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09 March 2010
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Just give this issue's Atari Star, Sherry Bradshaw, a paint brush and a few vials of paint and she is right at home. Actually, her home-away-from-home is Coin-Op's Silkscreen department. Vincent van Gogh and Ryn van Rembrandt, move over, Sherry has arrived to carry on the tradition of fine painting.
Sherry started at Atari in October 1975, stuffing PCBs. "I was not a very good stuffer," she admits, "so I asked to be transferred." Sherry next devoted her talents to inspecting power supplies in the electromechanical area. She worked in this capacity until August 1980, when she joined the Silkscreen department as a quality assurance inspector. "I didn't know that much about QA, but it sounded like a big challenge," she says. The challenges her new job put in her way, however, still did not tap all of Sherry's talents. "As a quality assurance inspector, I could not touch-up boards if something was wrong with them," Sherry states. So she was given a new job as a fab technician in the touch-up area.
After a piece of plexiglass or wood paneling has been through the ink screening process, each panel is inspected to see if each coat of ink is precisely within the registration guidelines. Any rejected pieces are given to Sherry, who must mix different colors to produce an exact color match. She then touches up the areas that were not screened properly.
Her supervisor, Doug Irvine, says, "Other people can do this, too, but not as masterfully as Sherry can." Doug adds that Sherry does more than what is asked of her. "Sherry continually comes up with new ideas and suggestions," says Dave Coiner, production manager.
If a side panel has even the tiniest dent, the hole must be filled before the panel can be touched up with ink. To accomplish this, Sherry suggested mixing Elmer's glue with plaster to form a putty. The idea was successful. She also solved the problem of how to get dry ink off plexiglass without scratching the surface or d ulling the shine. Sherry suggested combining butyl cellusolve and car polish—and presto!—the dry ink came right off without marring the surface or the sheen. When the department's conveyor belt seemed to have come to the end of its lifespan, Sherry brought in a needle and thread and sewed the frazzled conveyor belt back together.
Sherry muses, "As a child I loved to color and paint, and when my children were small I used to draw caricatures of animals for them. Who would have thought that my talents would lead to an exciting job like this with Atari!"
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