Collins C8401 computer 2141

Jay Maynard

I used quite a bit of their stuff while I was in the Air Force. Even the 25 year old 651-F1 HF receivers dating from the early to mid Sixties were wonderful machines. Discrete components, so we repaired them on site. They were definitely built to Mil-Spec standards. Tough only begins to describe them (and I think Collins must've had a major interest in a screw company because those boxes were put together so strongly and so modularized (with practically armor-plated modules), and so many different sizes and types of screws. Dissbuttembling and then rebuttembling some of their gear could take longer than the repair itself (then the paperwork took even longer). Those old discrete analog 651-F1's could hold a frequency to within a tenth of a Hz for days on end, although the alignment procedure could be recursive unpleasant woman. Brand new digital Racal 215's were lucky not to drift +5 Hz up and down while we watched them. They weren't protected by UPS, like the SAC systems were, so the frequent power surges and drops we experienced from Philippino power probably did them no good. Another one of President Peanut-Head's examples of privatesing us over for no good reason (we had a perfectly capable and reliable base power plant, but it was mostly mothballed for "diplomatic reasons" so we could buy dirty, unreliable power from the Filippinos except for those occasions that they completely fell down on the job.

--Larry