Test Equipment Anonymous (TEA) group therapy thread

[beanflying]

.....

Sorry to hear about your car woes, my friend. If things turn really pear-shaped, I could print you up a hammer with which to beat it to death... 

mnem
*Waiting for the electrician or someone like him*

Several weeks into beating things to death with it. PLA one sheared off at the thread, this PETG one is holding up a treat  The other end is the last of the Nylon ones I made over 35 years ago in an injection mold at secondary school

Marking out and making my x10 and x100  decades to complete my home brew 0-1M bench abuse set as distinct from my nice USSR reference one.

[bitseeker]

Cloning vintage knobs. Very nice!

[beanflying]

For those of you having problems with your vintage knobs make and fit a new one 

So many posts ago @bitseeker you even ticked the like box on my post at the time ....   

[bitseeker]

LOL! It's so good that it came around again.

Oops. With so many posts here, I didn't remember where it came from. I put it in my watch-later queue and then, just this weekend, watched it.

Thanks again, bean!

[bitseeker]

And now for an interesting twist on TEA, it appears that Outback, one of the prevalent used gear vendors on eBay, sold a bunch of stuff that they shouldn't have. Now, Keysight is helping them retrieve it all.

https://www.eevblog.com/forum/testgear/keysight-ip-intimidation/
https://www.eevblog.com/forum/testgear/ebays-outback6-lawyered-up-and-is-attempting-to-claw-back-equipment-they-sold/

I don't know about you guys, but I've seen lots of stuff listed by Outback over the years. Nevertheless, I never bought anything from them.

Anyway, it's an interesting "hazard" of buying used TE.

[med6753]

Yep, I've been reading those threads. It just reeks of .gov, secret programs, confidentially clauses, contracts, and the stuff was to be destroyed regardless of it's status. Instead some bureaucrat fucked up and sent the stuff for auction or surplus and now many assess are in a sling.   

[trapc45]

90 second epoxy?  Wouldn't it cure before you even get it mixed well?

Its from Mighty Fine Junk. No way it cures in 90 seconds! 

[bitseeker]

Yep, I've been reading those threads. It just reeks of .gov, secret programs, confidentially clauses, contracts, and the stuff was to be destroyed regardless of it's status. Instead some bureaucrat fucked up and sent the stuff for auction or surplus and now many assess are in a sling.   

Yeah, it's also a hazard for anyone who repairs and resells gear. Outback probably didn't know the special situation surrounding the equipment. They just bought the lots from some big liquidation house (or a smaller one who bought from a larger one) and then listed the stuff.

[Inverted18650]

Greetings All,

Hanging out reading a lot and trying to heal. Hope to be back to my normal self within a couple days. I have been tinkering with all the DC VREFs and some are so good its hard to say good bye. 

[mnementh]

90 second epoxy?  Wouldn't it cure before you even get it mixed well?

Its from Mighty Fine Junk. No way it cures in 90 seconds! 

Been using it for decades.

Nothing magical about it; good or bad. It's plain old organic phenol epoxy; it sets in a couple minutes, and holds well. The 1oz syringe was a good deal. I prefer the syringe for the convenience of not futzing around with tubes and screw-on caps that inevitably weep and get resin or hardener all over your fingers.

Syringe makes it much easier to use exactly the amount you need for a job, so really more cost-effective too; getting it at that price makes it a no-brainer.

mnem
*ZZZzzzZZZzzz...*

[med6753]

Yep, I've been reading those threads. It just reeks of .gov, secret programs, confidentially clauses, contracts, and the stuff was to be destroyed regardless of it's status. Instead some bureaucrat fucked up and sent the stuff for auction or surplus and now many assess are in a sling.   

Yeah, it's also a hazard for anyone who repairs and resells gear. Outback probably didn't know the special situation surrounding the equipment. They just bought the lots from some big liquidation house (or a smaller one who bought from a larger one) and then listed the stuff.

For sure. And if are a U.S. citizen it could turn ugly for you real quick if you politely decline Keysight's request to return the equipment, regardless if they are going to compensate you or not. All the .gov has to do is go to court and convince it that national security is at risk or that the equipment was "stolen" and the court will issue an order that it be seized. That order will be handed to the FBI. They show up at your door. You tell them to go fuck themselves. They leave. Go to another court and get a search warrant. They come back and this time they ain't playing.

Now if the equipment was sold to someone in another country it all depends on the treaties in place between the U.S. and that country. You may or may not be able to thumb your nose at them and tell them to take a hike.       

[bitseeker]

It's the first time I've seen something like this involving the general public, rather than a business keeping stuff that they should've disposed, for example. Makes you wonder about equipment with asset tags from certain companies.

[beanflying]

Given you have been able to get Military Data encryption/firmware for Agilent/Keysight gear for a long while someone made a booboo with what was left onboard and a potential backdoor in the wrong hands has got to be the likely issue more than custom hardware. Unlikely Outbacks fault and far more likely up the food chains fault for allowing them to receive that gear in the first place. Also unlikely the full truth will ever be known much as some on this forum seem to demand it.

That said there is some US based Test Gear sellers that scream run away .....

[bitseeker]

Greetings All,

Hanging out reading a lot and trying to heal. Hope to be back to my normal self within a couple days. I have been tinkering with all the DC VREFs and some are so good its hard to say good bye. 

Greetings! Good to hear your recovery is going well. Ahem, your TEA seems not to have been affected, of course.

[0culus]

Successful repair of my 3325B function generator rear panel output tonight. I swapped out the existing A22 board for another the fellow I purchased the instrument from sent me, and just like that, the rear panel output is fixed. I decided not to try desoldering because the particular transistor that is bad (circled in the pic below) is basically unobtainium and I only have the one replacement currently. So the old A22 board will be saved as a parts mule, if the need ever arises. The A22 board is kind of weird. The majority of it is the power supply for the whole instrument, with +5, -15, and +15 Vdc rails, while the small strip drives the rear panel signal and fast sync outputs.

The 0-60 MHz fast sync works now too. Not going to use the rear signal output that much...I bought this unit for work in audio frequencies mainly so the 0-20 MHz output on the front panel is completely adequate. Curiously, the "0 dBm" rear signal is really 10 dBm...either way it is unfortunately fixed amplitude so perhaps less useful.

Bonus pictures of the frequency domain view of a 10 MHz square wave from the 3325B. Shows why you need a significantly faster 'scope to get a clean view of the waveform than for a pure sine of the same fundamental. FWIW, the 8568B RF unit I'm using was a factory 8568A -> B conversion, so that's why the 8568B is tacked on.

[med6753]

It's the first time I've seen something like this involving the general public, rather than a business keeping stuff that they should've disposed, for example. Makes you wonder about equipment with asset tags from certain companies.

Of all the junk I have here only one still had an intact asset tag and that was the 2465 originally owned by IBM. But I am aware of how the PDA (Property Disposal Assessment) process at IBM works because one of my jobs when I worked there was the disposal of millions of dollars of obsolete equipment. It was a bullet proof process that required multiple layers of approvals before I could arrange for outside contractors to remove and dispose of the equipment. And if anything was "sensitive" (rarely) it required a bonded contractor. But everything was strictly internal assets for stuff that was sold commercially with absolutely no ties to the gov. I would assume if it involved the gov it would have been red tape city.

But don't think you're safe if your junk doesn't have an asset tag. Because within that asset record is the actual S/N of the equipment itself and could potentially still be traceable.     

[mnementh]

I read most of both threads. Seriously, 95% of the drama there is self-inflicted. 

mnem
Not before my morning cuppa.

[med6753]

I read most of both threads. Seriously, 95% of the drama there is self-inflicted. 

mnem
Not before my morning cuppa.

That's for sure.  But given that Keysight is not being forthcoming about WHY that's just fanning the hysteria. After all, who wants black helicopters hovering over your house? 

[mnementh]

Speaking of Drama...

Looks like I caught them on the right side of Chinese New Year.  Still haven't seen the funds in my PayPal, but once I do I'll post an autopsy. If the refund does go through, and I have no reason to believe it won't, then it'll be worth taking some time ot see if I can sort this POS into a working soldering iron.

mnem
Well, duck me!

Dear [REDACTED]mnem,

First of all, thank you for your reply and time in dealing with the order 605GLERRP. Under our joint efforts, we finally reach an agreement on this issue. Hope you will be satisfied with the solution.

Banggood will do what we have promised to our customers. When you receive this email, we have already arranged a refund US$34.35 to your payment account. But for different payment methods, the time for refund reaching to your account is different. We have checked your payment way is PayPal Express Checkout, so please wait for another 48-72 hours.

By the way, would you please do us a favor by writing a review for us via these two links listed below if you are satisfied with our services? We will much appreciate for your support.

https://www.mywot.com/scorecard/banggood.com
https://www.trustpilot.com/review/www.banggood.com

After writing a review, please contact us, sending the links and screenshots of reviews to us. Many thanks for your cooperation.

We hope to receive a continuance of your kind patronage and we shall spare no efforts in providing fast shipping and best services for you at all times.

For any questions or further assistance, please feel free to contact us.

Have a nice day!


Best regards,

Ashley

----------------- Original ------------------
Date: 2019/2/7 12:24:36
Subject: Item is different from the one I ordered 60555692

In Other News... Bang-em-good banged me good.

            

KSGER Stainless Steel FX-9501 T12 Soldering Iron Handle; $38 from Banggood

"Item NOT As described, defective, not even correct brand. Very disappointed. Please refund immediately."

1 - Arrived with messed up cable visible from outside. This does not bode well. 
2 - Cable strain relief messed up; this is what I found after unwrapping. Will need to be completely rewired correctly so cable is affixed inside. grrr. 
3 - Can't even get a cartridge into it any further than this. I almost broke the tip trying to get it past old, hard oversized o-ring inside. Just the tip, man. 
4 - Some off-brand product, NOT KSGER. 
5 - NOT Stainless steel. Magnetic, rusty, just plain cheap chromed steel tube. Utterly unmitigated piece of shit. Nice & skinny grip, though.

Very disappointing. No idea where they got this piece of shit, but this borders on bait & switch. We'll see what they offer. If they demand a video, I'll tell them to go suck a duck and have PayPal handle it.

mnem
Banggood, whatcha doin' widdat duuuuuck?

[mnementh]

I read most of both threads. Seriously, 95% of the drama there is self-inflicted. 

mnem
Not before my morning cuppa.

That's for sure.  But given that Keysight is not being forthcoming about WHY that's just fanning the hysteria. After all, who wants black helicopters hovering over your house? 

I do. Seriously; I'd LOVE to have done something important enough to be on that kind of RADAR. 

Clearly they can't be forthcoming; and even I've done work where all I can say about it is "I can't say anything about it.". Not even a government contract thing; just plain old NDA. The guy talking about how some fuckwits are willing to shoot themselves in the foot just on GP was absolutely right. 

You do realize... it could be as simple as the classification of certain types of crypto as "munitions" to prevent them being sold abroad, right? Remember when we all had to click-through a EULA that prohibited transfer of software to certain countries just to use SSL in our browsers? Smeesh. 

mnem

[bd139]

I doubt its anything to do with all of that. Someone paid for disposal, it got rammed in a warehouse somewhere, soemone decided to make some cash and sell it on. Now when it comes to audit, someone who paid for disposal expects to have certified corpses. Now they're executing the paper trail. Even when I worked for a defence contractor we had ZERO custom builds or anything special at all. It was all commercial spec. Literally everything was stock standard and most of it wasn't even very well calibrated or looked after. 90% of the test gear was "for indication only" and only QA had any calibrated and traceable cal stuff.

This is all a bureacratic pile of bollocks. It might be covered by an NDA but you don't go and start a fire without an offer on the table first.

Either way the customer loses here. Even if they ship you some new kit that has some problems with it in the tax and PITA factor as like hell they will collect on pallet. You'll have to pack and send out of your own pocket which isn't easy if you have a 30Kg bit of kit on your hands.

Apparently Keysight are executing claims against other vendors' kit as well (BK included) which is so far past the mark of acceptable behaviour it's unreal.

[med6753]

Yep, that whole Keysight thing is a freaking mess. And it could be something as stupid as bd described.

Here's something that will make you stop and think given today's current events. It was something I couldn't talk about while I was working but now that I'm retired I don't give a flying fuck.

Towards the end of the mainframe test process we have to pull up the actual order and verify it's configuration. Well that order lists the customer's name. Guess who bought several fully loaded....and I mean LOADED with every feature.....Z13's?

The Russian Federation.  Seems Vlad has got some BIG play toys. 

[bd139]

Doesn't surprise me. Easier for KGB to burn a stack of Z13s than it was for the Stasi to burn all their files on paper 

[Zucca]

bitseeker

Thank you for creating this place and unleash the best of us. Since then I feel less alone in my Lab.

How did you come up with the TEA idea?

After the millenium it's time for some documentary background BBC planet earth style.

[med6753]

  Cute!