Test Equipment Anonymous (TEA) group therapy thread

[bd139]

Decided to have a clear out here. The repair queue is nearly empty now after some effort in the last couple of weeks. 4 working scopes now up from 1. Granted I did buy one and it worked. Unfortunately I can't find the stuff that doesn't work now so a lot of the repaired stuff is going. Also need to downsize before even thinking about moving house this time. I was on the way back from a house viewing the other day and nearly had a panic attack at the thought of trying to pack and move it all.

My ebay sale spreadsheet is 87 items long now  ... starting to feel the same pressure that causes tggzzz to threaten to sell stuff at Dunstable.

Incidentally I'm not going to Dunstable now unless I shift some stuff between now and then which is unlikely.

Edit: Ok definitely not doing Dunstable now and just motivated myself to clear out... 



It physically hurt to press that button. It was either that or an SA. Elecraft won. K2 + KSB2 + KNB2 + KAT2 + hat + mic. 

Edit 2: My excuse is it has a built in frequency counter and DVM, SWR meter and power meter so it's a test gear purchase 

[med6753]

Decided to have a clear out here. The repair queue is nearly empty now after some effort in the last couple of weeks. 4 working scopes now up from 1. Granted I did buy one and it worked. Unfortunately I can't find the stuff that doesn't work now so a lot of the repaired stuff is going. Also need to downsize before even thinking about moving house this time. I was on the way back from a house viewing the other day and nearly had a panic attack at the thought of trying to pack and move it all.

My ebay sale spreadsheet is 87 items long now  ... starting to feel the same pressure that causes tggzzz to threaten to sell stuff at Dunstable.

Incidentally I'm not going to Dunstable now unless I shift some stuff between now and then which is unlikely.

Edit: Ok definitely not doing Dunstable now and just motivated myself to clear out... 



It physically hurt to press that button. It was either that or an SA. Elecraft won. K2 + KSB2 + KNB2 + KAT2 + hat + mic. 

Edit 2: My excuse is it has a built in frequency counter and DVM, SWR meter and power meter so it's a test gear purchase 

Baloney! Before you know it you'll be dressed in old dirty clothes and unwashed. Joining the other hobos. 

[bd139]

Already there. Not far to fall 

[Specmaster]

Ditto, washing and changing clothes and other shit just means less time for TEA 

[Kosmic]

hehe 

[Specmaster]

Decided to have a clear out here. The repair queue is nearly empty now after some effort in the last couple of weeks. 4 working scopes now up from 1. Granted I did buy one and it worked. Unfortunately I can't find the stuff that doesn't work now so a lot of the repaired stuff is going. Also need to downsize before even thinking about moving house this time. I was on the way back from a house viewing the other day and nearly had a panic attack at the thought of trying to pack and move it all.

My ebay sale spreadsheet is 87 items long now  ... starting to feel the same pressure that causes tggzzz to threaten to sell stuff at Dunstable.

Incidentally I'm not going to Dunstable now unless I shift some stuff between now and then which is unlikely.

Edit: Ok definitely not doing Dunstable now and just motivated myself to clear out... 



It physically hurt to press that button. It was either that or an SA. Elecraft won. K2 + KSB2 + KNB2 + KAT2 + hat + mic. 

Edit 2: My excuse is it has a built in frequency counter and DVM, SWR meter and power meter so it's a test gear purchase 

Baloney! Before you know it you'll be dressed in old dirty clothes and unwashed. Joining the other hobos. 

Don't worry, he's just kidding himself, with that order confirmation he's just chucked himself right back in there with the unwashed radio heads, so it's only a matter of time before he'll be back at the ham fests   

[worsthorse]

Decided to have a clear out here. The repair queue is nearly empty now after some effort in the last couple of weeks. 4 working scopes now up from 1. Granted I did buy one and it worked. Unfortunately I can't find the stuff that doesn't work now so a lot of the repaired stuff is going. Also need to downsize before even thinking about moving house this time. I was on the way back from a house viewing the other day and nearly had a panic attack at the thought of trying to pack and move it all.

My ebay sale spreadsheet is 87 items long now  ... starting to feel the same pressure that causes tggzzz to threaten to sell stuff at Dunstable.

Incidentally I'm not going to Dunstable now unless I shift some stuff between now and then which is unlikely.

Edit: Ok definitely not doing Dunstable now and just motivated myself to clear out... 



It physically hurt to press that button. It was either that or an SA. Elecraft won. K2 + KSB2 + KNB2 + KAT2 + hat + mic. 

Edit 2: My excuse is it has a built in frequency counter and DVM, SWR meter and power meter so it's a test gear purchase 

Baloney! Before you know it you'll be dressed in old dirty clothes and unwashed. Joining the other hobos. 

Don't worry, he's just kidding himself, with that order confirmation he's just chucked himself right back in there with the unwashed radio heads, so it's only a matter of time before he'll be back at the ham fests   

Don't let these guys give you a hard time. Elecraft owners are, as a group, well-mannered, well-dressed, and often smelling of good single malt scotch. Not a hobo in the bunch. Just ask 'em 

[bd139]

Might have to clean up my act 

[mnementh]

Mnem... It's hard to know without a 1955 twin lead only usa cable mount socket - the surplus sales socket will need a bit of bodge-ing - it looks too big as is but it is closer than I have at present.

Hi Rob - I just looked at mine in hopes of providing some insight.  I can't - they have fixed power cords with bog standard strain reliefs.  If it could be fitted without too much filing and hacking, if I were in your shoes I'd put in a regular IEC C14 mains connector.

-Pat

Thanks guys, the internal diameter is 25mm, the male connectors are 12.5mm apart from each other and centred in the hole, they are equal size at 6.3mm, ie all non metric. Is this is the old USA standard? (it was made in 1955).
 I think I have found an iec chassis 'plug'  that will fit with minimal /no panel work - if not, I will try either a cord bodge or a mock replacement mini-panel with a fixed cord - strain relief etc.
I will have to wait for bits to turn up in the antipodes!
-Rob

It looks a lot like the connector in pictures 5&6 would fit, on this useful site for old electrical fittings;
https://www.plugsocketmuseum.nl/NorthAm2.html

And why didn't you measure it in inches, I have checked a modern US cord I have here and the blades of the plug are 1/2 inch apart (12.7mm) & 1/4 inch wide (6.35mm).

Homepage for the plug socket museum website:
https://www.plugsocketmuseum.nl/Overview.html

David

Yup; that socket is the non-polarized version then. Like I said, it was hard to tell from the photo.

Those measurements match with US standard of 1/16" x 1/4" (nominal; thickness varies a bit) blades spaced 1/2" apart (center to center). This part of the standard has not changed; only the width of the NEUTRAL blade has changed for the sake of polarization. Even on grounded plugs, the standard is still 1/4" x 1/16" sized blades.

It's hard to say for sure then on the cord-end socket from Surplus Sales; guessing from the photo it Looks bigger than 1" nominal/25mm OD, but again, that's just a guess. 

Personally I'd still hack my cord from a grounded extension like the one I showed, just so I could mod the cord with a brush contact to make the chassis grounded. But that wouldn't look as good as an original molded cord. It's a tough call; neither choice presents an optimal appearance, and the OEM cord will be pretty much unobtanium unless you get crazy lucky at a hamfest or flea market and find a 50-year-old vacuum-cleaner cord in usable condition.

*Light dawns*

You know... that MAY be a source for you. Vacuum cleaners were by far the largest users of this type of socket; you may be able to find a cord locally from a vacuum cleaner repair shop. I know from experience that when I need an extra long cord for test equipment, that's where to go. Electrolux used to use 16/18ga 2-wire and 3-wire cords that match the IEC profile on many models; they're still available as new manufacture in 25/30/50 foot lengths. And available in straight or right-angle on the socket end. 

mnem
*currently having a sordid and unnatural affair with his morning cup of coffee*

[med6753]

Decided to have a clear out here. The repair queue is nearly empty now after some effort in the last couple of weeks. 4 working scopes now up from 1. Granted I did buy one and it worked. Unfortunately I can't find the stuff that doesn't work now so a lot of the repaired stuff is going. Also need to downsize before even thinking about moving house this time. I was on the way back from a house viewing the other day and nearly had a panic attack at the thought of trying to pack and move it all.

My ebay sale spreadsheet is 87 items long now  ... starting to feel the same pressure that causes tggzzz to threaten to sell stuff at Dunstable.

Incidentally I'm not going to Dunstable now unless I shift some stuff between now and then which is unlikely.

Edit: Ok definitely not doing Dunstable now and just motivated myself to clear out... 



It physically hurt to press that button. It was either that or an SA. Elecraft won. K2 + KSB2 + KNB2 + KAT2 + hat + mic. 

Edit 2: My excuse is it has a built in frequency counter and DVM, SWR meter and power meter so it's a test gear purchase 

Baloney! Before you know it you'll be dressed in old dirty clothes and unwashed. Joining the other hobos. 

Don't worry, he's just kidding himself, with that order confirmation he's just chucked himself right back in there with the unwashed radio heads, so it's only a matter of time before he'll be back at the ham fests   

Don't let these guys give you a hard time. Elecraft owners are, as a group, well-mannered, well-dressed, and often smelling of good single malt scotch. Not a hobo in the bunch. Just ask 'em 

Really? Did a google search of Elecraft owners and came up with this. 

[mnementh]

Decided to have a clear out here. The repair queue is nearly empty now after some effort in the last couple of weeks. 4 working scopes now up from 1. Granted I did buy one and it worked. Unfortunately I can't find the stuff that doesn't work now so a lot of the repaired stuff is going. Also need to downsize before even thinking about moving house this time. I was on the way back from a house viewing the other day and nearly had a panic attack at the thought of trying to pack and move it all.

My ebay sale spreadsheet is 87 items long now  ... starting to feel the same pressure that causes tggzzz to threaten to sell stuff at Dunstable.

Incidentally I'm not going to Dunstable now unless I shift some stuff between now and then which is unlikely.

Edit: Ok definitely not doing Dunstable now and just motivated myself to clear out... 



It physically hurt to press that button. It was either that or an SA. Elecraft won. K2 + KSB2 + KNB2 + KAT2 + hat + mic. 

Edit 2: My excuse is it has a built in frequency counter and DVM, SWR meter and power meter so it's a test gear purchase 

Baloney! Before you know it you'll be dressed in old dirty clothes and unwashed. Joining the other hobos. 

Don't worry, he's just kidding himself, with that order confirmation he's just chucked himself right back in there with the unwashed radio heads, so it's only a matter of time before he'll be back at the ham fests   

Good grief... we've known bd for years now. It was immediately obvious, to me at least, that he fell into that hole long before we met in here. 

He was RF-contaminated by the airwaves ages ago; he's just been treading water trying to convince himself otherwise until he could afford the good stuff. Or until he could MAKE HIMSELF afford the good stuff.

The fact he chose the Elecraft over a SA is just proof he's been irreversibly contaminated. 

mnem

[mnementh]

Volex did still make both the normal and reversed polarity cords some years ago. And to confuse matters they is a slightly smaller version too (I have a calculator with one). Do you have any more details on the actual standard for the connector type, the Volex data-sheet from 2007 just refers to the connector as being type PH163 and an Alpha data-sheet doesn't even mention the type.

Volex 17952 8 B1 (non-standard polarization).      Volex 17280 8 B1 (standard polarization).   

David

Honestly, no. What you've located there is more details than anything I've seen since my high-school days. We ordered replacement cords from a Scholastic A/V supplier who would accept POs, so really didn't have anything but a catalog with a photo like the one below and their part number next to it. We had a catalog-handbook of all sorts of power cords with tech drawings like that in it, but that reference was from the dept head's personal collection. That was where I learned the difference between IEC, UL-Approved vs Non, NEMA, etc. standardized power cords & receptacles; you could usually find them listed by that type and current capacity in the catalogs of the time.

And I'll be honest, most of the terminology I'm using here is from memory; things have changed and I'm sure most of the memory cells that info is stored on are far beyond their best-by date.

mnem
 

Apparently I permanently borrowed that Volex data-sheet in 2011, the source was the Newark listing for that cord, unfortunately Newark used a link from the Volex website which has since been disconnected. 

Alpha also made the cord with the PH163 connector, type 543 is the standard polarization & type 544 is the non-standard polarization. This doesn't help much either as they also seem to have stopped making them. 

I've done a bit more digging and have found a pdf for the discontinued Alpha 543 cord on the Allied Electronics site, which also gives the connector type as PH-163;
https://www.alliedelec.com/product/alpha-wire/543-bk078/70125977/
I have added the pdf here in case it also becomes a dead link.

David

Thanks for the having the foresight... I think we should ask bitseeker to start a library section on the first page for the thread. Things like this are bound to be invaluable reference for the future, like my carefully guarded dead-tree copies of the ECG. 

mnem
*data-hoarder*

[mnementh]

Might have to clean up my act 

That'll be hard, living on ramen noodles and pork & beans for the next 6 months to pay for your new toy... 

mnem
good luck widdat! 

[med6753]

Playing around with the 2430 DSO and trying to understand all it's functions and idiosyncrasies and I came across something that initially didn't make sense but true to form if you RTFM it makes sense. Sort of.

This is the 2430 in normal I would say “analog” mode displaying a 10MHz square wave from the Heath IG-4244. It looks terrible for a scope with a supposed 150MHz bandpass. It almost looks like a bandwidth limiter is on but according to the screen prompts it isn't.



So. RTFM. In Acquire mode there's this key called “REPET”. Turn it on and look what happens. The 10MHz square wave now looks as it should. I attached here what that “REPET” button does. Apparently with it off the scope IS limited to 40MHz bandpass. With it on full 150MHz bandpass. But it doesn't explain WHY it does this. Perhaps due to memory limitations? Anyone want to venture a guess?






BTW.....I've been beating this scope unmercifully for the past week and there's been no more CCD hybrid failures.

[bd139]

 

Good grief... we've known bd for years now. It was immediately obvious, to me at least, that he fell into that hole long before we met in here. 

He was RF-contaminated by the airwaves ages ago; he's just been treading water trying to convince himself otherwise until he could afford the good stuff. Or until he could MAKE HIMSELF afford the good stuff.

The fact he chose the Elecraft over a SA is just proof he's been irreversibly contaminated. 

This is exactly it. This goes waaaay back to the 70s. I've just been devoid of opportunity, money, time and too full of distractions until recently.

Really? Did a google search of Elecraft owners and came up with this. 

TBF that's the average queue at a hamfest around here.

That'll be hard, living on ramen noodles and pork & beans for the next 6 months to pay for your new toy... 

I'm going to "ebay like fuck". Knowing my luck there will be no more £1 listing weekends now 

Perhaps I should go to Dunstable as a seller 

[GreyWoolfe]

Here's an off the wall question for the TEA crowd: what's your favorite nonconductive adjustment/alignment tool(s)? I'm looking for some that don't end up twisting and breaking like the plastic ones I have.

For an off the wall answer, rubber mallets: small for small adjustments and large for large.  For really large adjustments/alighments, 2 pound hammer, 3 foot crowbar and 4 foot breaker bar for really tough nuts. 

For electronics, someone gave me a decent assortment of adjustment tools, haven't used them much so haven't borked any yet.

[GreyWoolfe]

Might have to clean up my act 

That'll be hard, living on ramen noodles and pork & beans for the next 6 months to pay for your new toy... 

mnem
good luck widdat! 

Hopefully, not in the same bowl!!!

[tggzzz]

Decided to have a clear out here. The repair queue is nearly empty now after some effort in the last couple of weeks. 4 working scopes now up from 1. Granted I did buy one and it worked. Unfortunately I can't find the stuff that doesn't work now so a lot of the repaired stuff is going. Also need to downsize before even thinking about moving house this time. I was on the way back from a house viewing the other day and nearly had a panic attack at the thought of trying to pack and move it all.

My ebay sale spreadsheet is 87 items long now  ... starting to feel the same pressure that causes tggzzz to threaten to sell stuff at Dunstable.

Incidentally I'm not going to Dunstable now unless I shift some stuff between now and then which is unlikely.

Edit: Ok definitely not doing Dunstable now and just motivated myself to clear out... 



It physically hurt to press that button. It was either that or an SA. Elecraft won. K2 + KSB2 + KNB2 + KAT2 + hat + mic. 

Edit 2: My excuse is it has a built in frequency counter and DVM, SWR meter and power meter so it's a test gear purchase 

Baloney! Before you know it you'll be dressed in old dirty clothes and unwashed. Joining the other hobos. 

My daughter would, very unkindly I feel, ask "how could we tell any difference?".

[bd139]

 


BTW if anyone is interested, there's a £1 max fees offer on ebay ending tonight for UK users. They dont tell you about it now by the looks. Link here: https://pages.ebay.co.uk/promo/

I'm going to list some stuff tonight.

[PA0PBZ]

So. RTFM. In Acquire mode there's this key called “REPET”. Turn it on and look what happens. The 10MHz square wave now looks as it should. I attached here what that “REPET” button does. Apparently with it off the scope IS limited to 40MHz bandpass. With it on full 150MHz bandpass. But it doesn't explain WHY it does this. Perhaps due to memory limitations? Anyone want to venture a guess?

REPET is what we now call equivalent time sampling, I think it's called REPETitive because you can only do it if you have a repetitive waveform. Since the scope can only sample at a maximum of 100 MHz it will just look ugly in direct sampling mode.

See here or google your own favorite: https://www.tek.com/document/application-note/real-time-versus-equivalent-time-sampling

[mnementh]

Playing around with the 2430 DSO and trying to understand all it's functions and idiosyncrasies and I came across something that initially didn't make sense but true to form if you RTFM it makes sense. Sort of.

This is the 2430 in normal I would say “analog” mode displaying a 10MHz square wave from the Heath IG-4244. It looks terrible for a scope with a supposed 150MHz bandpass. It almost looks like a bandwidth limiter is on but according to the screen prompts it isn't.



So. RTFM. In Acquire mode there's this key called “REPET”. Turn it on and look what happens. The 10MHz square wave now looks as it should. I attached here what that “REPET” button does. Apparently with it off the scope IS limited to 40MHz bandpass. With it on full 150MHz bandpass. But it doesn't explain WHY it does this. Perhaps due to memory limitations? Anyone want to venture a guess?

      

BTW.....I've been beating this scope unmercifully for the past week and there's been no more CCD hybrid failures.

You still have some form of Acquisition Mode turned on. Judging by my 2230, these older Tek hybrid scopes default to Acquisition Mode; it isn't easy to turn it completely off. This means that all signals are processed in either REPETITIVE or NON-REPETITIVE SIGNAL Acquisition Mode, modified by other options as you select. The details of just how it handles various acquisition modes should be explained in a block diagram in the UM; this is really the only way you'll be able to wrap your brain around the way these older Tek digital scopes work.

As you surmised, they are limited greatly by the memory framework within which they have to function. Add that to the fact they were an emergent technology at the time, and the roadmap for usage can be quite counter-intuitive.

Good luck,

mnem
*also limited greatly by the memory framework within which I have to function*

[factory]

BTW if anyone is interested, there's a £1 max fees offer on ebay ending tonight for UK users. They dont tell you about it now by the looks. Link here: https://pages.ebay.co.uk/promo/

I'm going to list some stuff tonight.

I definitely heard several adverts on the shed radio* for the ePay £1 listing promotion, I'm sure I have for previous ones too.

David

*Picture taken a long time ago.

[BU508A]

@factory:

What are you going to do with all this tubes with white getter?   

[Neomys Sapiens]

RF truth of the day:
If radio is magic, PIM must be very close to the reason they had for burning witches!

[Specmaster]

BTW if anyone is interested, there's a £1 max fees offer on ebay ending tonight for UK users. They dont tell you about it now by the looks. Link here: https://pages.ebay.co.uk/promo/

I'm going to list some stuff tonight.

I don't know how to tell you BUT that offer was on for 4 days and tonight is the last night, I suspect that you were distracted by the EleCraft RF gear