Test Equipment Anonymous (TEA) group therapy thread

[xrunner]

It was amazing. Best thing I’ve eaten all week  . Uber eats is still functioning correctly fortunately 

Do they deliver across the pond? 

[mansaxel]

Aaaaand BOOM:

(Attachment Link)

PostMord handed the package over 5 minutes ago. Things work.

PostMord? Didn't they send your order by FedEx?

Yes, but PostMord was last mile. I was truly baffled by this trick. Other than that, Tuesday to Friday is OK, especially in these times. 

And I forgot to order 10K resistors. Next time I'm in town (coming week) I'll stop by at Elfa and get some. Price is horrible, of course, but they'll have them.

And, which is why I pulled the trigger on this order, I can now build my balancing amplifier cards, almost (damn 10K resistors), once I take care to not only guess what the silk screen on the cards points to, but also measure what goes where, and fit resistors as they were supposed to sit, not where the silkscreen says. Protip: once you've squeezed components too close, it pays to nudge the symbols on the silkscreen layer so you can tell which label belongs to which component outline...  Still, for being my first-ever PCB built through the "shipping KiCAD Gerbers to someone" method, it's remarkably useful and correct.

[grizewald]

Yes, but PostMord was last mile. I was truly baffled by this trick. Other than that, Tuesday to Friday is OK, especially in these times. 

Odd. Maybe PostMord are helping them out.

My Mouser order has only just changed to "in shipping", so maybe they are short staffed at the warehouse.

And I forgot to order 10K resistors. Next time I'm in town (coming week) I'll stop by at Elfa and get some. Price is horrible, of course, but they'll have them.

Give them a call first to check that the Solna shop is open. Last time I was on their site they said that opening hours for the shop were cut back due to staff shortages.

Alternatively, if you're just looking for standard through hole 1% metal film 1/4 watt resistors, I have plenty of them in 10K if you need some for the cost of a beer.

[WastelandTek]

I'm not keeping up, have other fora, and real life is a bit crazy

is everybody in here OK??

[grizewald]

So far, so good I think. I haven't noticed anyone suddenly going missing at least.

[mnementh]

   ...And we're back in business.

mnem
*fettle... fettle... tinker-fettle... *

[Cerebus]

Yeah, we're all fi<gurk>

[bd139]

Med turned his Fluke into a Bluke. I think that’s the only victim so far since you last checked in 

[tautech]

Martin.M is conspicuous by his absence however he has been keeping his eye on us and last activity was a couple of days back. 

Maybe he's just broken from shifting his triple nickels around. 

[mansaxel]

Yes, but PostMord was last mile. I was truly baffled by this trick. Other than that, Tuesday to Friday is OK, especially in these times. 

Odd. Maybe PostMord are helping them out.

My Mouser order has only just changed to "in shipping", so maybe they are short staffed at the warehouse.

Yes. Entirely possible. On both maybes.

And I forgot to order 10K resistors. Next time I'm in town (coming week) I'll stop by at Elfa and get some. Price is horrible, of course, but they'll have them.

Give them a call first to check that the Solna shop is open. Last time I was on their site they said that opening hours for the shop were cut back due to staff shortages.

Alternatively, if you're just looking for standard through hole 1% metal film 1/4 watt resistors, I have plenty of them in 10K if you need some for the cost of a beer.

Thanks for the offer. Yes, I saw that on the web site too.  I'll take a peek in the component dungeon at work first; since I'll have to go in anyway and do some fiber patching, and get some network devices connected so I can configure them remotely.  I'll PM you if my search turns up empty.

[nixiefreqq]

hey oculus

don't i still owe you some 3440 display boards?

or did you find a local source?

with all the wacky stuff goin' on these days it is easy to lose track of life's real priorities....... TE, cat litter, and chocolate hob nobs. 

(but i did make it to wal mart today and got 40lbs of cat litter)

[AVGresponding]

A test print was fired off and dinner arrived courtesy Charcoal Grill in Twickenham. Fuck the diet tonight. I need protein and carbs!!!!!!!!! 

Dude, that shit looks like you printed it off using the Ender...

The ebay scammer is back btw, reported a couple of his listings for HP3458 etc, user name bannyfp or something.

[Specmaster]

Need a bigger lab, this is almost perfect, but not anywhere near ideal if you collect boat anchors 

[AVGresponding]

Need a bigger lab, this is almost perfect, but not anywhere near ideal if you collect boat anchors 

"This guy are sick"

He's clearly collecting bats in the belfry rather than boat anchors...


EDIT: Ugh, I clearly need to go to bed, before I decide that drilling holes for shelves at 2:30am is acceptable behaviour...   

[Cerebus]

(but i did make it to wal mart today and got 40lbs of cat litter)

Lordy, you're going to need a big bottle of chilli sauce to make that lot palatable.

[Cerebus]

"This guy are sick"

He's clearly collecting bats in the belfry rather than boat anchors...

Hey, don't knock Colin Furze. Any bloke who builds a jet powered bicycle is alright by me. 

[beanflying]

Measure twice, model once, check the model, cut once twice 

The idea to make a nice 90 degree vertical fence to replace the rubbish injection molded one was ok overall execution 2/10.....

EDIT: A little while later MK2 now 9/10 

[0culus]

Need a bigger lab, this is almost perfect, but not anywhere near ideal if you collect boat anchors 

Nah, one of those decommissioned missile silos you can occasionally find coming up for sale here in the states. People turn them into dwellings. Definitely "fixer-upper" though. 

[VK5RC]

Sort of test equipment -
It's grey, very heavy and extremely flat

It's a surface plate! (for some reason I can't load photos at present - imagine grey granite block 12x9x3 inches - 30kg!)

Re other matters
My ham club asked me to do a presentation on Books of interest to Hams, because of covid - the meeting was cancelled - instead
 we put the slides (pdf) up on the clubs website and I gave the presentation over the local 2m repeater, lots of jokes re 2m distancing and the only 'contact' sport still allowed! It was quite good as lots of other hams from the city joined in, including some who are pretty immobile.

[mnementh]

Groceries...

   

            

So... I needed a LED strip for my 3D printer. And a fix for a heatsink that fell off the heated bed MOSFET. Oh, and laundry detergent.  The 0.100" pin header was just cuz.  And as usual... Amazon wanted my business, so there they were with next day delivery. Who am I to say no...?

300mm x 6mm COB LED strip is actually quite excellent for ~US$4.50 via Amazon; it appears to have no ballast resistors of any sort, so a CC driver or regulated DC & ~10W+ ballast resistor is the way to go. It's rated 12V/800mA; at 10.5 volts it just turns on. At 12.0V it draws 620mA; at 12.1V 770mA, at 12.2V 910mA. Brightness is quite good at 620mA; that's where I'd set my drive current to decrease the likelihood of a shorted element.

0.100" Pin headers... Ehhh, they're like bread. Not really interesting until you don't have any. I have a project where I'll PROBABLY need some; so I added them to my quick list. 48 strips of my most commonly used types for ~US$11. I know... still expensive... when you're used to getting them for pennies as leftovers from work BOMs... but about as cheap as you'll get these small quantities anywhere next day to your door. 

What I thought y'all would be most interested in though is these little MOSFET PCBs. This whole MESS cost me just under CAD$17, or about US$12.

They claim they're good for use on 24V-powered printers up to 25A draw and will work w2ith pretty much any of the popular 3DP controllers. It uses a YMP200N08Q MOSFET; several site on alibaba list it as equivalent to IRFP2907 & HY4008 (PDFs below) 80V/200A switching MOSFET. It has indicator LEDs for power & PWM; it's designed to take the heated bed output of the FET on your RAMPS or similar 3DP controller board (typically at 12V or 24V) and use it to trigger this big beast. It rectifies the signal through a bridge, then to an opto-isolator; then through a a few resistors to tame the signal to the typical ~10 volts these brutes can handle across the gate.

I see them as cheap pass-element building blocks; easily mounted at a DC load and controlled remotely by pretty much anything, but designed to be fast enough for PWM power switching.   

mnem
Good thing I only really NEED one of these... I'll probably test one or two to failure. 

[mnementh]

Need a bigger lab, this is almost perfect, but not anywhere near ideal if you collect boat anchors 

Perfect for your survivors tho... all they have to do when you die is prop you up in your wheelie chair & pour it all full of concrete through the stairwell. At our typical rate of pack-rattage, should take 5-8yards.

mnem
Who wants to be an archaeological discovery in 300 years...?

[mnementh]

"This guy are sick"

He's clearly collecting bats in the belfry rather than boat anchors...

Hey, don't knock Colin Furze. Any bloke who builds a jet powered bicycle is alright by me. 

Aye, and he's turned his particular brand of batshit crazy into a multimillion-dollar concern. How many of us can claim the same...?

mnem
"Crazy Like a Fox" - Phrase, colloq-See Colin Furze.

[0culus]

I've been experimenting with using MATLAB plus the Instrument Control Toolbox as a computational companion (via GPIB) to my 8566B. So far, so good. I used Dick Benson's little application (https://www.mathworks.com/matlabcentral/fileexchange/68906-spectrum-analysis-with-the-hp-8568b-8566b) as a starting point to add other types of measurements using the RF toolbox. So far, so good. Tonight I got an occupied bandwidth measurement to work (at least, it gives reasonable numbers). I don't have a modern SA with these features to compare against. 

[Sam Spastic]

Is it channels 60 and 61? That would be 4G/LTE?

[Sam Spastic]

What tics me off is FCC sold TV channels to cell phone service providers. So now the stations have to be repacked. Expensive! Then re-scanned every few weeks while the stations move to their new positions. 

I cut cable and satellite when the bill went over $100. 40+ free digital channels, so not looking back.  Have Hulu and Netflix to keep wife and kids happy.

200 Mbit fiber internet so everybody can stream what they want.

I mostly watch Prime Time and the big tv will record my shows.  NO TIVO.