Test Equipment Anonymous (TEA) group therapy thread

[xrunner]

Should I make a thread about it or just post the repairs here over the next several days?

Make another thread - you'll get more views and suggestions and it will be documented for the internet searches a lot better as a stand alone repair thread.

[bd139]

First Fluke vs Keysight review.

https://youtu.be/rD-1A_SpHEU

To note you can turn auto hold on but you need the manual and the setup menu. This is a poke at the useless defaults.

Edit: to note when you do turn it on it doesn’t bloody work properly either.

[Specmaster]

One up to the Fluke there for sure.

[bd139]

Yes definitely.

[bitseeker]

Edit: and a house where I can have a 1.5m depth bench 

No need for such a bench. Just add shelves off appropriate depth.

Wow, very nice and tidy lab space capt!

[mtdoc]

Edit: and a house where I can have a 1.5m depth bench 

No need for such a bench. Just add shelves off appropriate depth.

Wow, very nice and tidy lab space capt!

I agree. Very nice!  One problem though:  Not enough space on those shelves for much more test equipment. 

[bitseeker]

LOL! That does happen, eventually. Time to build more shelves.

[neo]

LOL! That does happen, eventually. Time to build more shelves.

Yup, exactly like what i am doing only with less bleeding involved preferably. 

[Cerebus]

Wait... what?  This was a JOKE?!? I though Cerebus was dead serious. I wouldn't put it past him.

No. The Mice are not, how shall Cerebus put it, cooperative. [Fx: sound of a sharpening stone against meteoritic steel.] This may change...

[mnementh]

Wait... what?  This was a JOKE?!? I though Cerebus was dead serious. I wouldn't put it past him.

No. The Mice are not, how shall Cerebus put it, cooperative. [Fx: sound of a sharpening stone against meteoritic steel.] This may change...

Pinky will do ANYTHING for Phar Fignewton. (This information is the byproduct of a misspent youth )

Random Slice of IRL:



This is real, found in the hip pocket of a pair of Harbor Bay (casual clothes for fat bastards) khakis I bought online.

So confidence! Much qualities! Wear for Great Justice!!!

mnem
They don't want me to remember.

[Berni]

Edit: and a house where I can have a 1.5m depth bench 

No need for such a bench. Just add shelves off appropriate depth.

That's quite a neat setup you got there. Access to the back of your gear can be very very handy sometimes. Especialy some of the old stuff that has a lot of things on the BNCs on the back.

My bench is 60cm deep with a 45cm deep raised shelf behind it. Works well but the bigger boatanchors still won't fit on that shelf, so they have to be kept elsewhere in a rack.

[capt bullshot]

Edit: and a house where I can have a 1.5m depth bench 

No need for such a bench. Just add shelves off appropriate depth.

Wow, very nice and tidy lab space capt!

I agree. Very nice!  One problem though:  Not enough space on those shelves for much more test equipment. 

There's another shelf of similar size in the backside (where the chair faces to), with no bench in front of it and not accessible from the backside. Already full of TEA

Usually, it isn't as tidy as seen on the above picture:

[med6753]

Finally, Friday AM and I'm done work for the week. I'll stay up all day rather than sleep so I'll see daylight. I'll crash tonight. And no overtime this weekend so I'll have tomorrow off too. And no visitors this weekend. 2 days in a row to myself. What will I do?   

(If you're good boys I'll have some pron later)   

[bd139]

Lucky you. I'm currently fighting politics and cover your arse incompetence in the school system here today 

Have done nothing this week TEA related other than poking some batteries.

[dazz1]

@bd139
Member dazz1 contacted me about a scope as his PM3217 is concerning him.
Would you care to share some pearls of wisdom about them ?
TIA

Yep go for it 

Nah mate, preventative maintenance, recapping, any gotchas etc.

Hi
I got my PM3217 scope from the Naval Dockyard back in the late 1990's.  I don't know the manufacture date but it is dressed in the later brown colours.  It spent many years in storage unused.  When I powered it up a few months ago it still works. 

I put an order in today for all the caps needed to replace all of the blue Phillips ones.  I have been able to obtain axials for all except one value.  When I have finished, it should look almost factory original.   

Mine is fitted with a dull gray cap, not a Rifa. 

I also plan to fit a 2.5A IEC power connector.  The factory dangling cable and plug are annoying.

It will need calibration but I don't have all the required test equipment, so that will be a challenge.

Dazz

[bd139]

You're lucky if it's a grey one. May have been replaced already.

When I replaced the axial ones I used radial ones instead. Cheaper! No shame 

There's plenty of space for an IEC socket - good idea.

Calibration is easy enough if you have a reasonable signal source. Cheap chinese DDS is enough.

[med6753]

Lucky you. I'm currently fighting politics and cover your arse incompetence in the school system here today 

Have done nothing this week TEA related other than poking some batteries.

I recall those parenting days well and having battles with the school system. Alas, my oldest child is now 42 and the youngest is 29. Time flies. But now THEY have to fight the school system for the grand kids. 

[Specmaster]

Postman in his van has been down our street already this morning and also the foot postman has been to us this morning so no new toys were coming my way this morning despite there still quite a few outstanding 

Imagine my surprise when the about 10 minutes later the doorbell rang and there stood the postman again with a few parcels that he found at the bottom of his bag, yes yes yes I would have some new toys after all it seemed. None of them was big enough to contain my my new DMM so knew that was either high voltage probes from Ebay for my oscilloscopes or some Banggood goodies.

Open package no.1, nail clippers from Banggood for my thick toenails, package no.2 again from China, but had my high voltage probes in it, plugged the probes in  and connected to the test the test point on the scope, set the compensation on the scope to 100:1 and observe the waveform..... I was seeing fecking 50Hz sine wave at a very low value??

Set up number 2 scope, same fecking thing, pulled the grabber of the probe and as my finger touched the exposed probe tip, the screen became alive with large spikes, apply the tip to the test point and yes, there it was the expected square wave at 1KHz so  was going on. Turned out the grabber was not fully engaged, despite being retained firmly, gave it a real hard push and it slid onto the probe body a bit more and hey presto it was working correctly. Did the same thing to the 2nd probe and it too worked OK

Meanwhile in other news, earlier in the week the 4mm stackable banana plugs I ordered from Bangood arrived, what a pile of poo they are, just don't buy these, they are rubbish, the cage just spins on the plug shaft, fair enough when not in the socket, but these were spinning while in the socket even  The cage was either made too large for the plug spindle, or the spindle was too small, either way not good news. The plug pin was also a bit on the short side so if the socket is slightly recessed which on most DMM they are then not all of the plug is inserted before the body of the plug collides with the fascia of the meter 

Out of 20 plugs I may be able to use 8 or 9 of them, some of them don't even have any hole in the plug pin for the cable to be soldered into  so on those ones I'll have to solder onto the sidewall of the plug pin.

Does anyone know of some decent plugs of this sort that I can get?  Banggood have given a partial refund so that reasonable seeing as I can use some of them but I cannot recommend these ones to anybody they are shit.

[bd139]

I only use pre-made Pomona banana plug leads now. I burned so much money on shit ones over the years. Farnell sell them. They’re not cheap though.

[Specmaster]

Great, are they stackable though?

[bd139]

Yes. They have two sockets per plug. I use their banana to banana cables, BNCs to bananas and minigrabber to bananas for literally everything. Rarely use DMM probes if I’m honest.

[med6753]

Not exactly sure what you're looking for but I did get these from AliExpress last year. Extenders so I can use shrouded leads on my older Flukes. They fit tight and the quality is fine.

[med6753]

I did promise some pron today so here it is. Tek 7A15A Single Channel Vertical Plug-in. This one is giving me some fits. The attenuator deck switch is dirty. I removed the cover and sprayed IPA in there several times and it works fine for a while then starts going ape shit again. So now I have to get serious and pull the attenuator assembly out and see what's up. At least it's a nice open design and easy to get too.

[bd139]

Thanks for the teardown. One reason I wanted a 7000 is that the plugins are far easier to work on than the 4xx scopes even if half the bits are the same 

[Specmaster]

Not exactly sure what you're looking for but I did get these from AliExpress last year. Extenders so I can use shrouded leads on my older Flukes. They fit tight and the quality is fine.

Thanks, I already have some of those (although green and yellow, red and black were not available at the time I ordered) also specifically for the same reason as you and also so I can use shrouded leads with my HP3478A, HP3468A and HP3466A meters as well.

What I'm trying to do is make up some jumper leads to make comparing readings on my various meters at the same time easier, especially when checking for calibration drift between them. I have some premade leads that go from socket doublers to croc clips, and I need to make or purchase some with socket doublers at one end a banana plug the other end in order to loop from meter to meter.

The first attached photo shows the premade leads with the type of plugs that plug into it, the 2nd shows the crappy Banggood socket doubler that I made up against a premade one and as you can see the plug pin on the Banggood is shorter and that cage rotates but not on the premade ones thus a better connection is made with the device.