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Re: FAQ - NIM - SPECS - HISTORY ongoing and updated

Posted: Sun Jan 08, 2006 1:25 pm
by Richard Hull
6V in a bin is very rare! 6V bus wiring, output test jacks on front, etc. are common. Most 6V was generated by 6V power supply plugins (2 wide) and went onto the bin buss, thus enabling it. LRS (Lecroy Research Systems) modules regularly used the + and - 6v bus for their more complicated nim modules as did BNC (Berkley Nuclear Corp.).

For those with +/-6 Volt test pins on the front power panel, but with no +/-6 volts measured, here is the explanation. The 6 volt buss receives it power and transmits it on pins #10 and #11 to all modules. (see the original posting in this thread for the pinouts) NIM bins with the test pins have the 6 volt buss wiring. You will need to buy the NIM modules that use the 120 volt line voltage into them to generate +/-6volts within them and output these voltages from their pins 10 and 11. Remember, all NIM bin plugs have 120 volts as a wired buss on all bin sockets, thus, a nice transformer is always in the 6 volt NIM modules. No separate power cord is needed. Once plugged in and turned on, the +/-6 volt busses are now powered up.

NIM module makers worked almost exclusively in circuit design to avoid using any 6 volt power within their modules. The thinking was that if they did, it would involve extra expense for the purchaser of their module as they would be forced to power their buss with another module.

Why have 6 volts at all? Well, when the first NIM culture developed there were a lot of germanium transistors still in use and power consumption could be kept low by doing a lot of the electronics on a lower voltage buss. Silicon transistor technology was booming and was the future so 12 volt and 24 volt busses were also used in the main buss power. Very quickly the 6 volt buss fell into disuse. By the 1970's IC's, mainly DTL and especially TTL were the norm and the 6 volt buss came back into its own as the 5 volts needed for these systems fit the 6 volt, multiamp buss perfectly.

The upshot is that the earliest NIM modules might be found in need of 6 volts and a few of the last or latest might also need 6 volts. Still, most makers avoid the 6 volt buss like the plague.

Richard Hull

Re: FAQ - NIM - SPECS - HISTORY ongoing and updated

Posted: Sun Jan 08, 2006 4:33 pm
by Starfire
Tks Richard - that explains why it was difficult to trace the 6v's in the regulators. Your experience is as always, valued and respected.

Re: FAQ - NIM - SPECS - HISTORY ongoing and updated

Posted: Thu May 26, 2016 1:39 am
by JuanDosio
Thanks again for a great FAQ ! don't wish to be a bother but would anyone be willing into going into more detail regarding specific nim modules. Would quite enjoy knowing what is of use and what is not.

Cheers,
Dosio

Re: FAQ - NIM - SPECS - HISTORY ongoing and updated

Posted: Mon Sep 23, 2019 3:54 pm
by Richard Hull
Again, virtually no NIM bin has +/- 6 volt supplies installed, internally!! The +/- 6 volt buss is fully wired to all slots and their plugs, however, in all bins.

The very earliest bins used these voltages sometimes. To bring up the full +/-6 volt buss, you must purchase, both, a +6v and a -6v NIM plug-in module! These all power up off the 120vac buss and output onto the pre-wired +/-6 volt busses within the bin. I have both plug ins, and they are rated at 3 amps @6 volts!!

Richard Hull

Re: FAQ - NIM - SPECS - HISTORY ongoing and updated

Posted: Tue Sep 24, 2019 3:10 am
by John Futter
There are also European NIM module makers
the first to come to mind is FAST
as we use their NIM ADCs on our accelerator

I started out in the 70,s as an aspiring tech / engineer fixing NIM modules at my first job at the local university physics dept
I recall giving the mnemonic for ORTEC as Optimised Real Tricky Electronic Circuitry

Re: FAQ - NIM - SPECS - HISTORY ongoing and updated

Posted: Fri Jul 24, 2020 2:27 pm
by Richard Hull
Yes, In the early days of no IC's, the systems used often up to 40 transistors in some of the more complex NIM modules with up to 100 passive components. Real electronic engineering was required to do what just a couple of IC's can do today with far better effect. Servicing the internal electronics of one of the complex NIM modules can require a good deal of electronic experience and troubleshooting. Such skills are dying with old guys like me fading from the scene. Any form of complex, discrete, classic troubleshooting is virtually no longer needed. Even the large numbers of 1970's medium scale integrated circuit based systems can't be effectively repaired today as the DIP IC's, what remain of their ilk, are only offered as surface mount items that will always require a good bit of adaptation.

Older surface mount systems are also almost unrepairable due to the lifting of the hair-fine PC board traces during removal of the defective soldered-in component. Most ultra complex circuitry in modern systems are just a "board exchange" replacement. In some cases, in single board systems, total replacement of the entire device is often less expensive considering a new warranty period is also thrown into the new purchase.

NIM and even CAMAC, is a very "long-in-the-tooth" way to do nuclear instrumentation. It is only the VW, (Volkswagen), mentality that keeps NIM going. That is, lots of different available modules doing the same thing that plug in, universally, to a common buss. The lower expense of obtaining older modules, used, in working condition, make for a proven value to those wanting to assemble something special. Like the little VW, NIM can be bullet proof, maintained and kept working' on the cheap.

Richard Hull

Re: FAQ - NIM - SPECS - HISTORY ongoing and updated

Posted: Sun Jan 10, 2021 7:34 am
by ChristofferBraestrup
I've been keeping a list of manufacturers of NIM modules (for Ebay bookmarking) for a while. Some overlap with the existing, but many oddball/small manufacturers:


All sorts:

Ortec (Owned by EG&G)
Canberra
Tennelec
Nuclear Data (Bought by Canberra; big overlap in product ranges)
BNC (Berkeley Nucleonics) (mainly pulse gen's and delays)
Tracor (or Northern or both)
EG&G (non Ortec-branded NIM modules exist)
Lecroy / LRS (Many CAMAC modules, some NIM, some hybrid)

Only high voltage PSU's:

Bertan
Vern Kiebler

RARE:

Helgeson
Chronetics (Became Canberra?? Similar logo)
Harshaw
Nuclear Diodes
Kevex (X-ray diffraction/spectro specific)
Stanford Research (Mainly advanced analyzers)
Knürr Baugruppen (empty module enclosures)
Nuclear Enterprises (British, only one module known)
Hewlett Packard (at least 1 nim bin known)
SAIC
Emetron GMBH (German, one module known.)
Power designs Inc (BIN PSU's)
Ordela
Nuclear Chicargo
LASL (Modules dev'd by Los Alamos Nat'l Lab. Likely very low volume)
Hamner
Princeton Gamma-Tech (Relation to Princeton Applied Research unknown)
Oxford-Danfysik
Nucleus (the nucleus?)
Mech-Tronics
Nuclear Semiconductor
Sturrup
National Nuclear Corp. (NNC)

Hope this will be of use.

Re: FAQ - NIM - SPECS - HISTORY ongoing and updated

Posted: Sun Jan 10, 2021 11:58 am
by Richard Hull
Thank you very much Christoffer! A great addition to this FAQ! This is a combo fact and historical posting I love the list of the the rarities...I have a few.

Richard Hull

Re: FAQ - NIM - SPECS - HISTORY ongoing and updated

Posted: Sun Jul 03, 2022 4:46 pm
by Richard Hull
Updated original with a formal pin-out of the NIM buss plug and modules. 2022

Richard Hull

Re: FAQ - NIM - SPECS - HISTORY ongoing and updated

Posted: Wed Jul 06, 2022 8:38 pm
by Rex Allers
I thought I'd try to provide a little additional NIM documentation.

First, here is a link to a NIM Standard document from 1990.
https://inis.iaea.org/collection/NCLCol ... 98.pdf?r=1

This version is from
IAEA.org -- International Atomic Energy Agency
INIS -- International Nuclear Information System

Since links tend to change, here is a copy of the pdf.
'NIM Standard 1990 - 21080298.pdf'
NIM Standard 1990 - 21080298.pdf
(1.85 MiB) Downloaded 622 times
This old document is (I'm pretty sure) the current version of the full released Standard.

The NIM connector pin-out diagram that Richard recently added comes from one page of this document. Unfortunately, what was shared has the bottom of the page cut off and the original scan suffers from a fair amount of imaging noise (dark speckles).

I extracted another version from the doc page titled, in the contents,
"Bin and Module Connector Pin Assignments"
and saved my copy as:
'NIM Connectors 1990.png'
NIM Connectors 1990.png

This has the missing section of notes at the bottom and doesn't suffer from the digitizing noise. I trimmed a bit of white space around the borders but otherwise it is unedited.

I had done more web searching and found another pin-out diagram in a document from a German company that makes NIM Bins and Power Supplies.

Here is what I extracted:
'NIM Conns 2.png'
NIM Conns 2.png

This one is apparently newer than 1990 and has a few additional functions assigned. Notably:
-- Pins 1 & 2 are now + and - 3V
-- The larger circular openings now specify Coaxial rather than just blank

I assume these additions were specified in some committee addendum(s) but I haven't found a defining document.

------------------
If anyone is interested, here's how I came to find and post this stuff.
------------------

There is a recent thread about NIM stuff.
"Question on which NIM amp for a 3He detector?"
Post by Dennis P Brown » Wed Jun 29, 2022 1:56 pm
viewtopic.php?p=96182#p96182

I don't have any NIM stuff, myself, but was reading the thread.
At one point in the thread Richard posted an image file --
'Nim plug pinout.JPG'

That image has now also been added to the top of this FAQ.

It seemed like a good reference that might come in handy someday, so I saved a local copy. Looking at it, all the important information was there, but it was clear some notes had been cut off at the bottom and the whole image had a fair amount of visual noise (dark speckles) in the scan of the original paper document.

I decided to search and try to find the original source. On a Wikipedia page about NIM, I found a link to a document.
https://www.osti.gov/servlets/purl/7120327

This came from
DOE, OSTI.gov -- Office of Scientific and Technical Information
and was the same 1990 document.
I extracted an image of the page from that document. What I saved included the notes at the bottom that were cut off in Richards version.

This one had the same visual noise as in Richards shared image. In my saved image, I spent a lot of time in an image editor program painting out most of this irritating black speckle noise. I saved it as
'NIM Conns 1990.png'
and shared it in the other thread.

Today I did some more searching and found a different link for the 1990 Standard doc. This is the one from IAEA.org that I shared at the top of this post. It is the same 1990 document but a different scan. It is mostly cleaner visually and the image of the connector page that I shared didn't need any cleanup work.

I said "mostly cleaner" because I noticed there is one page in the doc (Figure 1) with pictures of example bins and modules. In the "cleaner" one these pictures are mostly dark blobs. In the "noisy" one the pictures are much better.

So for anyone who wants to keep a copy of the spec, the pdf I shared from inis.iaea.org is the mostly "cleaner" one. You might want to also download the "noisy" one from osti.gov because the pictures are better in that one.

I did more searching and eventually found a similar page in a doc from a German company, FAST ComTec GmbH, who make some NIM stuff. I think this contains newer information about the connector pin-outs than in the 1990 doc. The image I gave above may be the most current definitions.

Here is where I found that document:
https://www.fastcomtec.com/ftp/manuals/nim7022-7033.pdf

Ok, enough rambling.
Hope some of this is helpful for the FAQ.