> Well this was several (many?) years ago when I managed a VAX-11/780 (1.25Mb
> memory, 2xRM03, 1xRM80, 1xDZ11, 1xTE16 and a Printronix printer). Life was
> so much easier then! We'd had some problems with the TE16 (half inch tape
> drive for those not intimately familiar with 15 year old Digital hardware).
> I can't remember what the problem was but we got a new FS engineer out to
> check it out. I'm not sure of the details but I guess he connected the
> power up wrong cause when he turned the TE16 back on the lights in the
> computer room dimmed and suddenly large amounts of magic smoke (along with
> some nice orange/yellow/green flames were visible (the TE16 was out on its
> sliders). The fire was put out (by me) using a CO2 extinguisher.
>
> Huw Davies | e-mail: Huw.Davies_at_latrobe.edu.au
> Information Technology Services | Phone: +61 3 9479 1550 Fax: +61 3 9479
> 1999
> La Trobe University | "If God had wanted soccer played in the
> Melbourne Australia 3083 | air, the sky would be painted green"
>
>
Sounds like fun. I've never seen a TE16 hooked up wrong.
Didn't know it was possible, since it just plugged into the power supply
and that plugged to the power conditioner.
I remember when the NY Telephone union electricians
went home at 4pm just about when they blew out one of the three phases
to the entire switching center computer room.
Alarms went off on all the monitoring hardware. A lot of stuff
crashed and blinking lights above the machines kicked in and blinked
and rotated...
Boy, I've never heard the clicking of those 860 power controllers
like that.
Sparks actually came out of the 11/70 I was installing at the time.
Needless to say, I dropped power, pulled plugs and went home after I
was told the electricians would not be back to work on it before 5pm.
Now I see why they like everything they have to run on the 48volt
DC so they can run it all off the batteries and not depend on the
AC input.
Bill
---
bpechter_at_shell.monmouth.com|pechter_at_pechter.dyndns.org
Three things never anger: First, the one who runs your DEC,
The one who does Field Service and the one who signs your check.
Received on Tue Apr 13 1999 - 20:23:42 BST