Hi Rob -
Hi Pat,
That looks great! More Nixie envy. Such a pity some people don't pack at all well. So much can be lost but it doesn't look too bad from the photos.
Thanks! Yeah, got a bit of a queasy feeling when I picked up the box, felt the meter shifting around loosely inside and heard the clunk/rattle that the broken off handle and loose cuffs were making. Thankfully, it's nowhere near as bad as it sounded/I feared. Good thing HP used to build them like tanks back in the day! It's a crying shame that Keysight apparently no longer does, based on blueskull's recent experiences! Ugh!
I had to laugh recently, one of our real tube guys at our radio club, (you can say a tube part number to him and he can tell you about it! he worked for Phillips when they made electronic stuff in Adelaide http://www.philipstorr.id.au ) was giving a presentation about restoring old radios, he is very brave and tackles ones with serious rust and as he liked to put it "the rulers of the universe" had visited, (he is a great fan of 'Hitchhikers' Guide to the Galaxy' i.e. mice)
Ai yi yi - mouse piss - that's a truly nasty one to deal with, and corrodes the snot out of everything that can be corroded it seems. LOL - for the 'rulers of the universe', you'd think they'd be advanced enough not to pee and poop everywhere! (Though on the other hand, looking at the state of the world perhaps 'rulers of the universe' is in actuality a much lower bar than what it is in my mind...) Thanks for the link to his site; I just took a quick look and think I'll be spending some time poking about there.
A quick look at my recently acquired HP 5221B has one Nixie (MSD) not working, not sure if it is the tube or the driver, not easy to get to, the tubes look v hard to source.
Well, the good news is that the tubes (on mine at least) are socketed, so it's easy enough to switch them for testing purposes.
The bad news is that they're a bear to get to (as you've already apparently figured out); due to the way it's constructed you basically have to take one of the cast Al side frames off in order to remove display window - it slides out to the side. If memory serves, it should then be possible to disengage the little plastic nubs that retain the main board and slide it out to the front enough to access the tubes. (The top lid must be off as well.)
The worst news is that those funny little upside-down bat type nixies seem to be about as common as hen's teeth. Mine had a bad one as well - it would
sometimes light off - and it took a few months of waiting before one turned up on ebuy. I'll dig and find out what part number(s) I had in the ebuy search function - I think it goes by several different ones. I should probably extract the counter from the pile and put the new tube in it before the replacement goes astray! I have to wonder if something like your nixie resurrector would do any good for the weak tube I have - might be something to cobble together and try out.
I just realized I never posted the pics of 5221; I'd started labeling them and getting them ready back when you got your counter but then saw a bunny and went off chasing it before finishing. <edit> Or maybe I DID put them up but managed not to see the gallery there. D'oh!! Here's the gallery link in case you didn't already look at them:
https://pmanning.smugmug.com/Electronics/HP-5221A-Electronic-Counter I'll get them up later </edit>, and perhaps start a thread on the counter in the repair section. I don't know how far into dismantling it you've gotten, but perhaps they'll help you a bit.
Don't forget to post the progress!
Rob
Will do.
-Pat
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Topic: What did you buy today? Post your latest purchase! (Read 2800983 times)