I would recommend not plugging a turned pin socket into the turned pin socket soldered to the board. The pins on a turned pin socket are a bit larger diameter than an IC and can open up the contacts in the soldered socket a bit too much. I would only do this if a soldered turned pin socket has already loosened to the point of not holding the chip tightly, as a way to avoid replacing the soldered socket. As was already mentioned in earlier posts, replacing a turned pin socket is more difficult than the old/standard sockets, and the board has already had quite enough stress.
It probably is worth setting up the 6502 to run a nop test, but better to do it on a breadboard or protoboard
What I was thinking was to connect pin 36 to 5v, preferably through a resistor somewhere between 3k and 10k. Maybe link pin 36 to pin 2 is easier. This could be tried with a temporary link while watching pin 9 on the scope, if Colin has an extra hand to hold the scope probe
On later 65C02, I think including the rockwell, pin 36 was BE, bus enable.