Test Equipment Anonymous (TEA) group therapy thread

[tonyalbus]

If you think TEA is a bad addiction . what about HRAA .. Ham Radio Aquaring Adiction.. and what if you have both 

i need space ! lots !! ... and money...  and food 

Collected over the last years.

[tggzzz]

If anyone points it out, he proudly waves his flag of ignorance and calls them a Grammar Nazi, then says this is how I am and I'm not going to change.  In my head I call him an idiot, and am much more inclined to dismiss anything he says. 

Yes, that would be my attitude too. As I taught my daughter:

• ignorance can be cured, stupidity can't
• let's make new mistakes

[ch_scr]

Today, my big 'ol pack of resistors arrived:

As you can see, these claim to be 0.25W, 1%, 50ppm tempco, metal film resistors. 1000pcs open boxes, almost all of them nearly full.
23€ for the lot with shipping should be a pretty nice catch? Resistors of the name "MF-25T" are sold by UK company "Willow Technologies"...
But - all the boxes bear a little golden sticker inscribed "MADE IN TAIWAN - REPUBLIC OF CHINA"...
So, not UK made then. Also, how old does it make these? I don't think Taiwan does these stickers anymore? So 90's - or earlier?

[Vince]

Well since a number of you are always singing the praises and swooning over an 8060A

Nice! Congratulations. A recap is in order. Mrmodemhead has written the crucial blog post that should be your guidance in this.

Oh no, even freaking DMMs need recapping now.... I have one of these in my collection, guess I ought to pay this web page a visit then....

[Robert763]

Today, my big 'ol pack of resistors arrived:

As you can see, these claim to be 0.25W, 1%, 50ppm tempco, metal film resistors. 1000pcs open boxes, almost all of them nearly full.
23€ for the lot with shipping should be a pretty nice catch? Resistors of the name "MF-25T" are sold by UK company "Willow Technologies"...
But - all the boxes bear a little golden sticker inscribed "MADE IN TAIWAN - REPUBLIC OF CHINA"...
So, not UK made then. Also, how old does it make these? I don't think Taiwan does these stickers anymore? So 90's - or earlier?

Willow mostly sell into aerospace and military markets so chances are they are quality components.

[Cubdriver]

If you think TEA is a bad addiction . what about HRAA .. Ham Radio Aquaring Adiction.. and what if you have both 

i need space ! lots !! ... and money...  and food 

Collected over the last years.

I'm trying to avoid that particular affliction - just a Yaesu FT-1000 and a Stewart-Warner built R390A receiver here.  I can easily see how HAM GAS could spiral out of control, too.  Lots of cool hardware out there.

-Pat

[AVGresponding]

May have found the reason my OSF wheel speed sensor hasn't worked for a while...



Not that having the ABS, TCS, and ESP disabled bothers me; if you need those, go back to driving school     but I do need the warning lights off the dash for the MOT tomorrow...

Hope the sensor itself is good, reads 4.3k, which is higher than most sources state as a generic figure, shall see when I refit the repaired item tomorrow. If not, they're in stock at an ECP branch which is on my way to the testing station anyway.



EDIT: Why is SMF such a turd for attaching inline images?

[Cubdriver]

May have found the reason my OSF wheel speed sensor hasn't worked for a while...



Not that having the ABS, TCS, ans ESP disabled bothers me; if you need those, go back to driving school     but I do need the warning lights off the dash for the MOT tomorrow...

Hope the sensor itself is good, reads 4.3k, which is higher than most sources state as a generic figure, shall see when I refit the repaired item tomorrow. If not, they're in stock at an ECP branch which is on my way to the testing station anyway.



EDIT: Why is SMF such a turd for attaching inline images?

Yeah, that'll cause some unhappiness in the nanny systems...

-Pat

[Robert763]

Hmm I've got a decision to make. I was contacted by a "head hunter" a while back. A proper one, they got non public contact info for me from someone.  I had a couple of online interviews which I was not too bothered about. Then I got a call tonight to say an offer is in the post...
Now I'll have to make my mind up.
(No I can't say what it is. The employment conditions of my job mean I can't talk about other than it's aerospace).
 

[mansaxel]

Well since a number of you are always singing the praises and swooning over an 8060A

Nice! Congratulations. A recap is in order. Mrmodemhead has written the crucial blog post that should be your guidance in this.

Oh no, even freaking DMMs need recapping now.... I have one of these in my collection, guess I ought to pay this web page a visit then....

Yes, the 8060 is notorious for having its small electrolyte caps leak and wreak havoc with the PCB. It is such a sensitive instrument that any contamination on the PCB will interfere -- sometimes just as an annoyance, sometimes affecting measurement -- with the operation of the instrument. Gloves, handling by PCB edges and thorough cleaning is much recommended. I'm very fond of the pair I've got, and I plan to give them a long life.

[mansaxel]

...and a Stewart-Warner built R390A receiver...

I'm not very affected by ham GAS, but the 390A is something special, together with the HF Telefunkens and the SRT CR300. Some envy detected.

[Vince]

Hmm I've got a decision to make. I was contacted by a "head hunter" a while back. A proper one, they got non public contact info for me from someone.  I had a couple of online interviews which I was not too bothered about. Then I got a call tonight to say an offer is in the post...
Now I'll have to make my mind up.
(No I can't say what it is. The employment conditions of my job mean I can't talk about other than it's aerospace).
 

There is no secret here, spoke to that hunter at the pub a few days ago. Said MBDA wanted you to design the onboard electronics for their future super duper smart air to air missile. Sounds cool, I would take the job if I were you ! 

[ch_scr]

Today, my big 'ol pack of resistors arrived:

As you can see, these claim to be 0.25W, 1%, 50ppm tempco, metal film resistors. 1000pcs open boxes, almost all of them nearly full.
23€ for the lot with shipping should be a pretty nice catch? Resistors of the name "MF-25T" are sold by UK company "Willow Technologies"...
But - all the boxes bear a little golden sticker inscribed "MADE IN TAIWAN - REPUBLIC OF CHINA"...
So, not UK made then. Also, how old does it make these? I don't think Taiwan does these stickers anymore? So 90's - or earlier?

Willow mostly sell into aerospace and military markets so chances are they are quality components.

Thanks for the heads up, I was a bit worried about how much to trust the "TC50" on these after seeing the taiwan sticker.
(I figured Willow was into that sort of business after seeing on the datasheet how much of the test are to "MIL-STD-202")

[Vince]

Today, my big 'ol pack of resistors arrived:

As you can see, these claim to be 0.25W, 1%, 50ppm tempco, metal film resistors. 1000pcs open boxes, almost all of them nearly full.
23€ for the lot with shipping should be a pretty nice catch? Resistors of the name "MF-25T" are sold by UK company "Willow Technologies"...
But - all the boxes bear a little golden sticker inscribed "MADE IN TAIWAN - REPUBLIC OF CHINA"...
So, not UK made then. Also, how old does it make these? I don't think Taiwan does these stickers anymore? So 90's - or earlier?

Willow mostly sell into aerospace and military markets so chances are they are quality components.

Thanks for the heads up, I was a bit worried about how much to trust the "TC50" on these after seeing the taiwan sticker.
(I figured Willow was into that sort of business after seeing on the datasheet how much of the test are to "MIL-STD-202")

Well worst case scenario you could just make it a little project and actually try to measure that TC on a sample of 20 or so, make some statistics, sounds like fun...

[ch_scr]

Today, my big 'ol pack of resistors arrived:

As you can see, these claim to be 0.25W, 1%, 50ppm tempco, metal film resistors. 1000pcs open boxes, almost all of them nearly full.
23€ for the lot with shipping should be a pretty nice catch? Resistors of the name "MF-25T" are sold by UK company "Willow Technologies"...
But - all the boxes bear a little golden sticker inscribed "MADE IN TAIWAN - REPUBLIC OF CHINA"...
So, not UK made then. Also, how old does it make these? I don't think Taiwan does these stickers anymore? So 90's - or earlier?

Willow mostly sell into aerospace and military markets so chances are they are quality components.

Thanks for the heads up, I was a bit worried about how much to trust the "TC50" on these after seeing the taiwan sticker.
(I figured Willow was into that sort of business after seeing on the datasheet how much of the test are to "MIL-STD-202")

Well worst case scenario you could just make it a little project and actually try to measure that TC on a sample of 20 or so, make some statistics, sounds like fun...

I actually have a tiny peltier thermal chamber. And a chinese controller with serial control to tame it. And one or two or three DMM with USB or RS232. All I lack is motivation to write the test automation script in python 
What I don't lack (even before) is stuff to measure the TC of 
Edit: Also, I have a vref burn in rig + vref's. And a DMM with MUX. Want to guess what's missing 
Edit2: Want to know what I incidentally did the last 2 hours? Traced the pinout of a Fluke mux card to control by PC, to soon have even more stuff I could automate...

[Neper]

There's a guy on another forum I'm on who gets apostrophes wrong more often than he gets them right.

Other languages, other apostrophes....

In German, we have what's called the Deppenapostroph (idiots' apostrophe) in wrongly spelled genitives. Our genitive doesn't have an apostrophe in front of the s but you can bet on the fact that when Heidi opens a beauty parlour, it will have 'Heidi's Kosmetikstudio' written across the front.

The Dutch use the apostrophe for the plural, but only with loanwords: auto's, foto's, studio's etc.

[Specmaster]

Well since a number of you are always singing the praises and swooning over an 8060A

Nice! Congratulations. A recap is in order. Mrmodemhead has written the crucial blog post that should be your guidance in this.

Oh no, even freaking DMMs need recapping now.... I have one of these in my collection, guess I ought to pay this web page a visit then....

Yes, the 8060 is notorious for having its small electrolyte caps leak and wreak havoc with the PCB. It is such a sensitive instrument that any contamination on the PCB will interfere -- sometimes just as an annoyance, sometimes affecting measurement -- with the operation of the instrument. Gloves, handling by PCB edges and thorough cleaning is much recommended. I'm very fond of the pair I've got, and I plan to give them a long life.

If they are anything like my BlackStar 4503 bench meter, then they are a real pig to get clean enough to be useable. Mine had the calibration data retention battery leak, and it had contaminated almost the entire board and after cleaning it was spotless, but it would still not give any meaningful readings. The electrolyte had gone under all the IC's, sockets and everything. After countless washes, I was on the verge of giving up but decided to give one last bath overnight in IPA and then popped it into the airing cupboard for a couple of days and bingo, it came back to useful life.

Ran through its calibration procedure, and it was fine after that, it remains today as one of my favourite meters. 

[factory]

Time to go somewhat recursive and somewhat to the topic of TEA.

I have decided that I need a toque torque screwdriver. (EDIT: was toque a Freudian slip with winter coming?)
The main use would be for electrical work as part of house renovations and for working on TEA.
The tool may also be used in the repair of personal transportation vehicle by whatever terminology we decide to use here (yep, still an agitatingly good day).
Back in July, right around this message (https://www.eevblog.com/forum/testgear/test-equipment-anonymous-(tea)-group-therapy-thread/msg3615444/?topicseen#msg3615444)
the clear choice was to get something from Wiha.

I took a look at Wiha, found a kit that I liked, then looked at the price in the GWN 
That is more than a mortgage payment on the house!
Also, I am not sure what Wiha mean by Slimline and whether these tools might be used with bits that have 1/4" hex shanks?

Any suggestions for something that has a better price per use ratio?
(price per use, especially price per km for sports equipment, is generally accepted by SWMBO, but I suspect there is an algorithm to convert to peace & quiet time while the boys are out of the house)
Something that accepts 1/4" hex shanks would be great, since all sorts of bits in NA are made with these shanks.
My lowest torque wrench starts at scales of 25 in-lbs or 3.61 Nm.  I would like something for a lower range, with some overlap.

I looked at Greenlee (aka Brymen) and those are almost as expensive as Wiha.
Snap-On would need two tools to cover a similar range, so would end up close to the same expense as Wiha.
Are Wera tools any good; I am not familiar with them?
Crappy Tire had nothing .... that is, well ... crappy.
DigiKey also has Gedore, Weidmüller and PhoenixConact; none of which I am familiar with.

-- If it's not TEA, at least it can be found to fix TEA

Trouble with torque wrenches & screwdrivers is they wear, or if second hand you have no idea what condition they are in. The cal lab at work checks them against a torque tester, there are also torque testers on the shop floor, we have to check/set them before use and fill in a log.

David

[mnementh]

...After countless washes, I was on the verge of giving up but decided to give one last bath overnight in IPA and then popped it into the airing cupboard for a couple of days and bingo, it came back to useful life.

Ran through its calibration procedure, and it was fine after that, it remains today as one of my favourite meters. 

I bow before your demonstration of weapons-grade patience. I'd probably have run the thing through the dishwasher long before I got to that point.

mnem
twice. just to be sure it's dead.

[Vince]

A friend paid a visit this evening, surprise gift, the board for his heat pump. It misbehaved, service tech swapped it and didn't even take the old board with him... so now it's mine !

Lots of good stuff on here...

- 3 big ass chokes/line filters
- 10 mains rated film caps
- A fuse, you can never have too many fuses
- A PTC
- Two MOVs
- 4 cute little 3A OMRON relays
- One big ass 30A relay, that's the big black "cube" on the RHS. From a distance at first I mistook it for a molded mains transformer, but no, it's a huge relay.  30A is a lot but still, looks oversized to me... but I am no relay engineer so must be a reason for its deluxe size...
- A 4 way DIP switch
- 10 Rubycon caps including a biggish 100V 470uF
- 3 power resistors including 2 big ones, 5W and 15W in a weird package similar to that of old electrolytic filter can caps... cylindrical, tall, skinny, radial/vertical, with a single terminal in the center and 3 "ground" pins on the outer ring. First time I see this type of package and foot print used for anything other than a can cap... you live and learn, that's cool....
- A couple opto-couplers.
- A big ferrite bead on the earth wires
- A TO220 7805 regulator.
- A Neon bulb between earth and neutral it looks like.
- A few SOT23 trannies


I am not complaining !!! 

[25 CPS]

Well since a number of you are always singing the praises and swooning over an 8060A I figured I'd join the club and see what all the fuss is about. Should be here early next week. It looks a little dirty but should clean up. Seller claims 100% functional.

I thought for sure you'd be getting the IBM branded version of it:

[Vince]

A pale blue one... how weird, makes it look like a cheap chinese clone or something ! 

[factory]

Cheap playthings near Sydney 

eBay auction: #324848393872       

..... and I don't have a TDR!

Nearly an hour each way by untolled roads or about half that time with an extra $27 in tolls.  I'm sorta tempted, but not sure if I'm that motivated.


Not to mention the reception upon return to the household.   

I've got one of those in the queue down stairs; it came with a lot of gear I bought years ago.  Go for it!  Might prompt me to dig mine out and look into it as well.  Surprisingly, it's mostly air inside that big honkin' plug-in.

-Pat

I've got a two of those hp TDR plug-ins, here is one of them in the 140B it came with, this scope is so clean inside I wonder if it saw much use. There should be a divider place with these scopes, for use with the half size scope plug-ins, but they are often lost when supplied with a full size plug-in.



The 1415A TDR plug-in is quite empty and has quite a few tunnel diodes inside.


David

[factory]

And here is what I collected this afternoon, a little Tek scope, the journey down wasn't much fun, very slow on the M6 in Birmingham and completely stationary for about 15 minutes, while a stranded vehicle was removed (apparently). 

I thought I would give it a quick test this evening, amazingly it seems to work, needs the two broken controls fixing and the trigger isn't working as good as I think it should be.



Anyone know why these curves show on the CRT, could it be related to the brightness?? Can't turn it down as the control is broken off.


Teardown will have to wait for another day.

David

[med6753]

And here is what I collected this afternoon, a little Tek scope, the journey down wasn't much fun, very slow on the M6 in Birmingham and completely stationary for about 15 minutes, while a stranded vehicle was removed (apparently). 

I thought I would give it a quick test this evening, amazingly it seems to work, needs the two broken controls fixing and the trigger isn't working as good as I think it should be.

Anyone know why these curves show on the CRT, could it be related to the brightness?? Can't turn it down as the control is broken off.


Teardown will have to wait for another day.

David

I have a newer Type 321A. It does not have those curve marks on the CRT. But I suspect they would go away if you could turn down the brightness.

The Trigger works best in "Auto". If it doesn't lock correctly adjust the Stability trimmer.

The scope is loaded with germanium 2N2207 which are very prone to developing tin whisker shorts.