Test Equipment Anonymous (TEA) group therapy thread

[PA0PBZ]

and a speaker to boot ... 

That is clearly for the continuity test 

[bd139]

Talking of bench meters, I just saw this steaming pile of WTF on eBay 

Appears to be having multiple identity crisis's at once

Looks like someone gutted it and converted to a variable power supply. What's the confusion?

The speaker mostly.

Plus it’s a long standing tradition to bitch about such conversions 

[med6753]

“Back end of a 2465” job? 

 

LMAO

Touche. 

[med6753]

Paint it Tek blue it'll seem better then. 

Is this Comedy Central? 

[med6753]

Another calibration. Fluke 8010A 3.5 digit. Unlike most bench Flukes this one has just one pot to adjust the entire DCV range. (Center bottom in pix) So you may have to adjust for best compromise across the DC range. Turns out this guy was in spec across all ranges so no adjustments required. Another thing with these older Flukes is their very slow refresh rate. You have to give them several seconds to settle down. If you don't you'll screw up the cal. I don't find it to be a problem but millennials with 1ns attention spans might.



This was the last Fluke in my collection that needed the crummy beige case painted. It's now done so for now Papa Smurf has put away the spray paint. 

[med6753]

I fixed it.

[bd139]

Hahaha well played 

[xrunner]

Hahaha well played 

Haha that's about right for that thing. 

[Specmaster]

Speaking of bench meters, I've fallen of the perch again  just won myself a lovely Thurlby 1905A bench meter in what looks like almost mint condition. This box of tricks has a switched mode between 4.5 and 5.5 digits, but it also has a party trick mode, undocumented 6.5 digit mode as well  Has an accuracy of just 0.02% as well as 100 steps of data logging etc. be about 4 days before I see it so expect to see some nice tear down photos of this when it arrives.

[bd139]

Cool stuff. Let us know how it goes. They’ve always interested me as they can do basic computation.

[xrunner]

Ooh that's nice. Looks good and probably works great.

[Specmaster]

@bd139, thats one of the things that attracted me to it as well. The manual doesnt state if its a autoranger or manual? I kind of think it might be a auto ranger if the right hand 2 buttons are push in together as they are marked with an A, time will tell. I know its pre the TTi days but its is from the same stable so I'm thinking that it should match their built quality as well. Like you and your HP gear, it seems I'm slowly amassing the essential bits and bobs of a TTi based lab as we discussed a while ago 

[bd139]

Indeed. I think it’s auto. There’s apparently a hidden hack. If you press * then * then 51/2 it’ll go into 6.5 digit mode although I’ve never got my hands on one to try it.

[Specmaster]

That is how you get into the higher mode, but thats only applicable I think to the lower ranges, it looks to be quite well designed from this video I found of it and I have down loaded both the user manual and the service manual as well, so fingers crossed.

[worsthorse]

Cool stuff. Let us know how it goes. They’ve always interested me as they can do basic computation.

Owning a DMM that does arithmetic better than me (which is not difficult) would just depress me.   

[AVGresponding]

Speaking of bench meters, I've fallen of the perch again  just won myself a lovely Thurlby 1905A bench meter in what looks like almost mint condition. This box of tricks has a switched mode between 4.5 and 5.5 digits, but it also has a party trick mode, undocumented 6.5 digit mode as well  Has an accuracy of just 0.02% as well as 100 steps of data logging etc. be about 4 days before I see it so expect to see some nice tear down photos of this when it arrives.

  Is there an echo in here?   

I got mine last Friday, did you get yours from ComputerDisposals? I'm sure they had a few... (page 1669 to see my excuses for not fixing it as quickly as I should have)

The 6.5 digits only works on the 2000mV range, and pressing the two 'A' buttons only causes an error message, as they are the two ranges for the highest current measurement. The high current ranges are protected by an internal M205 ceramic fuse.

Seems pretty well bang on, though I confess I've not done the maths to prove it 

EDIT: The internal fuse is 5A

[Neomys Sapiens]

Speaking of bench meters, I've fallen of the perch again  just won myself a lovely Thurlby 1905A bench meter in what looks like almost mint condition. This box of tricks has a switched mode between 4.5 and 5.5 digits, but it also has a party trick mode, undocumented 6.5 digit mode as well  Has an accuracy of just 0.02% as well as 100 steps of data logging etc. be about 4 days before I see it so expect to see some nice tear down photos of this when it arrives.

Huh. Was that yesterday? I think I looked at it too, but as the compensation for the outgoing HP4261A will involve a HP3478A I looked away quickly.

[mnementh]

Mmmmmmmm... bagels toasting and a right proper pot of right proper coffee brewing. If only I could be arsed to grind it fresh...

mnem
"Oh yeah... that's the stuff... put it *thwap-thwap-thwap* RIGHT THERE..." *slightly pornographic sigh out loud*

I didn't know you could buy Tim Horton's coffee for home brewing.  Next time I'm in Staten Island I'll have to check that out. Unfortunately that's the closest one to me at nearly 100 miles. Next one is at least 150 miles away.

Looks like Amazon is your friend for that as well; seems they have grinds for every maker out there. 

mnem
*thrifting for a computer desk*

[Neomys Sapiens]

Set aside the 8840A until the option 09 board arrives (Monday or Tuesday?).  Spent my breakfast pondering time trying to convince myself that I should have one of my 5.5 digit meters "paid for" calibrated so I can use it as a reference for the other meters that I need to do (there are two Fluke 8840As, two HP 3478As, and a Keithley 199 and another four handheld DMMs of various stripes).   

But I am not there yet, so I spent the morning playing around with the small pile of voltage and resistance references I have bought or built and wandering into ebay to see how much a "real" voltage calibrator would cost. 

Doesn't seem like a purchase I am likely to make any time soon.

Finally decided to do something fruitful, so I repaired the type 106 that I tried to blow up last week. Spent a pleasant afternoon running it through the performance check and it works again.  Going to recalibrate it this evening.  When this one is finished, I will have worked through the entire pile of Tektronix big box signal generators.

Oh come on, what do you want with a voltage-only calibrator?

[Neomys Sapiens]

Someone around here (at least I think so) posted a link to a rather exotic (British?) metrology-grade DMM and calibrator manufacturer. Unfortunately, I did not store (or not sufficiently comment) the link.
Who can help?

[Neomys Sapiens]

More pr0n. Decided to make a quick bandpass filter to play with. Peak frequency indicated

Yes, it can do sweep. But I prefer to do it with the FG504, because you can get precise reading on start and stop frequencies by deselecting respectively stopping the sweep. Or did I miss the equivalent trick?

[Kosmic]

Someone around here (at least I think so) posted a link to a rather exotic (British?) metrology-grade DMM and calibrator manufacturer. Unfortunately, I did not store (or not sufficiently comment) the link.
Who can help?

Transmille ? https://www.transmille.com/

Time Electronics ? https://www.timeelectronics.com/

[bd139]

More pr0n. Decided to make a quick bandpass filter to play with. Peak frequency indicated

Yes, it can do sweep. But I prefer to do it with the FG504, because you can get precise reading on start and stop frequencies by deselecting respectively stopping the sweep. Or did I miss the equivalent trick?

It does that too.

1. Plug counter into sync.
2. Sweep off, set end frequency on main dial.
3. Sweep on, set range Hz to zero.
4. Set F start to desired start frequency
5. Switch range Hz to something other than zero to control range
6. Use sym to control rate.

Job done.

The 3312A is actually two independent FG’s in one box really. Also does burst and triggered stuff.

[nixiefreqq]

Mmmmmmmm... bagels toasting and a right proper pot of right proper coffee brewing. If only I could be arsed to grind it fresh...

mnem
"Oh yeah... that's the stuff... put it *thwap-thwap-thwap* RIGHT THERE..." *slightly pornographic sigh out loud*

I didn't know you could buy Tim Horton's coffee for home brewing.  Next time I'm in Staten Island I'll have to check that out. Unfortunately that's the closest one to me at nearly 100 miles. Next one is at least 150 miles away.

Looks like Amazon is your friend for that as well; seems they have grinds for every maker out there. 

mnem
*thrifting for a computer desk*

LOOK OUT!!!!   HE HAS A KNIFE!!!!

did they let you cross the border with that pig sticker?

don't tell me you use THAT to spread butter on your bagel?  (i thought people were civilized in the great white north)

does it lock back?

[ExodusEffects]