Test Equipment Anonymous (TEA) group therapy thread

[Specmaster]

Yeah I learned all about meat thermometers that time

Of course there's stuffing. I do ours different than you're supposed to. Get some sausage meat and sage and onion powder stuffing. Rehydrate the latter then mush it all up and cook it in a separate tray. Tastes bloody amazing.

I am the world's laziest cook.

Ditto with the stuffing, all this talk of Christmas food is making me hungry, feed me

[bd139]

Tell me about it. I just went over to the shops and got this because of it 



(excuse the unicorn plate - first one out of the dishwasher Never go shopping with my SWMBO!)

[bd139]

Not too sure about resting on a bed of carrots and onions, I'm the only one of loves onions (they tend to cause air pollution later in the day  ) but wait, where's your streaky bacon laid across the top of the crown???

You don't eat the carrots or onions. They are merely being punished for their existence by placing them under the turkey. Adds flavour and liquid volume to gravy too.

Bacon goes in with the chopped up and fried sprouts

[nixiefreqq]

188,888 blink of doom!


just zoorched my fluke 8810a.

Ouch! At least you didn't become the circuit path to ground.  But welcome to the destroyed Fluke DMM club. My similar 8800A sits in a closet badly damaged due to my stupidity.

12KV? Sounds like you were trying to measure the anode voltage of a scope or small B/W analog TV. Correct?

yep.  was checking an hp 54502 that looked a little dim.  was afraid it might be the tripler.

turns out the anode voltage was ok.   the internal brightness control just needed a tweak. 


the dim thing in the room was me.

won't be destroying any equipment today.

spent most of yesterday getting swmbo's eye pressure tended too.

yep.....have two really good eye doctors who insisted on opening their offices just for her on thanksgiving day.

the last guy decided to use his laser to drill some holes to relieve the pressure.  (she had "closed acute angles",  whatever the hell that is)

need to be back in his office at 0900 for a recheck. 

[bd139]

My mother had that done a few years ago. Worked really well. Hope she feels better soon 

Just a heads up here. LCSC over $20 under 1Kg free airmail shipping!

https://support.lcsc.com/article/224-black-friday-super-deals

Now to see if I can actually spend $20 on there.

[tggzzz]

Oh OK.....basically like most of us get a turkey here, but with the legs and wings intact.

Frozen solid, check.
Takes up all the room in the fridge, check
Takes days to defrost, check
Takes hours to cook, check
Still frozen inside? Ahem, meat thermometers are a new wonder device. 
No bread stuffing??? Gotta have stuffing! 

Stop worrying. I have meat that has been hanging up under the kitchen for 12 months. I occasionally go down and hack a bit off.

The traditional way that you know a pheasant is ready to roast is you hang it by its neck somewhere that isn't too warm. When it hits the floor, pluck, draw and roast it. Personally I think that is probably too long to leave it hanging, but everybody ought to know how to dress a bird; too many youngsters think that means removing the plastic wrapping

As for stuffing? Bread sounds disgusting. OTOH, chipolatas and broken chestnut stuffing is delicious, optionally with some mace.

As for TEA, I'm feeling proud of myself. I managed not to bid on any of the 9 22xx/24xx/HP/LeCroy scopes stored in an open barn. A narrow escape, but the prices do tend to suggest that there a fewer around ATM.

[Mr. Scram]

My mother had that done a few years ago. Worked really well. Hope she feels better soon 

Just a heads up here. LCSC over $20 under 1Kg free airmail shipping!

https://support.lcsc.com/article/224-black-friday-super-deals

Now to see if I can actually spend $20 on there.

You could buy a billion microcontrollers.

[med6753]

Tell me about it. I just went over to the shops and got this because of it 



(excuse the unicorn plate - first one out of the dishwasher Never go shopping with my SWMBO!)

Damn you, my blood sugar jumped 100 points just by looking at that.

There's those unicorns that are going to stab you in the arse. That's a bad sign. No TEA for you today. You'll burn the house down. 

[CJay]

Not too sure about resting on a bed of carrots and onions, I'm the only one of loves onions (they tend to cause air pollution later in the day  ) but wait, where's your streaky bacon laid across the top of the crown???

You don't eat the carrots or onions. They are merely being punished for their existence by placing them under the turkey. Adds flavour and liquid volume to gravy too.

Bacon goes in with the chopped up and fried sprouts

sacrilege, the veggies are an excellent addition to the gravy and sprouts are for life, not just Christmas.

[bd139]

To be fair I do eat the onions and the carrots out of the tray  ... Sprouts are indeed for life. Never let the dog get them though. GAME OVER MAN.


Edit: have forked off a thread for the Tek 2235 at the following URL so it's easy to Google if anyone else comes across these issues: https://www.eevblog.com/forum/testgear/tektronix-2235-repair-thread/

[Specmaster]

TEA and Audio will be curtailed a bit for me just when it was going so well, I had managed to resurrect a duff CD drive, replace drive belts on a cassette drive then SWMBO shouts up the stairs that the washing machine just bang (did bd139 just pay me a visit I wonder?? ) checked the plug fuse, still OK.

Took the top of the machine and just make out the faint smell of burning, stuffed my head inside and looked around with a good torch and bingo, there was a lovely PCB all encapsulated in resin with a thermistor that looks a bit the worse for wear and many components in the general area of covered in soot, so thats buggered that, Been a good machine though (LG) so its off to Black Friday Sales after all for me 
 

[bd139]

It's Christmas time. White goods do this at Christmas. Bastards! 

Have a look on ebay. Sometimes you can get the logic boards for £25 or so. I tend to just hit https://ao.com now though as they come, take the old POS away and drop the new one off at the same time without having to argue with anything.

[Ero-Shan]

After (again!) having trouble catching up, I show a little sign of life.

There hasn't been TEA for me for quite a while now (as I'm still clinging to my stuff and the room just doesn't grow, the acquisition rate has to drop!).

Since I'd like to play a bit with some of my 300 tubes, I've breadboarded a HV supply today.



Amazingly, it worked quite well on first try.  Looking for an old transformer I found that I had just a single one left, and this one won't give me 150 milliamps at 250 volts. But I guess I don't need that much current anyway.

Good thing is that I could make use of two of my hp34401 at once.

I just wonder what happened to my crate of tube radio transformers ... Hard to believe that I tossed them ...

[Specmaster]

It's Christmas time. White goods do this at Christmas. Bastards! 

Have a look on ebay. Sometimes you can get the logic boards for £25 or so. I tend to just hit https://ao.com now though as they come, take the old POS away and drop the new one off at the same time without having to argue with anything.

Yep, tell me about it! I few years ago the bloody oven went for a posh one 3 days before Christmas. It was insured as well and the bastards refused to come and look at it so I dashing around trying to find a built in oven that didn't cost an arm and both fecking legs. I got a Bosch out of all the others, it was the most affordable and it was delivered Christmas eve and I had to scramble to fit it so we could have a proper Christmas dinner 

With the washing machine I too thought that AO.COM was the place to go, yes they had the one we wanted in stock, £30 off because of BF but they could only do free delivery for next Sunday, otherwise the earliest date for normal delivery was Monday @ £30  Checked around on the web again and Boots had it for sale , cheaper then AO and delivery is Tuesday for just £20 (no free delivery at Boots) and you also if you have a boots advantage card get points worth nearly £18 as well (which keeps SWMBO happy) and with the BF discount it is £20 cheaper all in, winner winner.

The killer here is that Boots run their white goods operation via.... yes you guessed it AO.COM  , so cheaper delivery, and all round better price plus points on their store card, so double chicken dinner all round 

EDIT. That even includes disposal of the old machine as well.

[med6753]

After (again!) having trouble catching up, I show a little sign of life.

There hasn't been TEA for me for quite a while now (as I'm still clinging to my stuff and the room just doesn't grow, the acquisition rate has to drop!).

Since I'd like to play a bit with some of my 300 tubes, I've breadboarded a HV supply today.



Amazingly, it worked quite well on first try.  Looking for an old transformer I found that I had just a single one left, and this one won't give me 150 milliamps at 250 volts. But I guess I don't need that much current anyway.

Good thing is that I could make use of two of my hp34401 at once.

I just wonder what happened to my crate of tube radio transformers ... Hard to believe that I tossed them ...

Looks dangerous. I like it! 

[Specmaster]

OK, back to the Aiwa unit again, now that the washing machine problem has been resolved, just behind the laser head there was a small trim pot, tweaked that back just a smidgeon and the bloody thing reads and plays all discs perfectly, including track 1 was the original problem, so now I need a cheap eBay listing day to come along so I can try and get of some of these repaired audio units before Christmas hits us.

I'm tripping over all these audio units here now, 4 TEAC units just requiring 2 DAB modules to return them to 100% working order, 1 Sony system awaiting a remote for that, might be here tomorrow (strange unit, it needs the remote to carry out 60% of the control functions  , 1 Kenwood AV receiver, 1 Technics,receiver awaiting the imminent arrival of the amp IC and 3 Aiwa units 1 on which is awaiting a minidisc deck to come along and then everything will be 100% working 

Then hopefully I might be back on TEA trail over Christmas 

[mnementh]

Well it's not going well so far. I managed to get it up with 2 bench supplies in the end. Only pulls 600mA from each supply. Should have worked that out to start with.

However the display is flickering. Power rails are 100% fine so this is HT related. No bloody VR37 resistors in stock on RS until December 12th either. This one might have to go away in the cupboard for a bit

Edit: I am now the owner for 5 broken analogue scopes (475A timebase still has problems but switch related). No more!

Just found this in my inbox...



https://tequipment.cmail19.com/t/ViewEmail/d/E29DAD35AFE2B4AD2540EF23F30FEDED/

Looks like you don't even need to hack them anymore... 


mnem
*p00t!*

[bd139]

That's not a bad deal actually. Lowest price is $472 here. Total bargain for what it is though really.

[Specmaster]

Worlds top rated oscilloscope? really 

[bd139]

Price versus performance you really can't beat it if you're buying new.

This is literally the nearest major brand competitor in the UK: https://uk.rs-online.com/web/p/oscilloscopes/1224801/

£369 vs £1944. Hmm....

[mnementh]

Well, yeah.... except calling the 1054Z a 100MHz scope is pushing it a little.

More like a 50MHz scope you can abuse to 100MHz as long as you don't mind some very specific and well-documented artifacting.

Speaking of which... I guess I should actually do the hack on mine, since I'm now well OOW.   

mnem
Merry Christmas to me... Merry Christmas to meeee!!!

[Mr. Scram]

Well, that was a disaster. I was cleaning some dust off the display window of a multimeter. After ridiculously carefully brushing aside some dust with a brush, I thought some residue seemed left. After a wipe with the finger this was not only confirmed, but I was also greeted with scratches. D'oh!

To solve the issue, I thought I'd try the old toothpaste trick. After making the multimeter smell minty I not only noticed the scratches had gotten somewhat worse, there was now also very white toothpaste stuck between the non removable display window and housing. I knew that I'd never get it out if it dried out, so I did an emergency teardown. After washing the front housing panel of the meter with a plentiful supply of steaming hot water, I managed to get the toothpaste out. I washed the outside and especially the inside with distilled water to avoid having water stains on the window, or the inevitable scratches from wiping those off.

I've now ordered proper polycarbonate polishing compound, but I'm definitely going to try that one on something disposable first. It just doesn't end, does it?

[mnementh]

Worlds top rated oscilloscope? really 

Hmmm... at first I thought you were misreading, as the eMail header says "World's Best Selling Oscilloscope Now Only $349 + $745 in FREE Software".

But they really did have the chutzpah to say that on the graphic, didn't they? 

mnem

[Specmaster]

Worlds top rated oscilloscope? really 

Hmmm... at first I thought you were misreading, as the eMail header says "World's Best Selling Oscilloscope Now Only $349 + $745 in FREE Software".

But they really did have the chutzpah to say that on the graphic, didn't they? 

mnem

They do and that is why I quoted it because I dare say that there are an awful lot of people who would dispute that claim with some passion. That is a blatant lie if ever I saw one.

[Wolfgang]

After (again!) having trouble catching up, I show a little sign of life.

There hasn't been TEA for me for quite a while now (as I'm still clinging to my stuff and the room just doesn't grow, the acquisition rate has to drop!).

Since I'd like to play a bit with some of my 300 tubes, I've breadboarded a HV supply today.



Amazingly, it worked quite well on first try.  Looking for an old transformer I found that I had just a single one left, and this one won't give me 150 milliamps at 250 volts. But I guess I don't need that much current anyway.

Good thing is that I could make use of two of my hp34401 at once.

I just wonder what happened to my crate of tube radio transformers ... Hard to believe that I tossed them ...

Hi,

interesting. Do you have a diagram of this one ?
I have built some HV PSUs as well, look here:

https://electronicprojectsforfun.wordpress.com/power-supplies/high-voltage-lab-power-supplies/