@Prof Shadow:
Wow, thanks! Yes, I've grabbed quite a few of the cowboy's PDFs, but missed that one. That's a /much/ better version of what I have, which is BSP 518-450-106 in a crappy paper xerox form. The documents are similar, but indeed the PDF has schematics I /don't/ have.. weird!
I looked thru your PDF; it has some nice info, but it's missing all the IC's and quite a bit of the logic stuff, and circuit description. What the BSP's call "schematics" I'd more call a detailed wiring diagram; they cover the relays and transformers, but not the ICs, and details of transistor circuits. That stuff gets tricky. What I'm looking for would I guess be more of a "service manual", something the guys at WE/Bell Labs would have to troubleshoot and repair the circuit beyond field repairs. Those kind of documents cover part numbers, ICs and transistor logic. For instance, I've seen some of these for after market line cards. And I think on cowboy's pages, I found an actual WE schematic of a 400D card. A full diagram including the transistors. No circuit description though. IIRC, it was a bunch of GIFs I had to paste together to get the big picture.
@hbiss:
Yes, not many markets for sure, lol.. I'm not looking for one really. Just wanted to make a professional solution to this, to see where it would take me. Bones up my circuit board skills, and I actually find it fun. One market, though very slim, would be for film/tv and theater prop rentals. I work in the film industry, and have made technical solutions for many years, though mainly in special effects. Often I see 1A2 "not done right", not only in period pieces, but even in film/tv shows of the 60's/70's/80's. The most common thing is no lights, or lights not operating correctly.
Regarding "one off" boards, most pc board print houses offer small print runs for prototypes. In my case, 2 boards for 2 layers costs around $350 to print, 4 days or so to arrive at my door. That includes silkscreen (white text) and solder masks (green coating to cover the traces to prevent shorts from stray solder). It's cheaper to do a run without the silk and solder masks.. I think about half that price? I have few other hobbies that involve cost, and no significant other to tell me to "curb my spending habits", "get your power tools off the dining room table", or "stop using the living room as a workshop" : D
I remember the "masking tape" days of early circuit design. Ugh. Had to do that back in the mid 80's -- didn't like it one bit. I actually wrote some simple CAD software (in DOS) in the late 80's to layout circuit boards and pads. Single side only, but it spit out PostScript that went to a laser printer that was sufficient for the board printers to use instead of tape up. They'd make 1:1 prints of the page onto clear acetate (kodaliths?), one for drilling, one for traces and pads. They'd include those acetates along with the boards on delivery. I recall the cost for a few one sided boards with various holes was around $180 in those days, including their printing costs for kodaliths. I think I still have the invoices somewhere. Since they "stack" the boards before drilling, one board isn't much different than two.
I do have a friend that makes his own single side boards at home from time to time, when the board is simple enough. He has jars of chemicals and whatnot; a brownish green murky liquid that eats away the copper. I've never done it. That technique is best for surface mount boards; no or little drilling. Tricky for through-hole stuff like mine though; tough to drill tiny holes accurately without a computer controlled drill press, and some of these connectors won't go in at all if you're just a little off. Single side boards also suffer in that, without through holes, the solder pads "peel off" easily. With double sided boards, there's actually a cylinder of metal connecting through each hole, which increases pad stability.
