Test Equipment Anonymous (TEA) group therapy thread

[xrunner]

And welcome to page 600 (if your forum settings are at the default number of posts per page).

Yay 600! 

[tautech]

A little fun exercise is to click on the dots in the page # list and then count how many times you need to do it to have expanded all 600 into a single string.

 

[xrunner]

A little fun exercise is to click on the dots in the page # list and then count how many times you need to do it to have expanded all 600 into a single string.

 

12 ... 

[Cubdriver]

Hmm, should there be an "official" TEA channel on YouTube?

And welcome to page 600 (if your forum settings are at the default number of posts per page).

Not too shabby for a thread that started in January of 2017.   

-Pat

[mnementh]

I agree with Pat and Carl. A buyer has fullfilled their obligation once they have paid for the item.  They are not obliged to leave good feedback.  Why would a buyer leave positive feedback to a seller that has not left them feedback after their purchase?

Of course there are some dickhead's out there that will return stuff or claim that an item was not as described, etc. But that is the price of doing business on eBay.  Such a buyer is hardly going to be persuaded to not do so based on lack of feedback from the seller.    Feedback helps the buyer evaluate a seller not visa versa. As a seller on eBay, I cannot refuse to sell to someone if they have poor feedback.

Of course you can. You can cancel any bid, and low feedback or excessive negative feedback are perfectly acceptable reasons per eBay seller protocol. You may get some numpty who tries to give negative feedback, but if they really have poor feedback as per your bid cancellation then eBay support will remove said feedback. They will almost always do so if you immediately make a second chance offer to the next in line or relist.

Hmm, should there be an "official" TEA channel on YouTube?

And welcome to page 600 (if your forum settings are at the default number of posts per page).

Not too shabby for a thread that started in January of 2017.   

-Pat

Jeebus... has it really been that long? It seems like only yesterday. 

BTW, Pat... I gotta tell you, I was gritting my teeth waiting for you to grab those 650-volt leads without turning off your calibrator... 


mnem
tzzzt.

[mnementh]

A little fun exercise is to click on the dots in the page # list and then count how many times you need to do it to have expanded all 600 into a single string.

 

12 ... 

https://youtu.be/5ZtbCOpx8Sk


mnem
The world may never know...

[neo]

A little fun exercise is to click on the dots in the page # list and then count how many times you need to do it to have expanded all 600 into a single string.

 

12 ... 

https://youtu.be/5ZtbCOpx8Sk


mnem
The world may never know...

48 and a half exuberant licks.... i may have been an odd kid. 

[bitseeker]

BTW, Pat... I gotta tell you, I was gritting my teeth waiting for you to grab those 650-volt leads without turning off your calibrator... 

And what a nice calibrator it is, too. That's some heavy iron that would go nicely in my lab.

[Cubdriver]

BTW, Pat... I gotta tell you, I was gritting my teeth waiting for you to grab those 650-volt leads without turning off your calibrator... 

And what a nice calibrator it is, too. That's some heavy iron that would go nicely in my lab.

I made sure to shut the calibrator off before unplugging the leads, though I should probably have waited a moment more before pulling the connections.  I don't think a perm would work on me, so I try not to light myself up if I can avoid it.

And it is a nice calibrator, and for sure it's some heavy iron.  I think it tips the scales at around 75 lbs or so, and it was a PITA to ship back from the left coast.  It's 24" long, and that's the inside dimension of the boxes I normally send things back in.  I had to get creative with cutting the flaps on the box to let me 'rack' it, and turn it from a 24" square to more like a 27 X 21" rectangle to stuff that sucker in there with a bit of clearance.  Fortunately it survived its travels unscathed.

I rolled the dice and lucked out on that one - it had a dead display, and the issue turned out to be a bad electrolytic in the VFD power supply. A few bucks for two of them (they were under 10uF, little radial lead jobbies), and back to life it sprang.

Oh, and I'm afraid I've long since gotten rid of the custom box, bitseeker, so I'm afraid it's going to have to stay here..   

-Pat

[Berni]

Oh I'm sure many of us wouldn't mind that big heavy calibrator sitting somewhere in our lab. I looked at these things a few times and they tend to be quite pricey.

[bitseeker]

Oh, and I'm afraid I've long since gotten rid of the custom box, bitseeker, so I'm afraid it's going to have to stay here..   

Woah, you never eluded to having mind reading skills. 

Oh I'm sure many of us wouldn't mind that big heavy calibrator sitting somewhere in our lab. I looked at these things a few times and they tend to be quite pricey.

Yeah, you can say that again.

[Cubdriver]

Hey, you finally got one too!
Using my systron donner / fairchild 7050 as a reference.
Change all the caps, the HV one literally fell apart in my hands.
It may need a new cord since it may be the original with it having no iec jack.
And there is a transistor that, when looking at it from the front, is in the back left. Q34 though the board is unnumbered, it is identifiable as the only one on that back corner and it has a heatsink on it. Failure of this part bricks the entire thing till it is replaced.

Above all else please exercise caution and safety, there exists exposed mains on the bottom of this thing.

edited to make more useful.

I found and downloaded a scan of the manual from the BAMA site.  That was a pleasant surprise - I expected to be shooting blind when trying to fix it, figuring that the manual would be unobtanium.  It even has a (mostly) legible schematic!  And I see that Q34 is the series pass transistor for the 3.8V rail that feeds the display driver logic, among other things.  I could see that bricking things if it reverts back to being beach sand...

-Pat

[tggzzz]

I think Ebay buyers who don't leave feedback ought to be banned, I'm getting sick of the bastards, their quick in sending you derisory offers, asking that you take extra care when packing the item etc and then, once delivered all safe and sound they to ground and if you email them and ask them to leave you feedback so that you may leave them some as well, and what do they do? they ignore your request 

As a seller, do you leave them feedback?  My long-time feedback policy (developed when I was first starting out and had little feedback, after leaving feedback for all sellers and frequently not getting any in return) is that as a buyer, once I pay for the item, my part is done.  The seller should then leave me feedback.  If they do not leave me feedback, then they get none from me.

-Pat

I agree with Pat here.  When the buyer pays they have done their part of the transaction and the seller should give positive feedback immediately. 

That's optimistic, since there are many stories of bad-faith buyers that make unjustified claims after receiving the goods.

This allows the buyer the opportunity to give neutral or negative feedback if there is a problem worthy of such, without fear of retaliation from the seller with unwarranted negative feedback.

For this reason, as a buyer I will not give feedback until the seller leaves me one.  Although, now that I think about it, I guess there's no good reason I couldn't leave positive feedback once I'm sure I am satisfied with the item. 

Precisely. And I do that religiously.

But I guess another reason I do it this way is to encourage the seller to leave feedback.

I have little concern about feedback from sellers.

I have sold far more on eBay than I have ever bought, so I'm not being biased toward the buyers here.  I've sold over 200 items on eBay in the last 4 years and only once have I wished that I hadn't left positive feedback for a buyer at the time of shipping the item.   I had one buyer that bought something that he didn't know the purpose of, then claimed it was defective when it didn't do the thing it was never supposed to do.  eBay let him return the item even though at that time I had no returns on all my listings, and eBay made me pay the return shipping as well.  Once I explained this to eBay, and explained to eBay that the returned item tested good, they refunded the return shipping charge but I was still stuck with an item I couldn't sell as new in package.  And now I set all my listings to allow returns with buyer pays return shipping.  I figure if eBay is going to let them return things anyway, I might as well make my listings look better by allowing returns.

Despite my leaving feedback for every one of the 233 buyers I've sold to in the last 4 years, I still have received only 104 feedback as seller.   

That seems sensible.

I've bought and sold roughly similar numbers of items. About 50% of buyers leave feedback, all positive.

[bd139]

I rarely get any feedback. I don't bother leaving it unless someone else does now.

[neo]

I found and downloaded a scan of the manual from the BAMA site.  That was a pleasant surprise - I expected to be shooting blind when trying to fix it, figuring that the manual would be unobtanium.  It even has a (mostly) legible schematic!  And I see that Q34 is the series pass transistor for the 3.8V rail that feeds the display driver logic, among other things.  I could see that bricking things if it reverts back to being beach sand...

-Pat

Yeah, it has a nice manual which surprised me too. This unit is very luckily easy maintenance, at least relatively speaking, 5 dollars of parts an iec cord i bought for a buck from salvation army and a little tweaking on the pots to get it to agree to my better meters and she is golden. Also, mine is says fairchild and was, i believe, made in 1969.

[factory]

ballantine?  my old man drank their beer up until they stopped brewing the swill.

I want it, BUT...…….my hp counters might revolt.


https://www.ebay.com/itm/Ballantine-Laboratories-Digital-Frequency-Counter-Model-5700A/183383140011?hash=item2ab27ca6ab:g:dEUAAOSwcWpbdfqG

LOL - that's sorely tempting.     Must resist - I have too damned much stuff now!!

-Pat

you would be doing a good deed, and stop me jonesing for the damn ugly thing.

its got 9 (count 'em 9) digits.  none of my orange glowing hp units have 9.

come on man.....have pity.  buy it and stop me from going back to look again and again.

its making me itch all over!

You need to find a 5360A counter (11 or 12 orange glowy digits?), I regret not bidding on one a few years ago that made very little, having said that it looks very complex if it goes wrong and has a special rats-nest wiring loom inside;

https://pmanning.smugmug.com/Electronics/HP-5360A-Computing-Counter

David

always lusted for a 5360a because of all the glowing goodness.  BUT after reading the "the emperors" horror story about the multiple units he acquired.....no way.

apparently the problem is the massive parts count.  he reports over 500 ttl ic's that just constantly decide that their time has come.

don't really need a reason to up the dosage on my bp meds right now.

http://emperoroftestequipment.weebly.com/

There are certainly north of 300 of them, IIRC - there are individual photos of each of the boards on the SmugMug link above.  That's part of why the bloody thing weighs 55 pounds - the massive 5V supply for all those little black caterpillars living inside it!

-Pat

I've only just realised that the 5360A in the link is yours, after clicking the electronics tab at the top of the page and thinking this is definitely someone with TEA. Worryingly I seem to have about a dozen of the instruments pictured.

I must confess how I found that site, I have something with a tiny bit of the 5360A circuitry inside and a bit of web searching led me there. 

David

[Specmaster]

Tea has to be one of the best threads if not the best thread on this forum, now that we are officially 600 pages long, how does that stack against other threads? Surely there can't be another with such a meteoric rise as this one?

Bitseeker, did you ever in your wildest dreams think that it would take of like the sky rocket it is? You have created a true monster here 

Edit, just checked and I've been here for 517 pages and so far it's been nothing short of a hoot and pure delight, what a great of bunch girls and guys we have here. I'm proud to say that I'm a part of this wonderful group and culture we have and my TEA is not showing any signs of being cured even though I'm having a bit of a cull, just getting ready for even more items in need of some TLC and given a new lease of life.

[bd139]

 

Cull here. Going to MKARS on Sunday with a fad wad so that might be short lived. 

[Specmaster]

Just hope that your new car is big enough for the huge haul that your likely to pick up while there 

[bd139]

If I put the back seats down I can get a Tek 7k in there on a scopemobile. I checked 

[Brumby]

Some people might be worried by you saying that ... but they won't be reading it here.

On the other hand, those that will be reading it here are just nodding in approval of your planning.   


.... and perhaps a little jealous - but definitely interested in what follows you home.

[bd139]

I have a relatively objective shopping list which totals about £20, mainly toroidal cores and some air variable caps if I’m honest so I can build a trans match.

I’m slightly hoping SA dude turns up with his pile of 8557A/180T mainframes tested working. If not I’ll see if I can get some eBay bunce in.

[mnementh]

If I put the back seats down I can get a Tek 7k in there on a scopemobile. I checked 

So... still room enough for the body AND cans of gas when the missus decides to push you and your crap treasures off a cliff?   


mnem
Who am I kidding... she'd keep the car. 

[mnementh]

Some people might be worried by you saying that ... but they won't be reading it here.

On the other hand, those that will be reading it here are just nodding in approval of your planning.   


.... and perhaps a little jealous - but definitely interested in what follows you home.

LALALALALALLA!!!

I can't hear you!


mnem
*wibble*

[tggzzz]

...and ping goes the counter up there---^

Isn't numerology silly