Longest desktop instruments (in a home lab)?

[PwrElectronics]

The longest thing on my bench is a Fluke 8840A at about 38cm with a tight fit to the wall in back with the front hanging over the edge of the shelf a bit.  The longest gear I have is probably my 1956 Tek 531 scope but it sets on a cart and is almost 70cm.  My more modern scopes with LCD screens are shallow of course.

Unlike some, my lab space is really modest and the bench is just some kitchen countertop with a back splash setting on file cabinets.  A raised shelf along the back.  During the pandemic when I was WFH, I did all my board level testing on the last project there.

[David Hess]

The longest common standard is 19 inches or effectively 500 millimeters, but before that, 24 inches or 600 millimeters was possible in older test gear.

[joeqsmith]

Hey, a bit of an odd question, but what is the maximum instrument depth that one can expect to have in a home lab? I'm currently trying to dimension some workbench shelving for my instruments, and I'm having trouble deciding how much space to reserve. I already have a number of lab instruments (PSU's, scopes, DMM's, freq gens, a programmable load, etc), and my current longest instrument is the DMM6500 at about 400 mm plus some space for cabling in the back. I already made the mistake of going for 300 mm shelving, but that was before I got the DMM6500 and I had to plan a redesign. I'm not a professional electronics person, but I do love electronics as a hobby very much, and I see myself getting a desktop VNA, a frequency counter and maybe some other instruments in the future.

Is 400 mm deep shelving a reasonable choice?
If you have a desktop (not a rack) instrument that is longer than 400 mm, which one is it and how long is it?

My old LeCroy scopes are roughly 25" or 635mm deep.  But you better make sure that you include space on the back side for plenty of air flow.   

[artag]

My shelving is setup so the lowest shelf above the bench is 30cm, so it does not get in the way of the bench, the shelves above that are 40cm.

My bench is a standard twin-pedestal office desk, but I have adjustable shelving on the wall behind and to the left of it.

The left shelves are all 500mm and the first one is at the same height as the desk. The rear ones vary, and have an odd arrangement where the first, at bench height,  is 300; the second at slightly above the top of a computer monitor is 400, the third is 200 and used for small books, while the top is 300 and used for large books and folders.

This allows fairly large instruments to my left, a monitor that's off the main desk surface, and the larger books well out of the way while the smaller ones are accessible. The desk, but for the bottom-level instruments and the monitor, is effectively 2m x 1m. It's more crowded thanm I'd like, partially due to my poor tidiness but it does allow a lot of flexibility without any custom building.

The desk has small devices such as a soldering station but the only instrument that intrudes on it is the fron half of a logic analyser : the back is on the rear shelf, so it only uses a corner of the deskspace.

[johnk0gcj@gmail.com]

HP Agilent quotes my 5342A microwave range counter as being 498mm(19 5/8") deep.
 

[TheSteve]

Anritsu has several signal gens that need 600mm minimum. When I had one on my bench it got a corner and was hanging off the back a little.