Visio templates for shop layout

We once had to wire an IBM407 plugboard to print a list of missing check numbers. Sort the cardstock checks, run them through and print the check numbers that weren't there.

I think the boss was joking, but we (myself and one other) actually managed to get one to work - but only on one particular machine. It was definitely a thicket of wires - even after we converted to permanent wires.

Then the CE pulled maintenance and our board didn't work anymore. We called him back and he said "well, the timing was a little off". We yelled "put it back!".

For as long as I worked there, the board had a sign that said it only worked on that machine, and the machine had two signs - one outside and one inside - that threatened sudden death to any CE that adjusted the timing :-).

When you ran paper tape in via an ASR33 teletype, it printed everything on the tape. Since this was usually binary programs, you got a lot of junk printed, and a hole in the right hand position unless you manually returned the carriage ever so often. "Ghost code" tape only used 4 of the 8 positions and so didn't print anything. Of course it cut the speed in half too :-).

When paper tape came out of the punch, you grabbed the beginning and wound the tape around your fingers in a figure 8 pattern. The result looked like a bow tie. The reason we did it that way was that you could then feed it into the reader and it neatly unwound from the center of the bow tie.

The alternate was to spool it all into a wastebasket and wind it up when it was done so the beginning was on the outside. But then you had to mount it on an axle to feed it without twisting.

It's amazing what useless data our brains retain :-).