Bob Pease on bounding and clamping techniques
Tim Hoeppner, a product development engineer at Norscan Instruments Ltd. asked if he could purchase and old 1983 EDN article that Bob Pease references in his excellent book on troubleshooting. Since I have paper copies of EDN back to 1974, his request landed in my inbox. I guess nominally we are supposed to charge 25 bucks for old articles, but I could tell Tim was a diligent engineer with an inquisitive mind, so I just scanned the 10-page article and mailed it to him. His response shows his good character, as he wrote back:
- Thank you very much for digging this up for me. Being a junior engineer I’m just learning about all of Bob’s amazing work for the electronics industry. I read his bio on EDN after he passed away and was immediately inspired. I ended up purchasing several of his and Jim Williams’ books and am so impressed. I was amazed at how fun they are to read. I really think you guys at EDN are doing an awesome job at promoting all their work, it must have been quite the honor to know them.
I was glad to dig out and scan the article for Tim since it was such a good one. I have not OCR’ed it since that takes well over a day, but here are the raw scans, click on any image to get the 1024 wide one that you should be able to read.
Bounding, clamping techniques improve circuit performance
EDN, November 10, 1983
So there you have it, and Data I/O and Otto get a free ad to boot. Remember this those ads are from 1983, so don’t count on the address and phone numbers being right. I hope you enjoy the article, Pease was a real giant and a real friend. I keep opening my email program to write him and ask him something, most recently about my upcoming cover story on error budgets. Then I realise Bob is gone. It really has saddened me and ruined what started out a pretty good summer. I guess its time to remove his name from my address book.
[Update] I just read Bob’s bio on the last page. The comment about how he “tracked abandoned railroad tracks” reminded me of when we were are on the analog seminar together. We were driving from Manchester to London, and we stopped at one of the many rail museums. The next picture really sums up Bob’s rebellious nature. Click to enlarge.
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I also found this pic of Pease standing next to a locomotive.
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And finally, here is another anti-authoritarian shot of Pease, touching the naval mine in the War Museum in Manchester, despite the sign.
Paul Rako commented:
Page 279 is a full page advertisment. People pay to get those in EDN so I was not about to scan that in and put it up for free. The article is complete, really.
Leonardo commented:
Where is the page 279?
KGround commented:
Nothing wrong with what Bob is doing in the 'crossing the tracks' picture, except that some people might be unreasonably offended by the hand signal.
He is obviously NOT a passenger, he is a pedestrian.
tfinks commented:
There are a number of us interested in Bob's EDN article from EDN 15 May 1995, "What's All this Hassler Stuff, Anyhow?."
mr coffee commented:
Thanks VERY MUCH for this scan. Must have missed it the first time around somehow.
Great work!!
Anthony H. Smith commented:
Paul, many thanks indeed for scanning and publishing Bob's article.
Having published a few Design Ideas in EDN and Electronic Design, I know just how much work goes into them, so it's clear that Bob must have put a great deal of effort into preparing this article. For that reason alone, it's very satisfying that you've had the kindness to share it with us.
I agree with Ed who suggested that you should publish a complete "Pease Porridge" book with all of Bob's articles. I'd also like to see a book with all of Jim Williams' articles. I'd buy them both.
By the way, Paul, I am VERY envious of your collection of paper copies of EDN going back to 1974! I have paper copies going back to the early '90's and I cherish them all!
Charlie Delta commented:
As a Mancunian (well almost - 7 miles from city centre) Bob's spirit encompasses the Spirit of the Northern Capital. My great-grandfarther help build the city with the same spirit.
We will all miss Bob's expertise and his spirit
Winfield Hill commented:
Thanks very much Paul, for scanning and posting that article. Great stuff.
Mike commented:
Dude is a legend
Curt commented:
I'm reminded of those Dos Equis "most interesting man in the world" TV ads -- one says, "In museums, he's allowed to touch the art!" Maybe they were really talking about Bob!
joe commented:
Hi this man was "On Track" and I sure would like to see a book of "All That Stuff".
Joe Dublin
David W commented:
Please check page 282, page 05 of the scann for Figure 4.
Brooklyn Em commented:
Figure 4 is on the same page as 5 & 6. The other pages "missing" must be ads because best I can tell the text reads right through.
Lilacbarn commented:
As Mike says above, Fig 4 is missing.
But page numbers 279, 285 and 287 seem to be missing which may include fig4.
Great article and advice!
Mikey commented:
Paul,
Thanks for the Pics of Bob Pease, I only meant Bob a few times, I think the railroad picture is how I want to remember him, I hung it on my cube wall!
Davidm commented:
Now this is GREAT!! Love the pic of the rebel BOB. All good engineers need to have a little rebel in them.
bigMoose commented:
I sure miss Bob! Great article, and the picture of Bob in his youth has the same sparkle in his eye that he had as a grey beard!
R. Crumb commented:
Bob Pease, the original Mr. Natural.
"Jus' passin' thru!"
Mike commented:
OK So where did Fig.4 go?
Ed commented:
Hey EDN, have you ever considered publishing a complete "Pease Porridge" book with all of Bob's articles?
I'd consider buying something like that.
factor10mm commented:
Sure miss all those "What's All This ____ Anyhow?" articles he wrote, too. In the age of CAD and CAM he was a strong advocate for CSE: "common sense engineering."
biff44 commented:
Excellent circuits. I have used a variation of the 4-diode bridge clamp in figure 12 in very high speed circuits. If you put a resistor from lowest juntion to ground, in place of the direct ground connection; and an equal valued resistor at the top most juntion to +V, you get an excellent bidirectional hard clamp.
pselzer commented:
Looks as if Bob Pease likes "living on the edge"!
