Here are pics of the Bendix HP 3440A I mentioned in the thread that spawned this one. I purchased this and its sibling this past August from Apex Electronics in the Los Angeles, California area. They were sitting in the outside fenced in area, 'protected' by virtue of resting inside a desktop rack unit. (As a New Englander used to frequent rain, snow and ice, seeing all this electronic stuff outside and exposed to the elements seems like insanity, but then again, I suppose just north of LA the elements are mostly sun, heat and more sun. Oh, and dust, too. Lots of dust.) For all their exposure, they're in remarkably good shape and pretty clean inside, though I've no idea how long they may have been there. There was plenty of dust on them, so my guess is that it was for a while.
The embossed metal tags were doubtless added quite some time after they had been purchased, since a 3490 digital meter (introduced by HP in 1973) that I bought on the same trip has a similar sticker with a lower number than the ones on the 3440As. The thing I found to be pretty cool was the asset tag on the back of the meter that showed it had been purchased 50 years to the month earlier than when I got it. It's in the queue for restoration, and the electrolytics inside are no doubt dry as a bone. Based on the serial number, the meter appears to have been manufactured in late 1964.



-Pat