[HN Gopher] Ask HN: 80s electronics book club; anyone remember t...
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Ask HN: 80s electronics book club; anyone remember this
illustrator?
In the early 80's in the US, a popular DIY electronics magazine had
a book of the month club that I loved. Most were small and leather
bound hardback with topics like: make your own hydrophone;
augmented reality (required a full room and a boom arm, sadly); an
LCD model rocket launcher ignition; computer vision; lots and lots
of robots. One book I remember (large, softcover, yellow cover)
featured black and white, pen and ink illustrations of
fantastically complex robots and machines. One that I remember was
a water-based machine with video camera eye mounted on a tripod of
pontoons. Wow, these illustrations filled my dreams. Does anyone
remember this? Do you remember the name of the illustrator?
Anything at all?
Author : codpiece
Score : 20 points
Date : 2025-06-28 02:46 UTC (2 days ago)
| reneberlin wrote:
| I tried for you with google gemini:
|
| I'm continuing to focus on visually confirming the specific
| illustration of the water-based machine with a video camera eye
| on a tripod of pontoons. My previous research has strongly
| pointed to
|
| Edward L. Safford Jr.'s robotics books, 'The Complete Handbook of
| Robotics' (1978) and 'Handbook of Advanced Robotics' (1982), both
| published by TAB Books, as the most likely candidates for the
| remembered book. The descriptions of these books align well with
| the user's memory of complex, pen-and-ink robot illustrations.
| codpiece wrote:
| TAB books does seem to be the publisher of the book of the
| month series, thank you for that!
| ugh123 wrote:
| Seems to be downvoted for using AI, but ironically (or
| expectedly?) OP has confirmed knowledge gained from it
| slackpad wrote:
| Forrest Mims did a bunch of interesting hand drawings like that
| back then but I don't recall the specific book or image you are
| thinking of. I'm curious to see if you find it - it sounds up my
| alley too.
| codpiece wrote:
| Thanks! A bit different, but definitely worth exploring more.
|
| Here's a pretty close approximation of the illustrations:
| https://www.etsy.com/listing/4319242515/testors-robot-plasti...
| Stratoscope wrote:
| You must be thinking of _The Forrest Mims Engineer 's Notebook_
| or his _Engineer 's Mini-Notebook_ or _Getting Started in
| Electronics_.
|
| The Engineer's Notebook is still in print:
|
| https://www.amazon.com/dp/1878707035
|
| If you download the free Kindle sample, it has some of the
| illustrations, but mostly just individual components.
|
| This Reddit post has a couple of pages from Getting Started:
|
| https://www.reddit.com/r/ECE/comments/ik1gw4/from_the_book_g...
|
| The Internet Archive has the complete Mini-Notebook:
|
| https://archive.org/details/Forrest_Mims-Engineers_Mini-Note...
| reneberlin wrote:
| Maybe you remember the cover, too? Is it one of these?
|
| https://imgs.search.brave.com/KLbQPx02Oqq9Fgsg-AzyhQo_Y_FVRA...
|
| https://imgs.search.brave.com/ZNxGI_CJ_3QOkgR3dV2MGjIS8OQyE_...
| codpiece wrote:
| Sadly, no, but these look like pretty interesting reads! Its
| around that time period though. I think the book had an
| illustration of a robot/machine. They were very much non-
| humanoid, more like piles of mechanical and electronics shaped
| for a purpose. Cartoony, but cool.
| bitpush wrote:
| [offtopic]
|
| TIL that brave rehosts images from the internet onto brave.com,
| and crucially serve them universally. That cant be .. legal. If
| I have an image on my website, that cannot be "redistributed"
| without permission.
|
| https://search.brave.com/images?q=apple%20macbook%20pro
| reneberlin wrote:
| ... and:
|
| I've identified several prominent DIY electronics magazines from
| the early 1980s in the US. The most promising candidates, based
| on the user's description, are 'Popular Electronics' and 'Byte'.
| 'Popular Electronics' was a highly circulated magazine that even
| inspired the founding of Microsoft, and it transitioned into
| 'Computers & Electronics' in 1982. 'Byte' was a leading computer
| magazine that often featured electronics content and was known
| for its distinctive cover art by Robert Tinney. Other magazines
| like 'Radio Electronics Magazine', 'Nuts and Volts', 'Elektor
| Electronics Magazine', 'Practical Electronics', 'Circuit Cellar',
| 'Silicon Chip Magazine', and 'Hobby Electronics' were also noted,
| but 'Popular Electronics' and 'Byte' seem to be the strongest
| fits for the US context and time frame.
| codpiece wrote:
| I loved Byte magazine! Oh, that was the best. It was likely
| Popular Electronics where I found the Book of the Month club,
| but Hobby Electronics is a good path I'll investigate, thank
| you!
| timthorn wrote:
| I bought a 3 year subscription to Byte with my first
| paycheque. The magazine ceased publication within a couple of
| months :(
| tiahura wrote:
| https://www.amazon.com/Build-phaser-working-space-age-projec...
| miner1829 wrote:
| I don't remember the leather bound books, but popular electronics
| had a book club:
| https://archive.org/details/197911PopularElectronics/page/7/...
| bitwize wrote:
| Sounds like BASIC Computer Games by David Ahl.
|
| Link to book's contents (Ahl released his works into the public
| domain): https://www.atariarchives.org/basicgames/
|
| Artwork example:
| https://www.atariarchives.org/basicgames/showpage.php?page=8...
|
| (Was this your pontoon bot? I think those are supposed to be ice
| skates...)
| LarryMade2 wrote:
| I tink this was the one on pontoons -
|
| https://archive.org/details/More_BASIC_Computer_Games/page/n...
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(page generated 2025-06-30 23:01 UTC)