The restoration of an Elliott 903 at
the National Museum of Computing
These pages will record the work undertaken at The National Museum of
Computing (TNMOC) to restore to
working condition an Elliott 903 computer.
Elliott 900 series resources:
The best online source of information about the Elliott 900 series of
machines is the Computer Conservation Societies "Our Computer Herritage"
website.
"As Collected"
The 903 was collected from a private house in Bedford on Saturday 20th
November 2010. It had been dismantled into its component parts
some years ago when it was put into a loft for storage. More
recently it had been stored in a downstairs extension to a house where
due to a leaking roof (which went un-noticed for some time) some time
some parts of the machine had been standing on a wet carpet.
The operator's console was stored on its side so the front panel
itself is in good condition. 
Only the left hand side of the cabinet
will need some "rust removal" attention.
One of the 18 Post Office type switches won't stay in the down position
so that will need replacement, but other wise there is only cosmetic
"wear and tear" to the printed graphics around the most frequently used
buttons and switchs.
More images of the machine and its collection will be added shortly.
Rust Survey
Last Saturday I started to photograph all the rusty parts of the 903.
This is the left hand end of the console which was in
contact with the wet carpet.
This is the left, bottom edge of
the CPU chassis. The rust from the bottom has got under the paint
and it is starting to flake away.
This is the bottom of the CPU
chassis which was in contact with the wet carpet.
The corrosion has reached up onto the top of this panel (see below)
This
has made the boards impossible to remove until something is done to
free them in their slots.
