Repeater Production for the 

 North Atlantic Link 



By H. A. LAMB* and W. W. HEFFNER* 



(Manuscript received September 20, 1956) 



Production of submarine telephone cable repeaters, designed to have a 

 minimum trouble-free life of twenty years, required many new and refined 

 manufacturing procedures. Care in the selection and training of personnel, 

 manufacturing environment, inspection, and testing, were of great impor- 

 tance in the successful attainment of the idtimate objective. Although quality 

 of product has always been of major significance in Western Electric 

 Company manufacture, building electronic equipment for use at the bottom 

 of the ocean, where maintenance is impossible and replacement of apparatus 

 extremely expensive, required unusual manufacturing methods. 



MANUFACTURING OBJECTIVE 



Late in 1952, the manufacture of flexible repeaters for the North 

 Atlantic Link of the transatlantic submarine telephone cable S3"stem 

 was allocated to the Kearny Works of Western Electric Compan3\ 



hi accordance with established practice in initiating radically new 

 products and processes, production of these repeaters was assigned to 

 the Engineer of Manufacture Organization rather than to regular manu- 

 facture in the telephone apparatus shops. The job — to produce 122 

 thirty-six channel carrier repeaters and 19 eciualizers capable of operat- 

 ing satisfactorih^ at pressures up to 6,800 pounds per square inch on the 

 ocean floor, with minimum maintenance, for a period of at least twentj^ 

 years. Initial delivery of repeaters was required for March, 1954, less 

 than a year and a half after the project started. 



GENERAL PHILOSOPHY 



QuaUty has always been the prime consideration in producing appara- 

 tus and equipment for the Bell Sj^stem. There is an economical breaking 

 point, however, beyond which the return does not warrant the abnormal 



* Western Electric Company. 



103 



