DER EE DE-5000 Mods

[Acecool]

Here is a list of mods I did to mine...

I purchased a spare tweezer -22 box.. but having 3 boxes in the carry case was annoying so I modified one of them. I used the GX-16-4 connector with ground going to the exterior, and the 4 pins to -1, -2, +1, +2 with pins 1, 2, 3 and 4.

I didn't have to cut up the PCB in the -22 box, but I did just in case the threads of the GX-16-4 connector would scrape the solder-mask off ( although if it came into contact with ground, that wouldn't be a big deal as it is grounded ) and because it sat inside the housing a little off.

I wired up the tweezers and it passed. Next I'll be wiring up the 2 clips I purchased with BNC connectors via an adapter I'm making. So 1 box, tweezers can connect to the box... the clips go from the box to a BNC adapter ( I'll either leave the clips as BNC or I'll wire them up to the GX-16-4 connector... but having a BNC adapter would be beneficial as a lot of test equipment uses BNC...


I have yet to decide whether or not I'll modify the mini alligator clips - probably not because I have the larger ones with more range... So in the box I'll keep the larger clips, the tweezers, the one box, the unit, usb adapter, power adapter, usb cord, spare battery and maybe a few other things.


All of this is really easy to set up and clears out a lot of space in the carry case. If I end up wanting to easily swap between 2, quickly, then I may modify a second box.



Some issues - with the GX-16 connector, when the box is plugged into the unit... you can't screw the cable on. If you screw it on first, it sits at an odd angle so I may have to remove some plastic or melt the plastic of the unit casing to give it a clear path.. not sure if I'm going to do this.

I am also thinking of adding a capacitor discharge plug near the power button on the right side. I already have the resistors and I've built the circuit ( pretty simple to allow both directions ) so you can discharge it safely.

The solder job on the ground wire to the threads is pretty bad. I was only using around 350C and I used copper wiring from a shielded cable so I will redo that at some point.

But I just wanted to post this in case anyone was interested in doing something similar... It is definitely worth it because of space savings, quick swapping of tools ( calibration required though or? )... The nut didn't fit on the inside of the box, though unless I cleared a channel... I decided against it. I added a thick solder block to either side of the threads which helps keep it in place, and the heavy ground wire is tight to help it too... plus I melted a bit of the plastic into the threads and added a bit of black hot glue ( which is much better than the clear ). I can push and pull on this and it won't budge.