Test Equipment Anonymous (TEA) group therapy thread

[capt bullshot]

Klystron on its way. Run for the hills, the sky is falling 

You're nuts, aren't you?

[Brumby]

Not trying to be a wise arse but shouldn't this be required reading??

OK, I'm a smart ass

Must add this as a companion to The Art of Electronics.

[mansaxel]

My first piece of test gear...

Oh, an Earth Spike Fitting Tool. Or, also known as "General adjuster".

As I wrote upthread, tool collection is very close to TEA. I've got 6 hammers (counting various mallets), and a 5kg sledge hammer, with a beautiful red handle. I've named it Маяко́вский and it's been with me for 33 years.

My latest addition is a quite specialised hammer, the Hultafors EL. It is made especially for nailing cable clips and other small hard-to reach nails.



I've also grown quite fond of my deadblow mallet; with no recoil a lot more precision force goes into the target.

[mansaxel]

If it's like most companies I've worked for their IPAM will be based on snooting coke in the toilets and counting the dots of blood on the tissue to issue new network numbers.

We have Infoblox. Very expensive, and very good. Best of all, it can serve as DNS for Active Directory (anything can, but this is polished and By A Partner and someone had to pay A Lot Of Money, so automatically is Good.) so I do not have to tear my eyes out and resort to drugs running Microsoft DNS.

[bd139]

Netbox here. Cheap (free) and pretty good. https://netbox.readthedocs.io/en/stable/

[Wolfgang]

Klystron on its way. Run for the hills, the sky is falling 

You're nuts, aren't you?

Why on earth should a Klystron owner be nuts ? I have one too, I make harmless X-Band amateur radio experiments with it.

[Syntax Error]

Also in the range, management for dummies, project management for dummies and managing teams for dummies. Not to be confussed with stress management for dummies.

[mansaxel]

Netbox here. Cheap (free) and pretty good. https://netbox.readthedocs.io/en/stable/

Yeah, that one is nice. Another really good one is Nipap. Reason we went with Infoblox was that someone else (outside the company, so can be trusted by management....) said that it was a good way to run AD DNS services.

Edit: And I agree. It is good.

[tonyalbus]

GPSDO Continued...
Why i even bought this thing... seems the ebay Marconi is also spot on...
and tried the TTi on 10sec...
But now i know... and its nice on the shelf

Connected GPSView also to teh device... then you realise.. my shack is the only save place when we have fluds..
On attic on the 4th flour and GPS antenne just above my head on the roof... still 2.3 meters altitude ;-)


Tony

[xrunner]

Why i even bought this thing... seems the ebay Marconi is also spot on...
and tried the TTi on 10sec...
But now i know... and its nice on the shelf

Peace of mind brother, peace of mind. 

[tonyalbus]

I never bought one of those, it's like to admit I am dummy.

oops...

[BU508A]

You're nuts, aren't you?

You are what you eat:

[bd139]

I never bought one of those, it's like to admit I am dummy.

oops...

It's the Visual J++ book that got me going 

[tonyalbus]

I never bought one of those, it's like to admit I am dummy.

oops...

It's the Visual J++ book that got me going 

Yes perfect paperweight  and it has a cd ! 

[mnementh]

Clean the carbon pads by rubbing GENTLY with a Q-tip soaked in IPA. A little carbon rubbed off is okay (enough to see a shadowy smear); if you rub off enough to turn the Q-tip black, too hard or try a different solvent.

I've cleaned membrane touchpads like this in this manner for decades; only damaged a few that were already crumbly and had left bits of carbon on the PCB.

If they're well & truly FUBAR, you could try a carbon pad repair kit like this one: eBay auction: #174200669357   

Good luck,

mnem
 

Ah, the NASA "space pen" answer. An alternative is to go all Russian and use a pencil. In this case, a nice soft pencil and just touch up the surface of the pads by giving them a good scribbling. Just blow off any loose graphite after you're finished. It may not be clever, it may not be pretty, but it's worked for me in the past. I have very soft artist's graphite 'crayons' handy (no wood, just a very thick 'lead' with a paper wrapper) so I can't offer too much useful guidance on what grade of pencil to use, but I reckon that a 4B would be a fair starting point.

Found a 4B pencil. Fuck it, I'll try it:

Yeah, that works for about a week (maybe a month if you're lucky), and depending on the PCB contacts (especially those made of printed resistor material) it often causes random unintended keypresses as the graphite-impregnated clay migrates from the keypad. Cleaning the carbon pad with alcohol is in most cases a 100% long-term fix (lasts years rather than days) that can be repeated many times before there is any worry of damaging the carbon pad.

The pad repair kit was suggested ONLY as a last-ditch repair for unique and valuable keypads; while the parts are cheap (the kit costs like $12, and all you need along with is some CA and a X-Acto) properly repairing the the pads is time-consuming and requires some care & skill to get the correct finished height off the PCB. In contrast, for an ordinary TV/Cable box remote, etc I'd almost always recommend one chuck it and buy a new remote.

But hey... that's the difference between real and theoretical knowledge... I've repaired thousands of such keypads and have learned from hard-won experience what works and what doesn't.

mnem
 

[Kosmic]

After 2 months i'm still waiting for my USB connectors. Look like I will have to change my plan for my Jim Williams pulse generator.

Ha got my connectors in the mail today. Took 103 days to get here from China. Used to take 30 days at most.

Look like 100 days is the new norm for me. Got another one after 102 days.  Was initially ordered in February 

[bd139]

I got some pin header connectors I ordered in Feb yesterday as well. I've forgotten what I bought them for now 

My DHL delivery has been at stop 209 of 216 for the last 2 hours 

[mnementh]

Clean the carbon pads by rubbing GENTLY with a Q-tip soaked in IPA. A little carbon rubbed off is okay (enough to see a shadowy smear); if you rub off enough to turn the Q-tip black, too hard or try a different solvent.

Yea ... I've cleaned the contacts and carbon "pills" very well when I got the scope several years ago. I'm going to clean again but how are they getting dirty? I don't think it's an issue with cleaning.

This is absolutely normal; a byproduct of oxidation which happens upon exposure to air with ANY baryonic matter to some extent. Carbon is a stable element, but the binders used to keep it on the silicone membrane keypad degrade with age and the surface becomes "glazed".

Add a little electrolysis from the charged PCB contacts and you get this condition which the only real cure is cleaning the carbon pads with alcohol to expose fresh carbon matrix every few years or replacing the silicone membrane itself with a brand-new one. And since they haven't been made in decades, that's pretty hard to make happen; hence the carbon pad repair kits. 

mnem
 

[bd139]

For any fellow space nuts:

10 mins to go on the big stream when I posted this!



First meat being flown by SpaceX 

4:33pm EDT is target (21:43 UK time)

[mnementh]

My first piece of test gear...   

Oh, an Earth Spike Fitting Tool. Or, also known as "General adjuster".

As I wrote upthread, tool collection is very close to TEA. I've got 6 hammers (counting various mallets), and a 5kg sledge hammer, with a beautiful red handle. I've named it Маяко́вский and it's been with me for 33 years.

My latest addition is a quite specialised hammer, the Hultafors EL. It is made especially for nailing cable clips and other small hard-to reach nails.

https://youtu.be/GjOatBz-z7Q

I've also grown quite fond of my deadblow mallet; with no recoil a lot more precision force goes into the target.

An actual drawer in my big rollaway 
Pffft... amateur. I am a ASE CERTIFIED Munter.    And that's just the ones small enough to fit in a drawer. 

mnem
Judicious application of Blunt Force Trauma: Just another service we cheerfully provide!

[med6753]

https://www.eevblog.com/forum/repair/repairrestoration-of-a-tek-type-561b/

Been a fun project so far but every time I fix one thing something else crops up.

I'm going to let it bake for a few hours to see if anything else rears it's ugly head.

 

[Specmaster]

Clean the carbon pads by rubbing GENTLY with a Q-tip soaked in IPA. A little carbon rubbed off is okay (enough to see a shadowy smear); if you rub off enough to turn the Q-tip black, too hard or try a different solvent.

Yea ... I've cleaned the contacts and carbon "pills" very well when I got the scope several years ago. I'm going to clean again but how are they getting dirty? I don't think it's an issue with cleaning.

Ah, the NASA "space pen" answer. An alternative is to go all Russian and use a pencil. In this case, a nice soft pencil and just touch up the surface of the pads by giving them a good scribbling. Just blow off any loose graphite after you're finished. It may not be clever, it may not be pretty, but it's worked for me in the past. I have very soft artist's graphite 'crayons' handy (no wood, just a very thick 'lead' with a paper wrapper) so I can't offer too much useful guidance on what grade of pencil to use, but I reckon that a 4B would be a fair starting point.

Very interesting solution. I'm putting that as a probable thing to try after I investigate something ...

When I had to repair these carbon buttons I used in the past some gold foil. Worked nicely but a little bit tricky to handle. Don't! Breathe!

Again interesting idea, may try that.

I just took some old remote control and used a blade to remove the carbon pad from a rarely used button. I then removed the non-working carbon pad and glued the "new" one on.

Yes replacing the pads is another thing that people do and no doubt it works.

But ... I'm going to do an investigation for a little while and keep this on the bench. The PCB that the keys are pressing against is pristine and as clean as can be, so we know it's the carbon pill pads. But what I want to look at involves a microscope. There is something interesting when I use a magnifying glass ... If I find anything interesting I will post pics.

Thanks.

Another useful tip, is that you can get some silver paint on the carbon pads if they are failing.

[bd139]

https://www.eevblog.com/forum/repair/repairrestoration-of-a-tek-type-561b/

Been a fun project so far but every time I fix one thing something else crops up.

I'm going to let it bake for a few hours to see if anything else rears it's ugly head.

 

Are you suitably prepped?



 

[xrunner]

... the only real cure is cleaning the carbon pads with alcohol to expose fresh carbon matrix every few years or replacing the silicone membrane itself with a brand-new one.

Not true. As of this morning I have repaired the pads, and in a way that no one has mentioned here, nor did I see the way I did it on any internet search (not to say it doesn't exist out there). The alcohol cleaning did nothing at all because they were already cleaned before as I told you. Nothing else came off the the pad and I scrubbed them very well. Under the microscope they remained as they were before I cleaned them. As well, they did not perform any better when tested after this new alcohol cleaning.

What I have done this morning has fixed them and they should remain so for a long time. They work as new now with barely a touch of the key. I hope this will help others as well.

I will do a write-up and get pics assembled, until then enjoy the drama.

 

[mnementh]

For any fellow space nuts:

10 mins to go on the big stream when I posted this!



First meat being flown by SpaceX 

4:33pm EDT is target (21:43 UK time)

And if you're going to watch it, please tune in on the NASA Channel on your IPTV box rather than yoobToob. They broadcast IN HD, not 720P and why make other people rich off of the NASA TV feed...? 

https://www.nasa.gov/multimedia/nasatv/#public

mnem