Bill DeVey

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William J DeVey (b. June 18, 1940 in Chicago, IL – d. June 2, 2020) was an electrical engineer who was with Tektronix from 1963/1964 to 1987.

He was married to Helen Eike in Stavenger, La Salle County, Illinois. He obtained a bachelor’s in electrical engineering from the University of Illinois and later an MBA from the University of Portland.

Bill married Nancy Walter on September 6, 1975, in Clatsop, Oregon.

Bill was a circuit designer. In his early days, he worked in Building 81. In September 1969, Bill worked for Phil Crosby in “Conventional Instruments” on the third floor of Building 50. In December 1973, Bill worked in IDD Engineering in Building 86, which was the location of IDD (Information Display Division) engineering before the Wilsonville campus was finished.

In May of 1978, Bill was in IDO (Information Display Operations?) in Building 60. In November 1979, Bill was working in IDD (Information Display Division) in Building 63.

Bill is not listed in the March 1986 Communications Directory.

He worked for other electronics companies in the area after leaving Tek, including Credence Corporation and Sequent Computer Systems (later bought by IBM).

Tektronix products

  • His first instrument was the 3A7 which he did under the tutelage of John Horn in April 1966.
  • Shortly afterward he designed the 1A5, a Differential Comparator for the 540 series Tektronix mainframes, introduced in January 1967.
  • Then he designed the 81A, an adaptor for 540 series plugins to work in 580 series mainframes.
  • He is most famous for another Differential Comparator, the popular 7A13 plugin introduced in August 1969 along with other 7000 series plugins and mainframes.
  • This was followed by his design of the 7B52 dual time base in August 1971 and the 7B92 with Les Larson introduced in 1972.
  • He designed the 155-0049-00 sweep control chip
  • He worked on the 7904 according to http://www.rdmag.com/award-winners/1971/01/model-7904-oscilloscope
  • Bill was the Project Engineer for 7623 and 7613 according to Three kinds of Storage, in Tekscope, July 1972 or @ radiomuseum.org

Products by Bill DeVey

Model Class Description Designers Introduced
81 Plug-in plug-in adapter Bill DeVey John Gates 1960
3A7 Plug-in Differential amplifier plug-in Bill DeVey 1965
1A5 Plug-in 50 MHz Differential Amplifier Bill DeVey 1967
7A13 Plug-in 100 MHz Differential Comparator Bill DeVey 1969
7B52 Plug-in 100 MHz Dual Timebase Bill DeVey 1970
7B92 Plug-in 500 MHz dual timebase Bill DeVey Val Garuts 1971
7904 Oscilloscope 500 MHz non-storage mainframe Val Garuts Thor Hallen John McCormick Les Larson Bill DeVey Bill Peek Hans Springer Joe Burger Joel Swanno Ken Hawken 1971
7613 Oscilloscope 100 MHz variable-persistence storage mainframe Bill DeVey John Durecka Doug Giesbers Ed Wolf Chuck Davis Dave McCullough Dick Anderson 1972
7623 Oscilloscope 100 MHz multi-mode storage scope Bill DeVey John Durecka Doug Giesbers Ed Wolf Chuck Davis Dave McCullough Dick Anderson 1972
7623A Oscilloscope 100 MHz multi-mode storage scope Bill DeVey John Durecka Doug Giesbers Ed Wolf Chuck Davis Dave McCullough Dick Anderson 1974
R7903 Oscilloscope 500 MHz non-storage mainframe Val Garuts Thor Hallen John McCormick Les Larson Bill DeVey Bill Peek Hans Springer Joe Burger Joel Swanno Ken Hawken 1974
7623B Oscilloscope 100 MHz multi-mode storage scope Bill DeVey John Durecka Doug Giesbers Ed Wolf Chuck Davis Dave McCullough Dick Anderson 1990

Components by Bill DeVey

Model Class Description Designers Used in
155-0049-00 Monolithic integrated circuit sweep control with lockout Bill DeVey 335 464 465 466 475 475A 475M 485 5B31 5B40 5B52 5B42 5B44 7B53A 7B80 7B85 7B87 7B92A 7B90P 7B10 7B15 SC502 7B42N AN/USM-281C 067-0657-00

Patents by Bill DeVey

Page Office Number Title Inventors Company Filing date Grant date
Patent US 3599202A US 3599202A Analog-to-digital converter Bill DeVey Tektronix Inc 1969-01-21 1971-08-10
Patent US 3663832A US 3663832A Delay pickoff circuit Bill DeVey Les Larson Tektronix Inc 1971-03-17 1972-05-16

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