This sucks. I thought we were done with this crap. Could be upwards of 6 inches or more and later the wind will kick up and blow it into drifts. Lots of fun.
Starting Monday supposedly temperatures will rise into the 50's F and near 60 F. I won't hold my breath.
Also, at least here tonight we go back to DST.
Let's face it, God's just got it in for you.
Not sure about the Almighty but if you said it was Mother Nature I'd completely agree since women have been the bane of my existence.
Huh? What happened to the existing snow? We got about 5 inches, and the wind is starting to pick up. Just in time to go to ski lessons.
However, our snow banks are still 4 feet high... there is no well head visible at my place.
Our snow pack completely melted except for the piles pushed up by the plows. Ground was bare and dry. Ice melted off ponds. I even heard one or two spring peepers yesterday. And now this.
I stuck my head out of the window the day before yesterday and could smell "new mown grass" drifting my way from the park down the road.
I think you missed the point, the item is not sold so no money paid, no gain no fraud.
The "no gain no fraud" doesn't wash, as anyone jailed for attempted fraud will tell you. [Criminal Attempts Act 1981 and previously common law]QuoteThe only time it is illegal is if there is a single real bidder and the auctioneer does not sell as soon as the reserve is met. No one is making the real bidder bid more. I agree it's not good practice but its done. The moral issue is that it could make the unwary bidder think th item is worh more because someone else is bidding - auction fever.
Yes exactly, that's the deception and it's sufficient for mens rhea that one is reckless as to the consequences of an actus rheus. Although the auctioneer might be intending to merely 'puff up' to the reserve and not intending to inflate the price beyond what is reasonable, if they do so it's misrepresentation caused purely by their acts.QuoteAlso remember consumer and retail law does not apply to auctions in the UK.
Yes, but criminal law does.QuoteIt is indeed very similar to proxy bidding on an item with a reserve on ebay. For example consider an item listed at 99p start and £60 reserve. If I Bid £10 the bid stays at 99p and reserve not met. If someone else bids £9.99 it goes to me at £10 but still reserve not met. If I then increse my limit to £55 nothing changes, but if I increase to £65 the bid will jump to £60 to me with reserve met even if no one else bids.
The difference is that you know that you are bidding up to find the reserve and deliberately accepting the risk of placing a bid knowing that you have granted eBay permission to place proxy bids on your behalf. If the reserve is crazy you won't bid up to it, and nobody else's bids are convincing you that you have underestimated the true price of the item in question. That's a world of difference from the auctioneer inserting a fictitious bid with the hope that a real bidder will follow.
Any way you cut this if the auctioneer deliberate drives up the price, that is what they are doing, deliberately driving up the price. Their rôle is to be an impartial arbiter between the sellers and buyers. As soon as they act partially, while still presenting an apparent facade of impartiality, they are engaging in deception. That is behaviour that reaches the standard of criminality, ask anyone who's passed their criminal law and jurisprudence exams.
Hiding a reserve is not attempted fraud because they are not expecting a bid. If it is bid up to the reserve and sold the auctioneer / seller is not trying to make more money so no benefit and no intention to get benefit so no fraud or attempted fraud. If the bidder does not know what their limit is that is their probem.
I can't find anything to say that the presence of a reserve has to be declared. It is very clear however that the value of a reserve does not have to be revealed.
Another perspective:
An item that I want has a reserve (value not to be revealed to bidders, but lets say £50) I want the item at up to £100. Other bidders drop out at £30. Unless the auctioneer bids to the back wall I don't get to buy the item so I loose out. If he bids the wall until I hit reserve I win because I get the item and the reserve confidentiality is preserved. Yes it could be abused and tht would be fraud.
I guess we will have agree to disagree. I can't prove a negative and I'm not going looking for case law to prove your point
Someone please tell me this idiot is trolling: https://www.eevblog.com/forum/chat/heres-a-gas-pressure-vessel-can-i-get-some-advice/
In other news, I haven't actually bought much lately. But I am moving houses relatively soon and will have more space for my lab.
This sucks. I thought we were done with this crap. Could be upwards of 6 inches or more and later the wind will kick up and blow it into drifts. Lots of fun.
Starting Monday supposedly temperatures will rise into the 50's F and near 60 F. I won't hold my breath.
Also, at least here tonight we go back to DST.
Let's face it, God's just got it in for you.
Not sure about the Almighty but if you said it was Mother Nature I'd completely agree since women have been the bane of my existence.
I did consider writing "Goddess"...
Side topic from over a decade ago.
3/4 of a million are living through auctions, possibly a different number today.
TEA!
A package arrived this afternoon. Its my Metrix MX51EX.
Not great packing but it is an a carry case so OK. This meter is clearly completly unused The leads are still tied up and even the spare fuses are there. No sign of abuse around the clip together case.
Sold as "in full working order". Thats odd, it won't turn on First thing - check the battery. No wonder the case has no marks, it's got what must be the original battery which has leaked The leakage is totally dried up.
Clean up contacts and no change.
So I crack open the case. Actually virtually no mess. But the back of the PCB under the battery terminals is potted in a blob of clear plastic. This has 3 100 MELF resisors in it. Clearly part of the explosive proof design. No two component faults, one of these resistors short and a short elsewhere can cause more than 45 mA to flow or 0.4 W to be dissipated. However I'm not seeing 9 V anywhere on the PCB. If the fault is under the plastic that is the EX rating ruined.
A resistance check from battery terminal to the track coming out from the blob shows 300
Hang on that via looks a bit suspect. A clean and mignification shows a bit of track missing.
Before going further I messaged the seller, no response yet.
So repaired the missing track, did a general cleaning and it now turns on.
The LCD is dim with missing segments. Well that's an easy fix. Cleeaned the zebra strips and burnished the PCB tracks.
Now I have a nice sharp display, BUT, a reading of 5 M on resistance and -220 mV on DC volts with no leads connected :--in
There is leakage between the battery +ve terminal and the V / input terminal
So take it apart agian and a very through clean. Scrubbing with water and a drop of detergent, water, 70% IPA and then 99.9% IPA and careful drying with warm air and it now shows over-range on Ohms and zero o DC Volts. A final rise with IPA and a bake in the oven at 75 degrees C just to be sure. Put it all back together and
Not bad for £32 shipped but I'll be interested to hear what the seller has to say about it being fully working.....
Next, and last.
So what did I get in my lot of components exactly ?
Spread it all over the bench and took some notes... here goes :
It's all NIB or in new condition at least.
LEDs :
x100 5mm Blue
x100 5mm Red
x100 5mm Green
x100 5mm Yellow
x100 5mm White high luminosity.
x34 3mm Red high luminosity.
- x60 tactile switches, 20 of 3 different heights (4/5/6mm)
- x4 lovely beefy ceramic power resistors, I just love ceramic resistors, so cute.
- x10 multiturn vertical trim pots.
- x10 9V battery couplers
- x1 10MHz Crystal
- x164 PCS assortment of heat shrink tubing, various sizes and colours.
- 4 gold plated RCA panel mount sockets.
- x2 50R BNC panel mount sockets
- x7 gold plated 4mm banana jacks
- x7 bags / types of Germanium diodes. Eyeballing it, say 100 diodes in total, something of that order. Germanium diodes are useful when you work on vintage gear like me
- x200 (no typo) 1N4148 diodes, because you can never have too many 1N4148.
- A small kit of some sort, already assembled. Came with the instruction sheet, all in Chinese... but the schematic is there, and even I can read a Chinese schematic !
There is a microphone on one end, an audio jack on the other end, and 3 cascaded trannies in between. Looks like the first two trannies each provide voltage amplification, and the last one looks more like it provides current amplification to drive the audio whatever that you would connect to the jack socket thingy. Sorry audio is not my part !
So a mic with a preamp...Not too sure what that could be used for ?! Stick it inside a guitar then feed that to an amplifier to make noise on stage, "concert" I think they call it ??
Might play a bit with that tomorrow, who knows...
- A couple of little antennae. They sport a BNC 50R connector it looks like, so I of course rushed to stick on of them to my scope, hoping to see something on the screen to keep me entertained... no luck : the BNC of the antenna will NOT fit on the scope ?! Looked more closely, see picture below... could not believe it. The BNC on the antenna looks like a Male plug on the OUTside, but INside it's FEmale not male ! It's neither male nor female, it's a mix of the two, it's a " hybrid " !! What the hell is this thing ?! I sure don't have any adapter for such a weirdo plug ! If you know where to find one...
- Kept the best for dessert : I could not believe it... in that lot was a VOLTAGE REFERENCE !!!
A chip Chinese one of course, probably not much good but since I don't have any yet have 25 old DMM, even a Chinese one is marvelous, I have a Vref now, my start in Volt nuttery !!!
See pics. It's a nice one : comes with the crap acrylic case AND a battery with charging circuitry on the PCB. Has a tiny USB port to charge it.. need to see if I have a USB cable with the correct plug type, and will charge it overnight and play with it tomorrow. The sticker at the back gives a real measurement of each output (2.5V, 5V, 7.5V and 10V). I see that it uses an AD584KH.
I pulled the datasheet for that. Looks like there are two variants of this chip: suffixes 'J' and 'K'. The K is the most accurate of the two, the most stable as well, cool. 15ppm/°C.
I see that the 4 available voltages are produced by the chip it self, not by external circuitry.
Native precision 3.5mV at best, on the 2.5mV output (gets worse and worse as you select a higher output voltage).
So not stellar. I don't know it that can be trimmed for better precision, not if they Chinese who sells those boxes bothered doing it.. .probably not.
Sticker at the back gives actual figures for each output voltage, measured with a HP 34401A DMM, so not super high accuracy I guess isn't it ? What is it on this meter ? ... but it will do.
It says 2.50129 Volts for the 2.5V output.
Will play with the thing tomorrow I am sure, if I can find a USB cable to recharge its battery !
Even got to keep the nice plastic box the lot came in ! Good quality and with a hinged lid, worth a few Euros in itself !
So.... got all that for 10 Euros, pretty much down the street, zero shipping zero driving.... I am happy camper !!
EDIT : I just found the correct USB cable, Vref is now charging !
The other day I managed to get myself a free digital camera from the "trash nothing" website...
Do you buy from a seller on Ebay who does not respond to your messages/questions?
Risky risky.....
Generally, no. I might make exceptions for cheap things (like asking a generalist, almost inevitably Chinese, seller that has electronics connectors, sexy underwear, kitchen gadgets and cuddly toys as stock to clarify a measurement and they clearly can't be bothered), but not for anything with a decent ticket price like TE.
The other day I managed to get myself a free digital camera from the "trash nothing" website...
Damn fine glomming there, Spec! Almost as good as my curb-score fully-loaded MacPro, and arguably more useful.
mnem
- Kept the best for dessert : I could not believe it... in that lot was a VOLTAGE REFERENCE !!!
A chip Chinese one of course, probably not much good but since I don't have any yet have 25 old DMM, even a Chinese one is marvelous, I have a Vref now, my start in Volt nuttery !!!
See pics. It's a nice one : comes with the crap acrylic case AND a battery with charging circuitry on the PCB. Has a tiny USB port to charge it.. need to see if I have a USB cable with the correct plug type, and will charge it overnight and play with it tomorrow. The sticker at the back gives a real measurement of each output (2.5V, 5V, 7.5V and 10V). I see that it uses an AD584KH.
Do you buy from a seller on Ebay who does not respond to your messages/questions?
Risky risky.....
Generally, no. I might make exceptions for cheap things (like asking a generalist, almost inevitably Chinese, seller that has electronics connectors, sexy underwear, kitchen gadgets and cuddly toys as stock to clarify a measurement and they clearly can't be bothered), but not for anything with a decent ticket price like TE.
eBay auction: #125188878134
I asked if the lens containers are full. No answer. Muppet alert.
The other day I managed to get myself a free digital camera from the "trash nothing" website...
Damn fine glomming there, Spec! Almost as good as my curb-score fully-loaded MacPro, and arguably more useful.
mnem
I agree with the jammy git - but I'll lean towards the camera as the better score. (I know if I had the choice of one or the other, it would be the camera that would be accompanying me home.)