Test Equipment Anonymous (TEA) group therapy thread

[Kosmic]

Well look like I'm also a lucky winner. I started coughing today, then muscle pain and chest pain. Now I got a fever.

Really frustrating since I was home for the last 2.5 weeks, only went out once for grocery. And got food deliver once. 

Shit, that not good, have you got children that still going to school? If so then that is more than likely were you got it from. I wish good luck and hope that you have good result and that your recovery is a speedy one. 

Schools has been closed since the 13 March over here 

[Kosmic]

Bugga  I think I will keep sticking to home brew Junk Food rather than some sweaty Cook and Delivery driver coughing over it.

Yep better not taking any risks. Stay safe people!

[xrunner]

Schools has been closed since the 13 March over here 

Take care of yourself!

I went in Wal Mart Sunday to get a few things and vowed never going in again till this mess calms down. I'm otherwise using Wal Mart's pickup service.

Our county public health site shows 97 cases today and it was only 55 a few days ago. Things are going to get real nasty here quick. 

[mnementh]

mnem
* off to get some "groceries" *

   

Groceries.   

First stop: digitmakers.ca to pick up my order: 1m Capricorn Bowden tubing, 2 x 20T cogged idlers for X & Y, 2 x Formbot T-Rex hotend with 0.4mm SS nozzles (Bought just cuz they were $5), Micro-Swiss HeatBlock upgrade for Creality, 0.2mm Creality nozzle, Taiyo Ceramic trimpot driver (again, cuz it was only $5), 3mm ground shaft for other nefarious purposes, and Creality CR-10 hotend & service kit that even comes with pliers to crimp the terminals. Of course I'll solder mine; but the pliers are good enough to add to the tool drawer.  All parts also fit E3, therefore also my printer; lots of nice spares for US$22. All told, about US$70.

After that I went to the Dollar Store for some cheap sandpaper and epoxy; decided to do a little retail therapy and bought art & craft supplies for the kiddles and Stoopit Sox for everyone. I'll let y'all guess which pair is for which of us.

However, that excursion proved that while Texas may do its best to cultivate and distill STUPID, it definitely does NOT have a Monopoly on it. While there, I coughed twice (into my elbow) and some idiot woman wearing a dust mask started telling me off. I explained that I was just having a reaction to some perfumed crap I'd just walked through, and she starts screaming at me an my son. I cut her off when she starts yelling at the boy.

"Lady, you're wearing a dust mask like it's going to do jack shit against the SuperFlu. That tells me you don't know anything about COVID. A cough is just that... is is NOT Armageddon. Get away from me and my son with your crazy shit." She just starts screaming louder, so I walk down the aisle towards the checkout. She follows me, screaming all the way about how I'm sick and if I have a cough I have to go to the hospital, I'm a horrible parent and lots more. Somehow in all this, she gets ahead of me in the checkout lane, and even while she's cashing out she's screaming at me.

"Lady, I moved here from Texas. I don't know where you got your crazy from, but if you tried this shit where I came from, somebody would pull a gun and blow your fucking head off." Then I very conspicuously called 911. "Go away, crazy lady; I'm on the line with the Police right now. Pay for your shit and leave, so I can pay for my shit and leave."

She FINALLY leaves, and I can finally approach the register and check out, because you know, "Social Distancing".

mnem
Ignorance is easily curable, but you can't fix STUPID.

[Brumby]

Stop doing jobs for SHMBO and get to opening it already 

Yeah, yeah ... don't get your panties in a twist.

[beanflying]

There is some truely 'special humans' out there and the level of OUT seems to rise with misleading and overhyped media reporting. Even in Oz the two larger commercial stations try to out compete each other for the latest risk to inflate 

Locally when I was out I saw a mother and daughter (20+ year old) out shopping wearing woolen gloves as protection on a 20C day   The supermarket has sanitising hand towels available at the door so a wipe of the trolley handles and your hands to help drop the risks and the checkouts have very clear go no go areas and only every other checkout was open.

[med6753]

Well look like I'm also a lucky winner. I started coughing today, then muscle pain and chest pain. Now I got a fever.

Really frustrating since I was home for the last 2.5 weeks, only went out once for grocery. And got food deliver once. 

Wow sorry to hear that. You got no clue how you contracted it? Maybe from things you touched from a store? 

I'm pretty sure I didn't touch my face and washed my hands with Hand sanitizer once I was in the car and washed again once I got home. So it was the delivery guy (and I was wearing gloves) or one of the kids got it and she is asymptomatic. 

But I should be fine though, I'm in an age bracket where the risk is minimal.

Kosmic, I would immediately get it checked and find out if it is indeed coronavirus. I don't know your age but saying that your risk is minimal could lead to serious consequences. There have been 3 deaths so far in my County, all Men. Their ages? 75, 55, and 49!  I don't know if they had pre-existing health conditions.

[Kosmic]

Well look like I'm also a lucky winner. I started coughing today, then muscle pain and chest pain. Now I got a fever.

Really frustrating since I was home for the last 2.5 weeks, only went out once for grocery. And got food deliver once. 

Wow sorry to hear that. You got no clue how you contracted it? Maybe from things you touched from a store? 

I'm pretty sure I didn't touch my face and washed my hands with Hand sanitizer once I was in the car and washed again once I got home. So it was the delivery guy (and I was wearing gloves) or one of the kids got it and she is asymptomatic. 

But I should be fine though, I'm in an age bracket where the risk is minimal.

Kosmic, I would immediately get it checked and find out if it is indeed coronavirus. I don't know your age but saying that your risk is minimal could lead to serious consequences. There have been 3 deaths so far in my County, all Men. Their ages? 75, 55, and 49!  I don't know if they had pre-existing health conditions.

I will probably call tomorrow, there a drive through testing center in my city. Just hope they changed their criteria. recently they were only testing people that recently travelled or been in contact with people that travelled.

[worsthorse]

Finished repairing the wiring harness on the 3400A (thanks again factory/david for the photos!), applied power and nothing exploded. Proper DC voltages in the right places. That's the good news. 

The bad news is the thermocouple is bad. When I powered up the meter, the needle slowly swung to full scale and pegged. Checked the thermocouples and one of the two is out of limits.

The good news is that sphere has a couple in stock. The bad news is they cost $60 plus shipping.  So a couple more 3400A questions before I spend three times what the meter cost me for a single part 

1. If the thermocouple got fried, how likely is it that the chopper amp is damaged, too?

2. What's the likelihood of randomly finding another 3400A parts mule with a good thermocouple?  Seems like the easiest part of the meter to damage.

[mnementh]

Fuck. *Goes to take some zinc-magnesium wafers and a shower*

mnem
 

[worsthorse]

Well look like I'm also a lucky winner. I started coughing today, then muscle pain and chest pain. Now I got a fever.

Really frustrating since I was home for the last 2.5 weeks, only went out once for grocery. And got food deliver once. 

Wow sorry to hear that. You got no clue how you contracted it? Maybe from things you touched from a store? 

I'm pretty sure I didn't touch my face and washed my hands with Hand sanitizer once I was in the car and washed again once I got home. So it was the delivery guy (and I was wearing gloves) or one of the kids got it and she is asymptomatic. 

But I should be fine though, I'm in an age bracket where the risk is minimal.

Kosmic, I would immediately get it checked and find out if it is indeed coronavirus. I don't know your age but saying that your risk is minimal could lead to serious consequences. There have been 3 deaths so far in my County, all Men. Their ages? 75, 55, and 49!  I don't know if they had pre-existing health conditions.

I will probably call tomorrow, there a drive through testing center in my city. Just hope they changed their criteria. recently they were only testing people that recently travelled or been in contact with people that travelled.

Take care of yourself and if your symptoms worsen quickly, call 911, okay? 

[Kosmic]

Well look like I'm also a lucky winner. I started coughing today, then muscle pain and chest pain. Now I got a fever.

Really frustrating since I was home for the last 2.5 weeks, only went out once for grocery. And got food deliver once. 

Wow sorry to hear that. You got no clue how you contracted it? Maybe from things you touched from a store? 

I'm pretty sure I didn't touch my face and washed my hands with Hand sanitizer once I was in the car and washed again once I got home. So it was the delivery guy (and I was wearing gloves) or one of the kids got it and she is asymptomatic. 

But I should be fine though, I'm in an age bracket where the risk is minimal.

Kosmic, I would immediately get it checked and find out if it is indeed coronavirus. I don't know your age but saying that your risk is minimal could lead to serious consequences. There have been 3 deaths so far in my County, all Men. Their ages? 75, 55, and 49!  I don't know if they had pre-existing health conditions.

I will probably call tomorrow, there a drive through testing center in my city. Just hope they changed their criteria. recently they were only testing people that recently travelled or been in contact with people that travelled.

Take care of yourself and if your symptoms worsen quickly, call 911, okay?

No worries, I have my wife here to check on me 

Thanks!

[mnementh]

I would reply with something smart but I can't get my head around German transitive vs intransitive verbs today and will probably sound like the idiot I am

I'll admit I abused Gurrgle Translate... I found that every synonym for "a matter of discussion", "debatable", or "arguable"  I tried came up with the same translation, and if I translated the phrase to German, then to English and then to German again it came up the same; so I figured it most likely had the right connotative as well as denotative value.   

mnem
Möge dein gott mit dir gehen! 

Haha, the first thing that crossed my mind was this 

 

Yes, that was one of my fonder childhood memories; reruns of the Dave Allen show late night on PBS where he'd sign off with that every show. When he said "Good night and may your god go with you." I knew it was the absolute limit latest time for bed or there'd be Hell to pay; mom would whisper "Good Night" as I tried to get up the stairs quietly and into my room, just like that song by Carly Simon...

*mnemories*

[mnementh]

Looks good but -

   The difference? I took the silicone boot off the heater block.

That does not compute ... 

Of course, it doesn't, its not a computer, its an air manifold  I must admit it looks cool though.

LOL... sortof. It's a PetsFang V2 layer cooling duct; trying to make the Ender 3 version fit my Diggro A3. I'm still trying to work out why the boot made such a drastic difference in how the hotend behaves. Hence the E3 and Micro-Swiss parts, both of which come insulated.

mnem
 

[Brumby]

OK - 3478A report:  This is the item listing: eBay item: 402165310223

The box showed superficial signs of the journey, but no damage of any consequence.  Inside, packaging was quite adequate. A double layer of 30x10mm bubble taped securely around the unit placed in a box with another piece of bubble on top to reduce movement inside the box to "jostling".  No free fall gymnastics.  The power lead was not included (at my request) so that was one less source of destruction. 

Tried powering up on 240V, but blew the fuse (Well, the specs did say "ac line 48 to 440Hz; 86 to 250V, 25VA max" - so you know where my head went).  I then dragged out my "DVD player" (This is just a metal case with the guts ripped out and four 30V 2A multi tap transformers wired up to give 120V).  Output voltage checked at 120V, selector on back switched to 50Hz and this time it powered up with no problems.

Then, I went looking for a set of leads to use - and was dismayed to find most of my collection were shrouded types that just wouldn't fit!!  I had a nice set of Fluke probes I was hoping to press into service, but they, too, were of the modern shrouded design that just wont fit.  I had to use the cheapest set of leads I had - with screw fittings on each end and a bag of terminating pieces you screw into them.  So I used 4mm banana pins on one end and alligator clips on the other (for attaching to my DMMcheck).

Dug out my DMMcheck and did a quick sanity check.  I only did 2 wire tests, but these were all good enough to satisfy me that the unit was usable.  I'll have to dig up the calibration data for the DMMcheck and sit down with some decent leads to get a more critical assessment.

Case isn't too bad.  No signs of impact anywhere and it looks straight.  Missing the cover strip on top of the front bezel and the right rear foot.  Both front feet with tilting legs work fine.  A dirty great brown patch next to the power switch - and the power switch has a broken cap.  All these things were declared in the listing.  (Looks like I'll be printing 2 of these HP switch caps now.)

The sticker on the top of the case at the rear looks like someone tried shaving it off with a sharp blade ... as the textured surface also feels like it's had a light shave as well.  While there were a couple of typical nicks and scratches, they weren't excessive and I was very happy to see that the LCD screen was free of scratches.  It's a little grimy all over - which a light clean will fix - but that brown patch on the front does not respond to IPA or eucalyptus oil ... and I'm cautious about getting mediaeval on it.   

Bottom line - looks like a promising addition to the bench.   

[mnementh]

@bd139, I can only apologise for not leaving feedback sooner!   I thought I'd cleared it the other day, yours must have been on another page that I didn't notice or something   

Public service announcement: Do not buy wire wool from this ebay seller : https://www.ebay.co.uk/usr/only_wire_wool?_trksid=p2047675.l2559   They sell it by the metre, but I have to say, you'd almost have to unravel the strands and lay them in a row to meet the description. This is what they laughably refer to as 2 metres:         I don't have scales sensitive enough to measure the weight, but I'd estimate it at 75-100 grams, 3 or 4 ounces.   I'm deciding how to word the complaint.

In some applications, steel wool is sold like fabric; as flat material like felt. It CAN come pretty thin, depending on what it was made for; I've seen it as thin as 6-8mm thick x 300mm wide. Doubled over a time or four, 2m might probably look like that. Does kindof suck if they don't make it clear in the listing. 

mnem
 

[Brumby]

Now to rebuild the bench to accommodate it.   

[mnementh]

[img]https://www.eevblog.com/forum/testgear/test-equipment-anonymous-(tea)-group-therapy-thread/?action=dlattach;attach=960558;image[/img height=80]   Submitted for your approval...

It looks like a replacement prosthetic for Abu Hamza 

I'm going with "Borg implant".

Y'all are futtinnahaid...

mnem
*toddles off to ded*

[Saskia]

Well look like I'm also a lucky winner. I started coughing today, then muscle pain and chest pain. Now I got a fever.

Really frustrating since I was home for the last 2.5 weeks, only went out once for grocery. And got food deliver once. 

Take good care of yourself. This sounds like the bloody beer virus, but it still might be the flu.
In any case, do that test and watch out for pneumonia. One of the biggest issues there is to keep the inflammation in check and the blood saturated with oxygen.

Best wishes from across the pond.

[Brumby]

Downloaded the service manual.  Voltage changed (too easy) and now happily running on 240V.  Got rid of the last remnants of the sticker on the top cover while I had it off.

Inside is very clean.

[beanflying]

[Brumby]

(I was waiting for that.)  For initial pics - refer to the eBay listing.

I have a couple of others, but have spent the "free" time I had sneaking in the things that I've already posted about.


I should really change the fuse to a 125mA slow blow, but I don't have any of those - yet.   

[Ero-Shan]

Has the advantage of being able to play Civilization while burning Eproms.

I prefer Transport Tycoon Deluxe, the open clone of Transport Tycoon.

Superb playability for a God Game. Addictive.

My pick is Simutrans with a 8192 × 8192 map on my 42 inch 4k monitor.

[bitseeker]

Hope you are luckier than me with the current Blackhole of Sydney Post a parcel dropped in to Carlingford hasn't moved since last Monday 

Lockdown dining tonight. There was Rice and steamed Veg but they were a sideline for the Porkiness  Hoisin, Garlic, Ginger, Soy, Rice wine, Lemon and a glug of Sriracha for heat.

Ooh, I wanna be at bean's house when quarantined. Yum!

[bitseeker]

Back into isolation but importantly Lamb Souvlaki ingredients all present and correct for tonight's dinner 

Mmm, souvlaki. I'm getting hungry.