I live in Madison, WI, and have a DEC PC05 on a PDP-11 that can also
host a Unibone board to make file transfers easy. I also have a
recently restored HP 2748B, for which I have a simple Arduino interface
with an Ethernet "hat" to read files into a PC. Neither is available
for loan, but I'd be happy to read tapes in for those willing to make a
day trip or mail them to me.
The PC05 works well for fanfold tapes, but I have found it doesn't work
well for larger spooled paper tapes, even though I made a couple of 3D
printed inserts to provide a spool post on the input side and an
extended guide on the output side. The mass of a large spool puts quite
a bit of drag on the sprocket feed. But the HP 2748B works well for both.
I'd also point out that there are repositories of a lot of PDP-8 paper
tapes around, including:
https://bitsavers.org/bits/DEC/pdp8/
which includes tape images from a couple of other repositories. So,
aside from installation specific tapes, there is a pretty good chance
that someone somewhere already has images.
JRJ
On 5/18/2023 3:19 PM, Mike Katz via cctalk wrote:
I have just acquired a number of PDP-8 paper tapes. My reader/punch is
not working at the moment (neither is my PDP-8 but that's another story).
I am looking to beg, borrow or buy a paper tape reader or reader/punch
(stand alone or PC04) so that I can archive these tapes as they are
getting more and more rare.
I would prefer a serial (RS-232) reader or reader/punch but I could deal
with a parallel and create my own parallel to serial converter or get
some kind of USB to parallel adapter.
There are several "hand pull" types of readers out there (like the
OP-80A) but I am afraid of damaging the very old fanfold paper tape by
using my inconsistent hand rather than some kind of motor driven
mechanism which is designed for smooth paper tape flow.
Does anyone have any ideas or something they have to sell or donate?
Please contact me by email directly.
Note: This is also being posted to the VCF DEC Forum.
Thank you,
Mike Katz
bitwiz@12bitsbe
