Test Equipment Anonymous (TEA) group therapy thread

[med6753]

"Amateurfunkers" ? 

You Germans are funny. 

[Cerebus]

You mean, something like this one? 

https://www.ebay.com/itm/133643963414



You are welcome. 

Oh, that's interesting. You can tell at a glance what it's for. That has me immediately wondering how hard it would be to build up something like that with guts based on off-the-shelf SDR stuff.

[Cerebus]

"Amateurfunkers" ? 

You Germans are funny. 

Says a man who lives somewhere that got its name from a exchange something like "Och, it's wee bit higher over here than there. Whit shall we call the place?". The triteness, silliness or just plain weirdness of nouns in one's own language passes one by out of familiarity. Spend ten minutes thinking about it and you realise that we're just as funny/weird as foreigners, perhaps more so.

Placenames can be a good starting point. I remember my 'auntie' Joyce (my mum's best friend) getting into a huge fit of giggles over a signpost indicating the directions to "Peover Superior" and "Peover Inferior" in Cheshire when we were all on holiday together. No doubt the locals say the names everyday without urination once entering their minds.

[Specmaster]

"Amateurfunkers" ? 

You Germans are funny. 

Hang about, thought it was well known that Germans aren't supposed to have any sense of humour, according to Jeremy Clarkson 

[mansaxel]

NAWTS as usual

ooooh, Watkins-Johnson, the NSA house brand...

You mean, something like this one? 

https://www.ebay.com/itm/133643963414

You are welcome. 

If I were to try listening to "UHF" (as in, a dated description of the milspec AM air radio band which is "U" simply because it's higher up than "V" ;-) Not as dated as the pathetic screened banana plug PL-259, though..), yes, that's the one.

I'm more interested in eBay auction: #324307531462 though; the WJ-8711A  is iconic. And HF. Turns out I've bought from that seller; a batch of BNC jacks, NOS Amphenol at a sensible price. Took forever to get to me, but was correct, and well packed.

[mansaxel]

Oh, that's interesting. You can tell at a glance what it's for. That has me immediately wondering how hard it would be to build up something like that with guts based on off-the-shelf SDR stuff.

I've heard, in circumspect ways, that that (SDR) is what they're doing these days. The original customers, that is.

[McBryce]

Volume Testing equipment  Busted my last 'borrowed' Pint Glass from the local Pub and had to actually go buy some replacement ones. GOt to a warmish 30C outside and the Beer was an appropriate 3.5C

Local commercial kitchen supplier I have dealt with for over 5 years dropping them A LOT of $ wanted to sell me a box lot of 72 Commercial Pint Glasses now an EX Customer  Braved Bogan Central the local Kmart and dropped $12/6

I think the definition of "responsible adult" is when you own pint glasses that you actually bought from somewhere rather than a mismatched collection of ones you obtained by discovering that you had a new one when you woke up in the morning. 

But, but, but then my glasses would have come from a different "supplier" than my ashtray collection!

In my first apartment (at a time when I was an extreme frequent flyer), my entire cutlery service (for 8 persons) was from a certain airline, all matching, nice design, fully stainless steel. My mother visited and wasn't impressed, when I came home she had thrown them out and replaced them with some cheap-shit plastic handled set, that rusted and fell apart after a few months. I'm pretty sure the other ones would still be good today.

McBryce.

[mansaxel]

I wrote upthread about my Studer mixer, and what I found in it, deeply buried.. A Rifa... The old one measures pretty ok on capacitance, but is the ESR high or am i just dim-witted on X2 capacitor capacities? 

Today, I could be arsed to move it so the soldering iron and the suck-machine reach it, and swapped it out. For a new one. If the old held up well for 30 years, the new probably will, too.

Also, I received a recent impulse shopping, another microphone... A beyerdynamic M80.  It arrived in the cutest package yet. I immediately swapped the DIN plug for a XLR. Haven't tried it yet, except by driving a 400H VTVM and "eye-listening" to the meter. The connection did not match any of the standard Schaltschema für Diodenstecker, so wiring it to a XLR is sort of experimental. Which is why I got some motivation for fixing the mixer...

[Cerebus]

Oh, that's interesting. You can tell at a glance what it's for. That has me immediately wondering how hard it would be to build up something like that with guts based on off-the-shelf SDR stuff.

I've heard, in circumspect ways, that that (SDR) is what they're doing these days. The original customers, that is.

Oh, I'm sure they are, in all sorts of interesting ways. Why listen to one signal at a time when, with a bit of mathematics, you can listen to dozens in parallel, probably automatically capturing them and filing them away for analysis?

What caught my imagination was the idea of a receiver that shows there might be an interesting signal "4 MHz that-a-ways" from the signal you're currently listening to. I like the idea of an integrated dedicated, single purpose spectrum analyser display.  I'm thinking more in the realm of listening out for shortwave DX and the like rather than more clandestine activities. Could be quite useful for diagnosing and tracking down EMI/EMC issues as well, but a compact "communications receiver on steroids" was really where my thinking was going.

I've had a little play with an SDR dongle, and one of the interesting things to do was to fire up a waterfall display and go hunting for interesting looking signals. Looking around 433 MHz, I could see all sorts of periodic signal bursts from the neighbourhood  near my house. I was running this on a desktop computer, if it had been on something compact and portable I might have gone out and found the sources (presumed to be temperature/weather gadgets like the one I have in our house's porch).

[ch_scr]

You can have a play (and a marvel of the HW) from that technology now, from the comfort of your chair:
http://websdr.ewi.utwente.nl:8901/
That hand built prototype is a piece of art imho.
To be precise: the kind of HW at work there, digitizing the whole HF band and allowing a multitude of users to tune in and listen is very close to what you describe
(the difference beeing that in this case the listeners are not automated and presumably not recording)

[mnementh]

Quick article on “art” for all the folk who received damaged and broken stuff over the years:   https://kottke.org/21/01/fedex-shipping-damage-creates-fractured-artworks

Inventive... post-traumatic art. 

mnem

[mnementh]

bought today a Tektronix AFG 1022 in very good shape. It has one flaw, though: does not power up but I hope, I can fix this easily.   

Oh, that looks really good. Nearly as new.      I press you my thumbs. (Lübke..) )   Show pics..!      

Wishing you better luck than my 8070A! Also a wee bit jeally if you got it for a sane price and fix it without massive contortions/distortions/extortions required...

mnem
*punt*

[Cerebus]

You can have a play (and a marvel of the HW) from that technology now, from the comfort of your chair:
http://websdr.ewi.utwente.nl:8901/
That hand built prototype is a piece of art imho.
To be precise: the kind of HW at work there, digitizing the whole HF band and allowing a multitude of users to tune in and listen is very close to what you describe
(the difference beeing that in this case the listeners are not automated and presumably not recording)

Oh lordy, you've done it now. I've just spent 15 minutes hopping about the spectrum (so far one German station (sechs-null-vier-null)  fading to Russian station and back to German on 6040 kHz, one US nutcase with some "thing" about catholics, one Chinese english language propaganda station and quite a lot of local German and Dutch transmissions). I may be some time...

Bastard! 

[bd139]

Today's fun: Linux kernel bugs. Yes they exist. Found a very very very very nasty scheduler bug in 3.10 kernel which appears to be in 5.10.5 as well  .  Redhat support are useless too.

Scarily enough no one sitting there on their Linux desktops ever sees this sort of stuff or the very dangerous and expensive side effects it causes. The more I do this job the more scared I am

[mnementh]

Sorry; The difference is right in what you're saying there. It wasn't unusual for a car or any major appliance to last 30 years and more back then, and they were designed with repair in mind, and you could still get parts for that 30-something-year-old whatever without having to go to a specialty parts shop.

Your 30-year-old dishwasher is an aberration, not the norm. Any refrigeration item with sealed system is good for 30 years barring acidic intervention; they invented that stuff back then, and they designed it too well; now they have to find other ways (mostly cheap, brittle plastic interiors) to force turnover.

The big difference is the design scope has been changed from decades to "slightly less than it takes to pay them off" and the ones that last longer are the oddballs; usually owned by folks who take special care of them.

There were many many badly designed and manufactured items back then. That was a prime motivation behind the founding of the Consumers Association (?USA Consumer Reports?) who publish "Which?".

The point is to try to buy reliable brands which aren't excessively expensive. Naturally "expensive" does not imply "reliable".

I don't disagree with the concept you're espousing; and of course, there have been and will always be occasional bad designs.

What I'm getting at is the difference now in how low the bar has been placed; not only how much longer was considered a reasonably acceptable lifetime for any machine to last, but also in terms of actually testing the product to be fit for purpose and not a clear and present danger of bodily injury before release to the public.

They actually did that back then; now the consumer is the beta tester on everything.

I guess most of all it disgusts me how deeply and blatantly "Caveat Emptor" has been allowed to infect every aspect of our lives; from hard goods to advertising to politics to the fucking evening news. At least we used to be able to shame these motherfuckers into doing the right thing when they were caught being egregiously evil; now they've developed shame-resistant politicians and corporate figureheads.

mnem
"It's only wrong if you get caught... and then, only for as long as it takes for your cronies to get you off the hook..." ~ The mantra of modern business.

[25 CPS]

Looking back at the last few days of pictures, it turns out I didn’t take any of unpacking and bench testing the NOS 34401A although I did shoot video of most of it.  Here are some pictures of it getting put in the rack:







I think the contest’s over but the clickwheel iPod and Palm Pilot there would be fun.  Actually, hold the thought on the Palm Pilot.

[mnementh]

Volume Testing equipment  Busted my last 'borrowed' Pint Glass from the local Pub and had to actually go buy some replacement ones. GOt to a warmish 30C outside and the Beer was an appropriate 3.5C

Local commercial kitchen supplier I have dealt with for over 5 years dropping them A LOT of $ wanted to sell me a box lot of 72 Commercial Pint Glasses now an EX Customer  Braved Bogan Central the local Kmart and dropped $12/6

I think the definition of "responsible adult" is when you own pint glasses that you actually bought from somewhere rather than a mismatched collection of ones you obtained by discovering that you had a new one when you woke up in the morning. 

*looks over at block full of steak knives deliberately liberated from favorite restaurants as mementos of good times with friends and family*

mnem
 

[mnementh]

"Amateurfunkers" ?     You Germans are funny. 

Says a man who lives somewhere that got its name from a exchange something like "Och, it's wee bit higher over here than there. Whit shall we call the place?". The triteness, silliness or just plain weirdness of nouns in one's own language passes one by out of familiarity. Spend ten minutes thinking about it and you realise that we're just as funny/weird as foreigners, perhaps more so.

Placenames can be a good starting point. I remember my 'auntie' Joyce (my mum's best friend) getting into a huge fit of giggles over a signpost indicating the directions to "Peover Superior" and "Peover Inferior" in Cheshire when we were all on holiday together. No doubt the locals say the names everyday without urination once entering their minds.

Of course... just like when you say "SCUBA" over and over til it loses all meaning. That said... I don't care where you're from, "Deerlick Falls" is fukkin' funny. 

mnem
*used to drive over "Woman Hollering Creek" twice a day*

[Cerebus]

"It's only wrong if you get caught... and then, only for as long as it takes for your cronies to get you off the hook. the next couple of news cycles..." ~ The mantra of modern business.

TFTFY

[mnementh]

The news cycle is now one of those cronies getting them off the hook, unfortunately... 

mnem
"We own you." ~The OTHER mantra of modern business.

[Cerebus]

*used to drive over "Woman Hollering Creek" twice a day*

Why didn't you just step out of bed like any reasonable man. Oh, hold on, you were in Texas at the time weren't you?

[BU508A]

bought today a Tektronix AFG 1022 in very good shape. It has one flaw, though: does not power up but I hope, I can fix this easily.   

Oh, that looks really good. Nearly as new.      I press you my thumbs. (Lübke..) )   Show pics..!      

Wishing you better luck than my 8070A! Also a wee bit jeally if you got it for a sane price and fix it without massive contortions/distortions/extortions required...

mnem
*punt*

200 Euro plus 5 Euro shipping. And I've asked the seller nicely for a good packaging.

Pics will follow ...

[tggzzz]

Sorry; The difference is right in what you're saying there. It wasn't unusual for a car or any major appliance to last 30 years and more back then, and they were designed with repair in mind, and you could still get parts for that 30-something-year-old whatever without having to go to a specialty parts shop.

Your 30-year-old dishwasher is an aberration, not the norm. Any refrigeration item with sealed system is good for 30 years barring acidic intervention; they invented that stuff back then, and they designed it too well; now they have to find other ways (mostly cheap, brittle plastic interiors) to force turnover.

The big difference is the design scope has been changed from decades to "slightly less than it takes to pay them off" and the ones that last longer are the oddballs; usually owned by folks who take special care of them.

There were many many badly designed and manufactured items back then. That was a prime motivation behind the founding of the Consumers Association (?USA Consumer Reports?) who publish "Which?".

The point is to try to buy reliable brands which aren't excessively expensive. Naturally "expensive" does not imply "reliable".

I don't disagree with the concept you're espousing; and of course, there have been and will always be occasional bad designs.

What I'm getting at is the difference now in how low the bar has been placed; not only how much longer was considered a reasonably acceptable lifetime for any machine to last, but also in terms of actually testing the product to be fit for purpose and not a clear and present danger of bodily injury before release to the public.

They actually did that back then; now the consumer is the beta tester on everything.

I remember the situation before various consumer protection laws were introduced in the late 60s and 70s. Your view of the situation back then is rose-tinted.

Nonetheless, modern stuff, particularly consumer stuff, does have a shorted product lifecycle than back then.

[tggzzz]

Placenames can be a good starting point. I remember my 'auntie' Joyce (my mum's best friend) getting into a huge fit of giggles over a signpost indicating the directions to "Peover Superior" and "Peover Inferior" in Cheshire when we were all on holiday together. No doubt the locals say the names everyday without urination once entering their minds.

Near to me are a pretty hamlet "Nempnett Thrubwell", and a less pretty town (Pour) "Peasdown St John".

[mnementh]

I don't disagree with the concept you're espousing; and of course, there have been and will always be occasional bad designs.

What I'm getting at is the difference now in how low the bar has been placed; not only how much longer was considered a reasonably acceptable lifetime for any machine to last, but also in terms of actually testing the product to be fit for purpose and not a clear and present danger of bodily injury before release to the public.

They actually did that back then; now the consumer is the beta tester on everything.

I remember the situation before various consumer protection laws were introduced in the late 60s and 70s. Your view of the situation back then is rose-tinted.

Nonetheless, modern stuff, particularly consumer stuff, does have a shorted product lifecycle than back then.

No, actually, I consider those years along with that higher standard, TBH; especially home appliances. I remember getting rid of my grandmother's washing machine when we sold the farmhouse in '95; it was 30 years old and the only service it'd ever had was a single belt I replaced as PM prior to sale.

My experience working in a Ding & Dent Appliance Store circa 2000 reinforced that... We took laundry and kitchen in trade that were already 20-30 years old, and needed literally ~$20 worth of parts to work like new. The real work was in cleaning the stuff to make it presentable; I couldn't count the number of dryers & stoves I cleaned with a pressure washer and garden hose...  In many cases, we knew they would outlive the brand new ones being sold on the other side of the store, because we were already getting repetitive warranty returns on some of the product lines.

mnem