More tales from Bandley 3

[Huguenot]

Work-from-home has it's benefits, however mixing it up in the office is important, particularly when developing something new.
The spring of 1983 was stressful period for the Mac group, as the decision to build the factory in Fremont rather than Texas put a huge additional load on us.
Finding a building, purchasing the equipment and staffing all became -our- responsibility rather than that of the manufacturing division. So, lots of meetings.
One day in March this showed up in all our in baskets-



Remember kids- no e-mail or text in those days, just phone and Xeroxed memos to pass info around. (yes, this is my original memo but since they were all copies the initials are not "real")
Not only were they no meeting days, but they quickly became let's hang out in the B3 inner lobby and have a beer or two afternoons. This invited some cross-pollinating among the staff which was actually quite productive.
Soon though it was decided we should have a bit of entertainment as well. Steve was hooked on the Windham Hill record label at the time, and one Friday he had scheduled Liz Story, one of their pianists, to come play for us. Oops, we needed a piano for the lobby.
IIRC, 2 days and over $30k later a shiny new Bosendorfer grand appeared, was tuned and ready. Wonder where it is now?
On another afternoon we were treated to a Q&A session on design by Maya Lin, the architect of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial. There were more that I don't recall now -it was a very busy time.
The comment in his memo that mentions jeans and t-shirts is a bit gratuitous, as that was pretty much all anyone ever wore to work.

 

[David Cook]

I like his initials on the memo so you could tell it wasn't just anyone with a Mac pranking employees.

 

[thecloud]

Last time I was on the Infinite Loop campus, the Bosendorfer grand piano was tucked away in a room called the Piano Bar, directly across from Town Hall where media events used to take place.

 

[Huguenot]

Another one from my files for your reading pleasure-

 

[finkmac]

real truthnuke from steeb there. Apple 32 SuperMicro is a bizarre term. this pamphlet seems to be the only marketing thing that used it.

 

[David Cook]

I never heard the term Apple 32 SuperMicro before today.

 

[Huguenot]

I don't recall anyone ever using the term at work either, nor had I ever seen that pamphlet. Thanks for posting.

 

[Snial]

Another one from my files for your reading pleasure-
View attachment 96335

Aaah, you had both memos stacked, I can see the second one faintly behind the first !

 

[Huguenot]

I kinda rushed a bunch of pics as a lot of this stuff -might- be going to R&R auctions later this spring. Or not, though they gave me a crazy estimate for an SJ business card...
I'm getting older and my kids don't care.

 

[Huguenot]

Once Steve had won the battle over locating the Mac factory locally rather than in Dallas we found a suitable building in Fremont, CA.
120k sq ft. and brand new, so no interior obstacles to work around. As usual we needed to celebrate somehow.
He chartered a bus and we all took the 20 minute ride (much less traffic then) over for a look. On arriving we found lunch waiting for us -fully catered, white tablecloths, the whole bit. Some of the team had brought roller skates and had a blast skating all over that pristine concrete floor.
We were then each presented with an official Mac hardhat to kick off the construction.
I believe this may be one of the rarest early Mac collectables as there were only 80 ordered (I signed the purchase order). These are genuine Fibremetal brand, not some toy -typical of Jobs.

 

[MOS8_030]

Cool memos and memories! Thanks!

 

[Huguenot]

And then there were the last minute RFI issues. Originally all was supposed to be well, but the far-field tests indicated that the case seams leaked a bit more than was allowed -I remember the term "slot antenna" being used.
The solution was to spray a coballoy (paint) coating inside the case -some were actually done using an arc-spray (metalizing) process. Both added some thickness and that caused interference at the seam, which caused difficulty on assembly. The solution was to put each Mac face down and push the back onto the bezel with a large arbor press -a stunningly manual step in an otherwise automated factory.
If you have ever tried to open a Mac for the first time you probably did some damage with your screwdriver or whatever. There was a cool tool developed for use here, made from a chunk of piano hinge with the edges milled down to fit. Once the case had been opened and re-closed a couple of times things got easier. I made and sold a bunch of these case crackers to Radius as well.
The extended Torx driver was a last minute thing too.

 

[thecloud]

These are genuine Fibremetal brand, not some toy -typical of Jobs.

That hat is tremendously cool! And so different to the Apple of the following decade. When eWorld launched, employees were given souvenir "hard hats" made of flimsy yellow plastic. That plastic eventually became so brittle, the hat would shatter into pieces if you dropped it on the floor. It was sort of a metaphor for all the computers made during the Spindler years.

 

[stepleton]

Another one from my files for your reading pleasure-

Ha ha --- take that, Lisa!

So much for using "spinach dentist beatles michael jackson apple 32 macintosh" as a passphrase...

 

[joshc]

Thanks for sharing your recollections, perhaps a blog or book might come of these if you have the time and energy to write more?

And please scan documents you have and add them to archive.org. RR auction stuff is bought by people who tend to not want to share what they’ve ‘invested’ in. I’m not saying to not sell the stuff, but at least some archival beforehand would greatly benefit the wider group interested in this stuff.

 

[David Cook]

The backstories are so helpful. Those of us that were not around tend to invent our best theories for parts, bodges, and designs, but are delighted to learn the actual first-hand account.