My first and last Agilent / keysight meter

[wirezzz]

Been a lurker here for ages but I need to rant, so here goes.

I am the owner of a U1242A multimeter which has served me very well for tube amplifier work (except for the slow continuity). Anyway recently my batteries died and I opened it up to discover that two of them have leaked and the contact terminals were corroded through. Simple enough issue... dropped keysight an email for a repair quote and was basically told to buy a new one. Obviously being unhappy with that answer for a 4 year old meter I asked for more details and I attach the following response. Just a heads up if you're a hobbyist looking to purchase a new meter to last a lifetime.

Thank you for your feedback. Support is available for units under factory/extended warranty or repair agreement, whereby repair will be by one to one exchange and customer will receive the replacement with a different serial number. For non-warranty, we recommend a new purchase because this will be more cost saving for customer vs sending in for repair.

A replacement U1242B base price is listed as S$315. However, our Evaluation fee is S$480, excluding parts. After-repair warranty- 90 days, for the same parts failure.

Thus it is more worthwhile to purchase a new model which comes with a minimum 3 year warranty.

Long story short... my next meter is gonna be a Fluke 87v

[solock]

Notwithstanding the fact that agilent/keysight cant or wont stock the simplest part of that meter, were they name brand batteries?

I know that Energizer and or Duracell used to make an issue of their leakproof designs and implied some warranty for leakage, maybe a reachout to the battery manufacturer would be fitting and get some compensation.

[Sbampato12]

Notwithstanding the fact that agilent/keysight cant or wont stock the simplest part of that meter, were they name brand batteries?

I know that Energizer and or Duracell used to make an issue of their leakproof designs and implied some warranty for leakage, maybe a reachout to the battery manufacturer would be fitting and get some compensation.

My experiencies with duracell are the worse. Except for that chinese non-brand ones, the duracell is the worst, not only the last equal or less than others, but they are more prone to leak than Energizer, Eveready, Panasonic and other well know brands.
At least the bateries that come to brazil. About some time ago, when I compared them, the Duracell was the only one made in china. Some others were made in Germany, or Brazil, and cost the same or even less, and visible better build.

[HighVoltage]

I know that Energizer and or Duracell used to make an issue of their leakproof designs and implied some warranty for leakage, maybe a reachout to the battery manufacturer would be fitting and get some compensation.

Well, that was along time ago and because of this, I bought lots of Duracell.
But in the last 5 years or so, I have huge problems with leaking Duracell batteries and I have switched almost
exclusively to quality Lithium batteries and will no longer use Duracell or Energizers, if I have a choice.

 

[macboy]

This is not too unusual. A lower priced item like that is usually considered to be BER - beyond economical repair. So by the time you pay for a technician's time, parts, and downtime, you might as well have just replaced it with a new in-warranty instrument. If course a hobbyist wants access to parts for DIY repair, but they don't care.

I noticed something else recently at Agilent, that they are neutering some service manuals by removing schematics! Case in point, my E3620A power supplies. They no longer offer repair for these, but replace the unit outright if there is a (warranty) issue, and suggest that the customer buys a replacement when out of warranty. The service manual that is currently available has no schematics, but the one I downloaded years ago does. Their explanation is simple and outrageous: (paraphrasing) we don't repair them any longer so we removed repair information from the manual. Almost everything in there is a common off-the-shelf through-hole component, but they somehow figure that nobody needs the service information any longer.

If you own Keysight/Agilent/HP gear, download and archive the service manuals now. Don't wait for a failure, because you might find yourself without a schematic and parts lists.

[ivan747]

If you own Keysight/Agilent/HP gear, download and archive the service manuals now. Don't wait for a failure, because you might find yourself without a schematic and parts lists.

If anybody's willing to have an archive of those, definitely give it a try!

[bobaru]

Unfortunately this is a simple economics situation in today's times.  This "No parts available" started awhile ago with Consumer Electronics.    It is cheaper for the manufacturer to overproduce a run of products and hold back a certain percentage as replacements under warranty.    This way they do not need to stock a warehouse of replacement parts and the infrastructure to support it, or pay technicians to repair them.    By producing more products they lower their cost per unit and lower their warranty costs.

-bob

[Macbeth]

But deliberately removing schematics is simply criminal to my mind  . It actually costs them more money to have all those bullshit meetings deciding what pages to remove and all the other bollocks re-producing the old PDF's sans schematic diagrams, because some pointy haired marketeer thinks it's giving the crown jewels away for free or something. 

Sadly all the Chinese stuff only comes with block diagrams in service manual form too, no proper schematics. Hell they even go to the trouble of physically scratching identifiers from ICs. Utterly fecking bizarre. Thankfully we have some real solid EEVbloggers like Tinhead and even Dave himself who can reverse engineer the shenanigans. 

[Macbeth]

...as for the meter - don't be so uppity - I've repaired many devices that happen to have been the victim of battery leak and corrosion. It's not rocket science. I'm sure your Agilent meter would be fine with a simple DIY repair.

If it's too complicated for you, I will gladly take it from your hands for P&P and a drink.

[PlainName]

is there also an example of fluke repair response to older models?

I contacted Fluke to get a new LCD for a 6500 PAT. Fluke US fobbed me off onto Fluke UK who determined that I didn't have an account with them so suggested I contact one of their distributors. None of their distributors were interested in supplying parts, only entire products, and one disty said that in their experience they'd have no more success at getting the part out of Fluke than I would.

[LabSpokane]

If you call Agilent/Keysight and ask *nicely*, they will dig around for an internal-use service manual with a schematic and send it to you if they have it. I've had them do that for me twice now on legacy equipment. 

And the pasture is no greener with Fluke. 

I'm not sure what the drama is over the battery corrosion.  Just take it apart and use some CorrosionX to kill the corrosion, then clean it off with isopropyl.  The terminals are likely off the shelf, or can be replaced with something close for a few dollars.

Go to some place like here to find replacement contacts:  http://www.battery-contacts.com/search.php?cat=Battery+Contact&type=AA

Surely something will be close.  Yes they have a 100 pc MOQ, but that will still be the same or less than back and forth shipping of your meter for repair would have been. 

[mazurov]

Why pay that amount for a handheld? Couple years ago, I paid $250 for used HP34401A, in perfect working order, calibrated with cert ( Agilent still takes them for calibration btw).

Besides, a damage from battery leak is often non-lethal. Open the instrument and see if you can fix it.

[wirezzz]

Already took it apart and planned to fix it.

Guess I'm just annoyed that they wanted $480 to even evaluate it. A simple we'll ship you over a spare part would have been much preferred. I guess I'm just expecting too much