a little past Fortran ... and I was doing mechanical stuff then. But yeah, 8" floppies. I remember they had to add a 1MB memory board to a processor until they optimized the code. This was like '86. The board was 14" square and cost $6k. Before the 90's it was all hardware character graphics, 8 colors. In the 90's the big players mostly went UNIX XWindows, but L&N picked Windows ... 25MHz 486 PC's to start. I designed the graphics but the "sell" for the system was the customer could create their own graphics displays ... ANYTHING they wanted! Easy for a salesman to say. Once they started staging the system they realized they had no clue how to translate the steel panel to four or eight 21" Sony monitors and control them with as many keyboards and trackballs. The salesman sold them the touch screen ... wow how cool is that! Then I asked them ... "so when you give the 7th grade tour of the control room and a kid points to the screen and asks 'what's this?' ... do you want that motor to shut off?" I made a few bucks for the company doing training classes ... and put a few bucks in MY pocket moonlighting on the test floor fixing and building displays for customer systems ... I called it "Graphics for GoreTex" |
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hemster
Global Moderator
Particle Manufacturer
...still listening... still watching
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Post by hemster on Jun 6, 2022 16:22:39 GMT -5
Habits are inertia  |
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