Thanks Nick!

I had thought about selling PCBs or creating a kit, but I lack the skill to 
draft it in PCB CAD software.  The boards I made come from scans of the plans 
(on swtpc.com), and I really had to tweak those to get them to work.  And even 
then, while I was able to correct for size I missed de-skewing them, so the 
molex connectors for the bus between boards do not line up perfectly, making 
connecting boards a bit of a trick.  I hadn't realized just how badly scanning 
could distort artwork until I got my hands on an original copy of the Radio 
Electronics construction guide for the Mark-8.  Comparing the artwork in it to 
the scanned copies online showed just how bad the scanner mangled things.  

Unfortunately I missed a perfect opportunity to acquire an original 
construction guide when an actual vintage TVT came up on ebay.  The auction was 
for the TVT and the seller threw in the guide he'd bought.  I lost that auction 
to Grant Stockly.  As it turns out, he plans to diassemble that TVT, scan the 
boards and make kits available.  I was disappointed that he was going to 
dismantle an original piece (he does intend to reassemble it), but am glad some 
quality kits will come as a result.  We had been negotiating to send my 
original Mark-8 boards for a scan, since they are unbuilt, but I have been 
leery about shipping them off to the US ever since they were almost lost in 
transit to me.

If folks are interested I could make my 'corrected' (photoshopped) artwork 
available somewhere.  Maybe someone could fix it further.  I may even fix it.  
Last week I acquired some actual vintage 1973 PCB stock, and now have an 
opportunity to go the last mile on authenticity and actually rebuild the TVT 
with correct PCBs.  That'd make it almost indistinguishable from an original.  
But.. it'd also be a ton of (re)work.. 

Brad


-----Original Message-----
From: cctalk [mailto:cctalk-boun...@classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Nick Allen via 
cctalk
Sent: Sunday, June 25, 2017 12:54 PM
To: cctalk@classiccmp.org
Subject: Re: TV Typewriter project nearing completion

wow impressive work Brad!  Thanks for blogging about it, it's fun to watch you 
progress.  Ever consider selling some of the PCB boards, and coming up with a 
BOM list, so we can recreate some too?


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