[volt-nuts] Tek gear

[Dick Moore]

Again, thanks Chuck for the great info. I was working in Plant 2 Final Assembly and then in the Research Division during my time at Tek, so was peripheral to some of these stories. I just don't believe that glass jugs were inappropriate for the flat CRTs and Storage CRTs, and I met some engineers and managers at the time who didn't believe it either. 

That Corning was charging a lot for their jugs is likely very true, and also every company in America at the time was singing the hymn of "vertical integration" as the key to profitability, but IMHO, Corning was far better placed to deal with the CRT design issues than the ceramics folks at Tek. The learning curve was obviously very steep, and as I mentioned before, the fact that Tek did it at all is amazing to me. 

I was part of a small group who were informally told by our top boss, a VP, that the initial motivation for the ceramic jugs was to utilize the existing ceramics plant. The fact that it wasn't ultimately up to the task was after the decision.

Best,
Dick


On Nov 20, 2010, at 4:00 AM, volt-nuts-request at febo.com wrote:

> Message: 2
> Date: Fri, 19 Nov 2010 09:53:23 -0500
> From: Chuck Harris <cfharris at erols.com>
> Subject: Re: [volt-nuts] Tek gear
> To: Discussion of precise voltage measurement <volt-nuts at febo.com>
> Message-ID: <4CE68F63.3060709 at erols.com>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8; format=flowed
> 
> The thing is Dick's recollection, although flippant, and fun, isn't
> entirely true.  Yes, Tektronix had a ceramics facility that was
> under utilized, but they weren't above getting rid of it wholesale.
> (Which ultimately they did.)
> 
> It required a tremendous amount of retooling to make ceramic CRT's.
> Nothing from the facility that made barrier strips could fit the bill.
> The hydraulic presses were too small to handle the large jug molds.
> The kilns were too small to fire a significant quantity of jugs.
> The ball mills were too small to grind up enough ceramic, the building
> was too small to handle the new larger machines... need I say more?
> 
> The reason ceramic jugs were made is because glass wasn't economically
> suited to flat screen CRT's, and complicated storage CRT's.  Oh, and
> there was another reason, Corning was too expensive at the level of
> quality needed for the flat screen CRT's and complicated storage CRT's.
> 
> If you want to see more of the history, check out:
> 
> http://www.classictek.org/
> 
> The whole ceramic vs glass crt situation is explained in detail...by
> the guys who did the work, and made the decisions.
> 
> This is my last word on the subject.  This is a little far afield for
> volt-nuts.
> 
> -Chuck Harris