The AM Forum

We watched the movie "The Last Sentinel" on the SciFi Channel Saturday night. Much to my surprise and amusement, the piece of equipment that was the heart of the control of the killer androids was none other that Fatso, the beloved HP608D. What a hoot!!!  Who else remembers that unit?

I have 2 of them in the basement a D and an F.
My first job in electronics had one on my bench. It was great to enjoy a long coffee breat first thing in the morning while it warmed up.

I've logged over a thousand hours in front of 608's.  I have one here in the shack closet - a Navy version TS-510A/U, it's a hybrid between the C and D models as I recall.

There was a movie called "Pump Up the Volume" starring Christian Slater.  His character is an FM band pirate.  In one scene he was broadcasting mobile with a 608 on the back seat as I recall, HI.

I was thinking of having the kids rip them apart for scrap.

Ah yes, the 608D and F, I spent many an hour with those. We had some with the PLL external "lock boxes" on them.

Speaking of the FM pirate use, I used to work in a place in East Rochester NY during my college breaks where the PA system, which told you when you had incoming phone calls and what line to use etc, spent the rest of it's time dispensing  elevator music from the local EZ listening station, WEZO - whether you wanted to listen or not. Yuck! Worse, they only had one tape, so you listened to the same songs by the same people at the same time of day over and over and over. It was sort of like Groundhog day, you could set your watch to Celito Lindo being butchered by the Thousand Strings Orchestra at 10:10 each morning. After a few months of this, I had had it and was looking for a way to MAKE IT STOP before I totally lost it. We had a few spare 608's sitting on the shelf waiting for something to do. Hmmmmm....

Unscrew the ruby red pilot lamp on the front. Snake a piece of #32 magnet wire a few wavelengths long into the output connector and Voila! Silence! The sig gen captured the FM receiver downstairs full quieting. Much consternation in the front office. A few frantic phone calls to the station insisting that they *must* be off the air, we can't hear you. Sadly, there was a backup EZ listening station on the dial which was tuned in within the hour to replace the missing "EZO". Happily, there were TWO 608's looking for something to do.  ;D

For the next week, there was a constant stream of different radio stations on the PA system as they hunted around trying to find something to replace the missing elevator music. Country/Western, Rock (yeah!), Gospel, whatever, but none of it met their requirements. But a lot of folks were enjoying the change in music down on the prodcution line and elsewhere.

Finally the plant manager got suspicious of "those engineers" and started skulking around in the lab looking into corners. I don't think he'd have ever figured it out but my boss noticed Don and I about splitting our faces trying to keep the grins off and got the story out of us. He waited the till manager was gone and then made us take down the signals. My only regret is that we didn't bring in a tape deck or something to feed to the FM modulation port to put our own choice of music on for a while.

I'll always have fond memories of the 608.  ;)

AH my first job....setting up ARC 73 front ends. I think it was used in the A7 plane.

We had two of these at work sitting on the shelf unused and I begged for years. I finally got one of them (608F) and now I just look at it. Man does that thing waste room in the shack!

I do use the 606.

Mike WU2D

Saw this adapter kit once that replaced the front handles with cleats.

Does anyone have a photo of the 608?


Visual aids please.

heres won

Dave,
Check bama I think the manual is there. Mkaes a good seat for shack visitors. A HP 8640B repalces the 606 and 608 and much better generator.

Thanks for the photo. Haven't had the pleasure to handle one....yet.