Test Equipment Anonymous (TEA) group therapy thread

[0culus]

Oh fun! Now you need to make one big enough to ride and you'll have a hoverbike! 

Thanks, no... my name is not Colin Furze.  I'll gladly let that nutcase take it one toke over the line in the name of bombast and testosterone so I don't have to.

mnem
"When Liverpool filled up, all the nuts rolled downhill to Stamford." ~ Random FB conversation

  Probably a wise decision!

[mnementh]

Hahaha sorry

https://www.banggood.com/HSKRC-TWE210-210mm-Wheelbase-4mm-Arm-3K-Carbon-Fiber-X-Type-FPV-Racing-Frame-Kit-for-RC-Drone-p-1283150.html?rmmds=myorder&cur_warehouse=UK

Shipping from UK at moment as well for £15.

Excellent bit of kit actually.

Edit: blame mnementh for this one

Source material:

I'll take the blame happily. 

Do yourself a flavor and avoid the CMOS camera; spend the extra money on the CCD camera. CMOS are cheap, and there's a reason; they SUCK. Motion blurring is enough to make you blarf, and all the "high resolution" they claim goes right down the shitter as soon as you start moving.

The F4 Omnibus FC he recommends is okay; it's optimized for ßetaƒlight, which is a good firmware to start with and learn the basics of PID tuning. I just dislike FCs that run main current through the FC as that brings all the ESC switching noise right onto the FC, and the fat wires from BATT & ESC tend to carry a lot of vibration, which is exactly what you DON'T want on your gyro/accel. Also it tends to be a current bottleneck. I prefer a separate PDB so only skinny wires to the FC; less vibe, less EMI.

Your builder doesn't mention it, and some of the modern ESCs don't need it, but I still recommend a 470-1000uF low ESR electrolytic right at the battery connector, or 220-330uF where the ESC solders onto the PDB. On that FC, I'd probably put at least a 330 uF on each side, across (+) for one ESC and (-) for the other, leads cut to 3mm and soldered to 20-25mm pigtails of 18ga silicone wire with the caps silicone RTVed direct to the frame. This maximizes filtering while minimizing vibration transmitted to the FC; if you just solder the cap direct to the soft-mounted FC it becomes a low-frequency tuning fork that eventually rips the pads off.

Cheers,

mnem
moo.

[bd139]

I ordered the CCD one. The CMOS one made me instantly think of those hacks where you used to use a decapped DRAM as a camera that was popular back in the mid 1980s.


TEA related, my 33120A is arriving tomorrow (woohoo) and got me some Pornoma stuff in the post today (seeing as I set fire to the other set of these I have  )

I use these more than DMM probes as you don't have to have hands on when using them.

[mnementh]

Still waiting on all my lead fab bits from AliEx and BG.    But should be any day now.

Not like I have time to fuck around with that right now anyhow... 

mnem
*Drowning in a sea of boxes*

[bd139]

I am currently at the mercy of the codebase of a thousand idiots that takes 30 minutes to build every time I change something so I have plenty of time on my hands today

[mnementh]

So working for the DMV then? 

mnem
*Back into Hell*

[bd139]

LOL no. Much worse! If I was a permie here I think I'd go postal after a month or two

Edit: I'm actively avoiding work to be honest so I get some more time for TEA etc. It's just quite difficult at the moment because half the EU based staff fucked off from all the tech companies due to Brexit. I figure I do another 5 years of this crap and retire so I can bury myself in a basement full of boat anchors.

[Specmaster]

No way on earth is that going to happen, SWMBO wants that basement for her hair salon 

[bd139]

I'm going to make sure it's uninhabitable so that isn't a possibility 

[Specmaster]

And the dog kennel and shed? You may have to sleep in one of them time to time if SWMBO throws a wobbly 

[Specmaster]

The best part of having a drone as far as I'm concerned would be the ability to see things from different perspective and things that would otherwise be almost if not impossible to see normally.

[bd139]

https://youtu.be/nuDUb93mSqs

[0culus]

I am currently at the mercy of the codebase of a thousand idiots that takes 30 minutes to build every time I change something so I have plenty of time on my hands today

[bd139]

That’s basically it

Sooo looking forward to my 33120A. Some decent HP kit at last. Probably courier will destroy it now.

[0culus]

That’s basically it

Sooo looking forward to my 33120A. Some decent HP kit at last. Probably courier will destroy it now.

Nice! That HP voltmeter I got last week is on the UPS truck now...

[bd139]

Cool stuff. Everyone getting new toys 

[URI]

TEA again.
Just bought my second Fluke PM6681 universal timer (read here). I don't really have the space for it. 
But for the overall price I really couldn't stand it.

Ah, so you got that one. I saw that there was one other watcher and I had asked the seller what he did to "refurbish" it as well as photos of the rest of the unit. After he replied, you bought it.

I'm very curious about its true condition, when you get it.

Errm. Yes. 

Didn't take that route asking questions -because I've also been there: Asked a seller details about the item and before he answered it was sold.
In this case (I was looking for one since almost two years) -meaning: at that price*- I knew I had to act real quick. 

Just checked the feedback profile, saw that the seller had good feedback also for Test gear >$1k and only one marginal bad feedback and jumped right in.

It's a bit of a risk I admit. I'm also curious.   
I'll let you know if it's  or  -be sure.   

*-Shipping was also reasonable low for shipping over the pond.

Yes but if it was sold before they answered, you might just have dodged a bullet there.

bitmaster will know after I received and inspected the counter...       

[Specmaster]

@URI, I think we ought to call you Dr Frankenstein then seeing as you have just made a monster out of bitseeker amd yours truly, bitmaster indeed 

[pigrew]

I've been spending the last hour pondering if I should use stranded or solid cable when measuring my fancy new DC voltage reference. I see so many photos of cat5 UTP pairs on this forum, but I don't know if they are stranded or solid.

I could only find one paper talking about solid vs stranded. It suggests to use either very expensive solid wire, or any stranded wire.

I think my current plan is to use USB cables for DC measurements. They have a nice twisted pair (positive and negative) and a shield (guard). What to do with the power pins? I think tie them to guard, too.

Triboelectric is a dirty word.

[Mr. Scram]

Hahaha sorry

https://www.banggood.com/HSKRC-TWE210-210mm-Wheelbase-4mm-Arm-3K-Carbon-Fiber-X-Type-FPV-Racing-Frame-Kit-for-RC-Drone-p-1283150.html?rmmds=myorder&cur_warehouse=UK

Shipping from UK at moment as well for £15.

Excellent bit of kit actually.

Edit: blame mnementh for this one

Source material:

Guys, can you quit this? This is going to cost me money.

[bd139]

Now I have two rails, I can have some fun building bd139's scope thing!

After reading this, and in the interest of being a completely awkward sod I've been working on a new version of this today to make it easier for people to build one. This one runs of a single 9V battery and one rail





Quadrature oscillator working so far (the hard bit)...

[0culus]

3455A voltmeter arrived! Not a whole lot of time today for testing, but she powers on. Some sticky keys, but I was able to free up the power switch with contact cleaner so I'm confident that the buttons can be fixed as well. Very clean inside.

[xrunner]

Some sticky keys, but I was able to free up the power switch with contact cleaner so I'm confident that the buttons can be fixed as well. Very clean inside.

I and others have dealt with the key thing. I have pics in other threads dealing with how to fix them which includes dealing with the little metal strip and some lubrication that makes them work like new. 

[bd139]

Congratulations. I want one now 

[0culus]

Some sticky keys, but I was able to free up the power switch with contact cleaner so I'm confident that the buttons can be fixed as well. Very clean inside.

I and others have dealt with the key thing. I have pics in other threads dealing with how to fix them which includes dealing with the little metal strip and some lubrication that makes them work like new. 

What's the procedure?