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Won a Poly 8813

falter

falter

Veteran Member
Joined
Jan 22, 2011
Messages
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Location
Vancouver, BC
Wow.. I did not expect to win this one:

https://www.ebay.com/itm/Polymorphi...KyNi5tVPJo%3D&orig_cvip=true&nordt=true&rt=nc

I mean, it's missing the wood top, the CPU and and video card. But still, I thought for sure it'd go for more than a couple hundred bucks.

I'm kind of regretting selling off my spare CPU and video card now. :( Technically the boards in my 88 are probably from the 8813 anyway. So if I want to use it i guess I can just borrow and swap around until I (maybe) find replacements.

In terms of the ROMs I need, I just need the .75 one for the disk drives right?
 
falter said:
Wow.. I did not expect to win this one:

https://www.ebay.com/itm/Polymorphi...KyNi5tVPJo%3D&orig_cvip=true&nordt=true&rt=nc

I mean, it's missing the wood top, the CPU and and video card. But still, I thought for sure it'd go for more than a couple hundred bucks.

I'm kind of regretting selling off my spare CPU and video card now. :( Technically the boards in my 88 are probably from the 8813 anyway. So if I want to use it i guess I can just borrow and swap around until I (maybe) find replacements.

In terms of the ROMs I need, I just need the .75 one for the disk drives right?
Click to expand...

It is also missing the floppy controller. The one you have, in the box, is for the 8 inch drive, not the 5.25. The firmware is 35035. That is for the 8 in drive. Notice it goes to an outside cable. It has the printer interface ( that would interconnect to the CPU board). It is RS232.
Still a nice find.
Dwight
 
Yeah I noticed that after - I wondered why it had the ribbon cable going to the rear. I have on occasion seen the proper controller come up on ebay but not very often. I'll bet the disk drives are gummed right up anyway.

Just kicking myself that I let the spare Poly boards I had go. Only got $45 for each too. I swear every time I hang onto something I never use it, but then if I let it go... suddenly there's a need. :)

Superficial stuff: does anyone know what wood they used for the top? I wouldn't mind recreating that.
 
I can probably supply you with the missing boards and PROMs. Contact me, deramp5113 followed by ASCII 0x40 then the Yahoo domain name.

Mike
 
The wood used was a wood veneer on a plywood base. I'm not a wood expert but it wasn't oak. It looks the same as used on the N*.
Dwight
 
I was about to observe the same thing, Dwight. Dimensional hardwood isn't really easy to use for quantity production--too unstable from batch to batch. Judging from appearances, it was also stained.

Select a match from here
 
Hi Chuck
That is a great page. To bad my polymorphic 8813/2 is in my storage container in my mountain home right now. I hope maybe Mike might be able to match it to one of his boxes.

Also, I didn't see you at VCFPNW. I was up there in the consignment room. There was a great exhibit of over 50 different types for recording media ( floppy and optical ). I'm sure you'd have enjoyed it.
One I liked was Wang calculators from the calculator museum. They had 22 other things on exhibit as well.
I bought a Data I/O Sytem 19 with a UniPak2. My other Data I/O only does typical EPROMs ( for $30 ).
Dwight
 
Yeah, Dwight--I'm not much one for get-togethers. In any case, my sister and her husband were visiting us from Indiana and it just wasn't in the cards.
 
The corners on the top are solid wood. This is done because trying to bring veneer right to the edges is not very durable.

And yes, this definitely looks stained, which helps tie things together.
 
I don't know how they cut them but it looks like the edges are veneered front and rear. Maybe they clamp on a scrificial piece to keep the veneer from tearing up.
Still, a furniture grade carbide saw. I have a blade that cuts clean enough that you don't need to sand it, as an outside cut. I got the blade along with some other stuff but was told it wasn't cheap.
Dwight
 
Looks to me like a piece of veneered plywood with a solid wood frame, mitred at the edges like a picture frame. (Hmm, I see a compound mitre on one joint.. not on the opposite side though - in the picture of the rear of the case.)

As a classic Lotus owner (the sports cars) and a member of lotuselan.net, I see quite a few discussions about relaminating the wooden dash, which is a plywood base with a walnut veneer that is lacquered to a very high gloss. Although the edges are not visible once fitted, it does not look too difficult. I'd suggest that this top piece can be recreated reasonably easily if you have a router. What I'm thinking is, get a suitable piece of plywood and glue the veneer to it, then cut to size using a bench saw with a fine saw blade. Do this with the veneer on top so the blade cuts down on it. Then use a router to put a step in the edge. Put a mating step in your frame material and cut the pieces, mitred. Glue the frame to the plywood and allow to set (in a frame clamp). Stain and varnish.

Hmm, now I write it out it looks like a job for a craftsman... But you can bet that the original manufacturer didn't use craftsmen. It looks to be the same sort of quality as a '70s hi fi enclosure.
 
Chuck(G) said:
The corners on the top are solid wood. This is done because trying to bring veneer right to the edges is not very durable.

And yes, this definitely looks stained, which helps tie things together.
Click to expand...

I think Chuck(G) is right. All edges, including the top and sides, are real solid wood or it would be prone to chipping. This way, if the corner gets bumped, the veneer doesn't fly off. Here's what the back looks like. You can see the mitred edges on the real wood.
 
Good picture, snuci!

At a guess, I'd say the edge and panel are not stained (with the same stain, or at the same time). The edges have a really nice contrasting colour.
 
Hi Santo
Mine doesn't look like that. I don't think it had a mitred edge pieces. This one may be a replaced one. I'm almost sure mine is veneer over plywood. Maybe in the next month I'll be checking things out and look at the one I have.
It may be that the edges of the plywood are not mitred and one just fit the veneer, slightly over size and used a sanding block to fit the edges. The showing mitred veneer edged are only the veneered pieces.
When I get my to System88 cover off I'll photo it from different angles. I know it was original because it was a return in an original shipping box, I still have.
As for chipping, the N* cover I have, has just such minor veneer chipping on the bottom corners, so I know it is not solid pieces of hard wood.
Using a fine carbide blade and a jig, clamp, one can do fantastic work with sacrificial piece of wood to be the edge. As a kid in wood shop, we made such clamps and guides to feed across our table saw. We were able to make repeatable pieces exactly, over and over.
We didn't freehand the pieces with one of those T slides. Too much could go wrong. The guide was made that way, though. You use sloppy pieces to make jigs to make finer pieces.
Dwight
 
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