Test Equipment Anonymous (TEA) group therapy thread

[mnementh]

How did I get to deserve a mention in your little tirade? 

Do me and all of us a favor. Log off, step away from the keyboard, and go to bed. 

Sorry... did not mean to drag you in. I was only referring obliquely to your self-proclaimed antisocial nature, nothing else.

I actually am exhausted from all this; my intent was to do just that.

mnem
 

[0culus]

This spat about solder is exactly why I don't participate as much anymore. 

[AVGresponding]

Even better is a non-interference design like the FIAT JTD 1.9 120hp which was also used in the Vectra I used to have. Despite FIAT it's a very reliable engine.

The 1.9 litre common rail diesel? Someone correct me if I'm wrong but wasn't that engine originally developed by Alfa Romeo before the takeover by Fiat?

If it’s a 1.3 variant of that engine it’s a fucking turd. Absolute shit show beyond all compare. I owned one.

My bad, I meant Alfa Romeo, not FIAT. Still, given they have a similar (well deserved) reputation for unreliability, I stand by my use of the word "despite"...   

You’re excused 

This time 

The 1.3 is not the same. I had a Croma with the 1.9 16V mJTD 150 HP version and that was an excellent engine. It also made a lie of current wisdom that if you put ANY petrol in a common rail diesel it will wreck it as soon as you start it or even turn the electric pump on. On a run back from Cornwall to Cambridge via Bristol in filthy weather I stopped for fuel. It ws not a brand I normally used and I picked up the black pump handle. SWMBO then distracted me by asking if I wanted nything from the Kiosk. I fuelled up, later calculation showed I added more than half a tank. SWMMBO paid which is unusual. I'd got straight back in the car because the rain was almost horizontal.
So a little while later doing the speed limit down a long hill the car felt a bit judderry but I thought it was just wind buffeting. Stopped in Bristol for about an hour visiting a friend. Came out and the car was slowwer to start than usual but I put oit down to the very steep hill we were on. Then on the M4 I started thinking about it and asked SWMBO if she had  the receipt but it was in her bag in the back. I pulled into the next services, dug out the receipt - UNLEADED 
Well sod it I'd done about 150 miles on it so any damage was done. I topped the tnnk up as high as posible with premium diesel as it contains more lubricity additives and drove home. Put some diesel additive with a lubricity agent (many are just IPA) and changed the fuel filter. Over the next week or so I topped up the tank with premium when it was down a quarter twice and then half then ran it down.
The engine did another 50,000 miles before I sold it without muissing a beat. It's still registered as on the road.
The A would hve told me not to start the car and charged e £200+ to drain the tank nd flush the system......

The 150hp is slightly different to the 120hp, and the valves do interfere on it. It is reckoned to be less reliable, but as I haven't owned one, I can't comment directly on that, though I suspect that like much unreliability related to cars there's a certain amount of lack of proper maintenance and/or poor driving style involved.

[mnementh]

@mnem congrats for going all in.  And for your tinkering on those cameras.

in other news, my Nakamichi 680 arrived today. Need to unpack, due to recent events I had not gotten around to it yet.

Thanks for the  . I'm at 6 grams right now, but that's due to missed dinner out roadrunning.

I need to get some pics up on that lens assembly; it really is a interesting mechanism.

Good luck on the Nak. Those belts can be a right blister if they've gone marshmallowy.

Just read your post aboot it needing an overhaul and the VFD going south during testing... Uggh.

Hope you get it sorted.

mnem
 

1 day down; rest of my life to go... *sigh*

mnem
*toddles off to ded*

[Zoli]

...
Soviet ТЛ-4М (ТL-4М) voltmeter from the Bay of Pay. It shipped from Latvia and I just got it yesterday.

It's bright orange, and it includes the battery cover. There are brass inserts in the plastic for the battery cover to screw into. Looks like one of the precision wire-wound resistors is toast and the glass meter cover is cracked. I tried the DC voltage up to 300V and it's reasonably accurate. It has 1,000V AC and DC modes but I don't have anything that makes 1000V DC (yet!). It's all hand assembled. Some Deoxit faderlube helped the mode-selection wheel to turn much easier. The switch in the lower left marked - ~ is the DC/AC mode selector switch. That's different. I grew up during the cold war, which makes this meter all the more interesting. Does anyone have any idea what year this was mode? I'll have to cut and paste some Cyrillic characters into a translating site to read what is written on the back.

EDIT:

Thanks, Neomys Sapiens. You meant to gross us out but instead triggered a spell of "What an odd little meter. I simply must have it."

EDIT:

"8512" on the diode. Is that a date code? Also, 84 and 85 markings on some of the resistors. Perhaps that's a year?

EDIT:

I just noticed the wire lacing. How many meters have that as a construction feature? Not too damn many, I'd wager.

The manufacturing date is at the center-bottom of the window below the model#:XII(december)-(19)85. Some time(~40years) ago I've had a green one...

[capt bullshot]

Presenting the white 1.3" OLED. There are no flaws (for now) but over and above that it looks much better than the blue one did. Provided it lasts for at least a few days  I'm going to go with it. I got it displaying what I want so might as well get on with the rest.

Next up I'll be modding an aluminum case that held the GPSDO I had (which failed several years ago) before my current model. It more or less matches the current GPSDO case. I'm going to make custom 3D printed panels for the front and back, mount the ATmega328P breakout board inside, RS-232 and power connector on the back, and display panel on the front. Then it will sit next to the GPSDO and run until the OLED fails.

From my experience, it'll start to look uneven quite soon (burn-in).

[capt bullshot]

Here's an alternative to mutilating test equipment, especially AVO meters:

You'd want to do something else with this stuff:

[med6753]

So how come I think the lamp made of auto parts is super cool yet a lamp made of an old and obsolete AVO meter is sacrilege? 

Rational explanation welcome because I don't have one. 

[bd139]

That’ll be because the auto parts lamp is now greater than the sum of its parts while the Avo lamp is now less than the sum of its parts.

From a philosophical point of view I suppose one is art and the other is 💩

There’s also something horrible about taking an object which has had effort and design put into it and removing its purpose entirely. Prompts an uncomfortable visceral reaction to anyone who sees purpose in it.

[med6753]

That’ll be because the auto parts lamp is now greater than the sum of its parts while the Avo lamp is now less than the sum of its parts.

From a philosophical point of view I suppose one is art and the other is 💩

I guess that's as good an explanation as it gets. Agreed. And yes, I woke up at an ungodly hour of 02:30 hours.  I'm definitely going back to bed.

Later today I'm going to attempt to power up the 212 and I'll bring everyone along for the ride. 

[BU508A]

That’ll be because the auto parts lamp is now greater than the sum of its parts while the Avo lamp is now less than the sum of its parts.

From a philosophical point of view I suppose one is art and the other is 💩

There’s also something horrible about taking an object which has had effort and design put into it and removing its purpose entirely. Prompts an uncomfortable visceral reaction to anyone who sees purpose in it.

Decide yourself....



https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fettecke

[BU508A]

That’ll be because the auto parts lamp is now greater than the sum of its parts while the Avo lamp is now less than the sum of its parts.

From a philosophical point of view I suppose one is art and the other is 💩

I guess that's as good an explanation as it gets. Agreed. And yes, I woke up at an ungodly hour of 02:30 hours.  I'm definitely going back to bed.

Later today I'm going to attempt to power up the 212 and I'll bring everyone along for the ride. 

Sleep well in your Bettgestell. 

[Cubdriver]

So how come I think the lamp made of auto parts is super cool yet a lamp made of an old and obsolete AVO meter is sacrilege? 

Rational explanation welcome because I don't have one. 

Because it is, and because auto parts are much more readily available, currently being produced, and made in much greater volume, whereas old AVO meters are none of these things and are instead a finite resource and every one "modified" by some hack to make a lamp is one less that remains in the world.  And because you're a test equipment geek who probably to at least some extent anthropomorphizes test gear and hates to see a piece of it "die" needlessly.  (this is why I wind up trying to fix parts units....)

-Pat

[mansaxel]

Ah, this is the same plotter crap that commodore used way ago in its vic 1520 (and Sharp too). Besides the pens (originally in two flavours: ball pens and felt tip pens) being dry or empty every time you needed them, the plastic (nylon?) gears molded to the motor shaft tends to crack.

And now we have inkjets. Where at least one of the inks is empty every time you really need it. Do I sense a trend?

As long as the plot is in HPGL or EPS, and is not committed to paper, I'm happy.

Printers deserve their own tier in Hell. Period.

[Robert763]

Now, can we please have some positive interaction? It seems like the only time you ever bother to talk to me any more it's something in a negative tone, or to correct me.

You know that's not true.

It really gets old.

mnem
 

I'll tell you what gets old, not being able to quietly correct a factual error in something you've written before first thinking "Is this worth it? Is the information important enough that it's worth risking sort of reply that Mnem might think somehow insults his understanding and cause him to take three pages to explain how he isn't wrong and I'm picking on him?". I didn't blink before correcting Vince about the silver solder thing earlier because I didn't expect any comeback for having the temerity to offer an alternative, and as far as I know, correct interpretation to him. I think hard every time I ought to reply to you and say "Erm no, it's like this", or "Not quite" or "I think you're misunderstanding this". I certainly genuinely wouldn't dare just say "That's wrong" to you for anything less than something categorically wrong and easily proven because I know that even that you'll quibble over. Think about that for a minute. No, really, think about that. I don't have to do mental weighing like that before risking disagreeing with anyone else on the whole forum, even people who are famously fractious, even the people everybody regards as gobshites.

Here here,
I was doing exactly that about posting a correction to the statement when you beat me to it.
No one knows everything Even in areas we do know about we make slips and mistakes. Much better to say "You're right, thank you for the clarification" or even just accept it without comment.....
I don't think anyone i going out of their way to pick fault with others, but if it's an important point it's worth correcting. We have to remember this will be here for years and others with less knowledge will read it. Accepting that salespeople misuse terms is justifying their actions.

[bd139]

That’ll be because the auto parts lamp is now greater than the sum of its parts while the Avo lamp is now less than the sum of its parts.

From a philosophical point of view I suppose one is art and the other is 💩

There’s also something horrible about taking an object which has had effort and design put into it and removing its purpose entirely. Prompts an uncomfortable visceral reaction to anyone who sees purpose in it.

Decide yourself....



https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fettecke

Ahh that’s another form of art: Taking the piss.

Clearly he could be taking the piss here and simply through reputation and anticipation trolling everyone while making a ton of money. The art is increasing your reputation by doing something trivial or obscure. The application of a hat builds credibility. This is the art us software engineers have and occasionally I wear a hat 

Either that or drugs and the gallery was just lucky that day they had some butter around instead of some readily available bodily solids or liquids.

[mansaxel]

This spat about solder is exactly why I don't participate as much anymore. 

My wife and I have this discussion at least weekly. "Wrong" needs correction. That applies to me too.

[mansaxel]

That’ll be because the auto parts lamp is now greater than the sum of its parts while the Avo lamp is now less than the sum of its parts.

From a philosophical point of view I suppose one is art and the other is 💩

There’s also something horrible about taking an object which has had effort and design put into it and removing its purpose entirely. Prompts an uncomfortable visceral reaction to anyone who sees purpose in it.

Discussion

[bd139]

Yes well aware of that one. That's the reputation thing again. The argument is it increases the reputation of the item when actually it does that of the artist.

Merely malicious trolling of unspoken rules

[mansaxel]

Yes well aware of that one. That's the reputation thing again. The argument is it increases the reputation of the item when actually it does that of the artist.

Merely malicious trolling of unspoken rules

The Fountain is a bit special because there was no known artist reputation to increase at the time. That it still made such an impact adds a bit of intrinsic value to a value attribution process that otherwise very well could explain the term "volatile" to Bitcoin fanboys.

[BU508A]

At least, R. Mutt could piss up a rope. 

[Robert763]

Even better is a non-interference design like the FIAT JTD 1.9 120hp which was also used in the Vectra I used to have. Despite FIAT it's a very reliable engine.

The 1.9 litre common rail diesel? Someone correct me if I'm wrong but wasn't that engine originally developed by Alfa Romeo before the takeover by Fiat?

If it’s a 1.3 variant of that engine it’s a fucking turd. Absolute shit show beyond all compare. I owned one.

My bad, I meant Alfa Romeo, not FIAT. Still, given they have a similar (well deserved) reputation for unreliability, I stand by my use of the word "despite"...   

You’re excused 

This time 

The 1.3 is not the same. I had a Croma with the 1.9 16V mJTD 150 HP version and that was an excellent engine. It also made a lie of current wisdom that if you put ANY petrol in a common rail diesel it will wreck it as soon as you start it or even turn the electric pump on. On a run back from Cornwall to Cambridge via Bristol in filthy weather I stopped for fuel. It ws not a brand I normally used and I picked up the black pump handle. SWMBO then distracted me by asking if I wanted nything from the Kiosk. I fuelled up, later calculation showed I added more than half a tank. SWMMBO paid which is unusual. I'd got straight back in the car because the rain was almost horizontal.
So a little while later doing the speed limit down a long hill the car felt a bit judderry but I thought it was just wind buffeting. Stopped in Bristol for about an hour visiting a friend. Came out and the car was slowwer to start than usual but I put oit down to the very steep hill we were on. Then on the M4 I started thinking about it and asked SWMBO if she had  the receipt but it was in her bag in the back. I pulled into the next services, dug out the receipt - UNLEADED 
Well sod it I'd done about 150 miles on it so any damage was done. I topped the tnnk up as high as posible with premium diesel as it contains more lubricity additives and drove home. Put some diesel additive with a lubricity agent (many are just IPA) and changed the fuel filter. Over the next week or so I topped up the tank with premium when it was down a quarter twice and then half then ran it down.
The engine did another 50,000 miles before I sold it without muissing a beat. It's still registered as on the road.
The A would hve told me not to start the car and charged e £200+ to drain the tank nd flush the system......

The 150hp is slightly different to the 120hp, and the valves do interfere on it. It is reckoned to be less reliable, but as I haven't owned one, I can't comment directly on that, though I suspect that like much unreliability related to cars there's a certain amount of lack of proper maintenance and/or poor driving style involved.

You are correct, it is interference.
It has one big maintenance advanage over the 8V. They both have long glow plugs. The thread is near the bottom of the 8V plug, far from the hex where torque is applied.  As a result they have a habit of shearing off. To make it worse access is bad. On the 16 the thread is at the top, next to the hex and they are very easy to access.
The oil filter access is another matter  . I'd quite happly do things like wheel bearings but come oil change it was down to the local independent garage. I did supply the oil though, they are quite fussy about that.

[McBryce]

[..] Medical stuff, was that the hobby you had in mind Bryce  ?

No actually, vintage computers. There were several printers / plotters such as the Atari 1020 that used the same pens. They are often on offer on retro computer sites. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atari_1020
The original Atari pens were made of metal and the top can be popped off and re-filled.

McBryce.

P.s. Where's the close-up picture??

Oh interesting ! Yes if you know of another source for these pens, please share !

Piccies ? Oops sorry forgot to attach them, a disease of mine !

I edited my message to add the pics, you can scroll back to see them.... well I will attach them here as well for convenience...

Yes, they're the same ones. Here's some I have. These are from 80's Atari and Tandy printers, so there should be quite a few sources in the US for these. You can carefully pull the tip out of the metal barrel and refill these as often as you want.

McBryce.

[tggzzz]

Oh hell... someone hide all my bank cards and hit me in the head before I do something foolish...

Current price is about the same as the cost of the Fischer connector (with a minumum order of £250, IIRC).

You just need to install some proper binding post. Not those Fischer rubbish

Vandals, the lot of 'em

The Fischer connectors are wonderful to handle; they ooze high precision engineering (as well as causing money to ooze from bank accounts).

Besides, I was just trying to be friendly and provide a disincentive to buying it. It has to be noted that your comments are more in keeping with TEA/GAS ethos!

[med6753]

Well hell, I'm awake for good now. Guess I'll go shower and in keeping with my antisocial nature go grocery shopping right as they open at 6 AM. No crowds, no screaming kids, no little old ladies in front of me at the checkout looking through their purse for exact change. You know, I was practicing "social distancing" before the term was even though of.