Test Equipment Anonymous (TEA) group therapy thread

[beanflying]

No TEA today. Sun is shining and I have Bee'ing helper to remove a Hive from the wall of the Rear Shack. Bee'ing the uncooperative beasties they are decided to move swarm to the roof requiring level 11 bee keeping ninja skills.

After that definitely Beer O'Clock and refurbishment time of for my Grandfathers marking gauge after many years of neglect. First layer of polish done and looking like the day he either brought it or in this case more likely made it.

[Black Phoenix]

After that definitely Beer O'Clock and refurbishment time of for my Grandfathers marking gauge after many years of neglect. First layer of polish done and looking like the day he either brought it or in this case more likely made it.

What are you going to do with that FSP PSU on the back?

[beanflying]

That's the supply for my Woody MITX - still not finished 

[Brumby]

Now that's something you don't see every day.

[med6753]

Now that's something you don't see every day.

Needs scraping and a coat of paint

[Brumby]

... and you have just the colour, don't you!

[beanflying]

Some time or another. 

Needs the Bees gone first then the Ivy and the board we had to remove under bombardment needs replacing at least due to being in several bits.

Then maybe some TLC with a sander and paintbrush. It is another 100' down the yard from the shack so sort out out of sight out of mind. It is fully lined dry and clean inside for storage so it get the job done. It is only the North wall in the pic that really needs a paint.

[bd139]

Ok reporting back on the 3312A sweep process from the other day now I have a few minutes:

1. Stick sweep on.
2. Turn range Hz to zero and start controls to zero
3. Change the main frequency control to the end frequency measuring with sync connected to counter
4. Change the START frequency to the end frequency measuring with sync connected to counter
5. Flick range into whatever and it'll start sweeping.

Getting it to trigger and get a full screen wide scan on a scope with say 2KHz a div is a dick however. Much easier with DG1022Z sync and markers. But then again considerably newer tech.

[Black Phoenix]

... and you have just the colour, don't you!

I was thinking exactly that!

[med6753]

Needs a 2nd coat. 

[Specmaster]

And the door?? 

[Specmaster]

Anyone on here have any exerience with laser printers at all? I have been given a Samsung CLP-315W printer complete with a sealed set of toner cartridges plus an additional sealed magenta cartridge as as well. Problem is that it prints horizontal black smudges / lines across the whole page, sometimes its 1 or 2 and the position moves from top of the page the bottom and when it prints 2, the first is 1/3rd the page down from the top and 2nd line is 1/3rd up from the bottom.

The next page still has the same issues, plus a ghost image of the previous page. I have cleaned the transfer belt and also the imaging drum without any improvement.If I removed the toner artridges and look inside the printer, the transfer belt still has an image of the previous page. Any ideas what the cuprit is?

[Black Phoenix]

If the bars moved from the top to the bottom, probably the rubber rollers that catch the paper/move the paper have toner powder on them.

[bd139]

Some advice I got from a laser printer repair guy once: if the printer is worth less than £100 throw it away and buy another one 

[Specmaster]

If the bars moved from the top to the bottom, probably the rubber rollers that catch the paper/move the paper have toner powder on them.

All the rollers have been cleaned so I think that theory can be discounted and it dosent explain why the transfer belt still displays the image of the last page printed.

[bd139]

Fuser is probably fecked if it’s printing lines. If it’s reprinting then it’s probably the drum.

[Specmaster]

Fuser is probably fecked. That’s what killed my last brother laser.

I'm not so sure, the print comes out OK, paper is nice and hot but the print has black horizontal line which is smudged on it, the rest is nice and sharp, and print also has a chost of the page before printed on it, which is also visibile if you look inside the printer, still on the transfer belt. Surely the fuser just does the cook the toner onto the paper, which it does.

Edit, the drum has been inspected for damage and also cleaned with IPA so the drum is spotless.

[bd139]

See my edit.

[Black Phoenix]

Did the transfer belt assembly have the wiper / cleaning blade present / in good condition?

[Specmaster]

Did the transfer belt assembly have the wiper / cleaning blade present / in good condition?

There was something that looked like a wiper blade but it was not actually touching the belt at all and also the waste toner receiver is clean, which I would expect, that if the wiper was removing any residue toner from the belt, would be deposited in the wast tank?

[bd139]

Fuser is probably fecked. That’s what killed my last brother laser.

I'm not so sure, the print comes out OK, paper is nice and hot but the print has black horizontal line which is smudged on it, the rest is nice and sharp, and print also has a chost of the page before printed on it, which is also visibile if you look inside the printer, still on the transfer belt. Surely the fuser just does the cook the toner onto the paper, which it does.

Edit, the drum has been inspected for damage and also cleaned with IPA so the drum is spotless.

Measure the distance between the main print and the ghosted image. Then divide by pi. Then find whatever is circular and that diameter in the printer and there’s your problem

[Black Phoenix]

Yes it was suppose to have toner on it.

Little info about these transfer belt issues. The problem is in wiper blade of the transfer belt unit - these printers are quite old, and ITB wiper blades are losing the elasticity - the working edge of the blade doesn’t have a good tight contact with the belt anymore, and so the new image is put on the remains of previous image - and then we’re getting this “ghosting” effect.

The faulty wiper blade can be “re-shaped” with the usage of heat gun and a bit of skill. Done that with a Sharp old big photocopier, in 2017, until she broke from another part that were more expensive that a new one used.

The fact that the image is never removed from the transfer belt totally also causes some of the power to deposit on the rollers and drums, that then are applied to the paper as lines and smudges. So it always look clean when you look, because it is on the last page.

[Mr. Scram]

Measure the distance between the main print and the ghosted image. Then divide by pi. Then find whatever is circular and that diameter in the printer and there’s your problem

Standardised roller sizes may ruin your day but still a pretty good starting point.

[mnementh]

mnem
So there are two friends, Pete and Steve. They haven't seen each other in quite a while and decide to meet & catch up. The next day, Pete comes over to Steve's apartment; they order a pizza and open some beers. As they eat they talk about the old times. Pete tells Steve all about the past 10 years of his life; how he's married, his job, his kids, pretty much everything. Steve responds by explaining how his job has been good, and that he's recently married and had his first kid, and concludes with "...But lately I've been looking into farming bees."

"Bees?" Pete asks.

"Yeah, man. It's so awesome. I'm gonna make my own honey, lip balm, perfume, there's so much stuff you can make from a bee farm. I'm gonna make my own family business; I'll be able to quit my job. I'm so excited, I just absolutely cannot wait to get going. I finally feel like things are coming together for me. I can't imaging things being better than this. I actually just got 10,000 bees sent in about a week ago."

"Holy shit! 10,000 bees?" Pete asks.

"Yeah."

"Where the hell do you keep 'em?"

"Follow me..." Steve says. They get up from the couch and head down a narrow hallway of Steve's apartment. As they get further and further down the hallway, a deep buzzing is becoming apparent. They stop in front of a closet and Steve opens the door, lifts a couple stacked blankets off of the top of a cigar box and takes the box off of the shelf. The box is shaking so badly that Steve can barely hold it. *BBBBUUUUZZZ BUBUUBUBUUZZZ!!!*

"Well, here they are..." he says.

"Your bees are in there?" Pete asks.

"Sure as shit."

"10,000 bees in that cigar box?"

"Yep."

"Well, don't you think they're a little cramped in there?"

Steve looks at his friend thoughtfully for a moment; then says:

"Fuck 'em; they're only bees." ~ Attributed to Jerry Garcia

[med6753]

Now that I have both Fluke 8800A's completely checked out I officially retired the Fluke 8050A as the bench 1 reference. But as a final check I decided to perform a total calibration of the 8050A to make sure I wasn't screwing myself using it to calibrate the other 3.5 digit DMM's. No worries, it's bang on spec. So as a parting shot here's some quick 8050A pron....



So that completes all the volt nut work except for 2 outstanding items...

Waiting on Tautech and that “tweak” cal document for Siglent SDM series DMM's.

Fixing the unacceptable drift on the Fluke 8810A. Going to tackle that from multiple angles. First, monitor the regulated supplies for drift. If OK monitor the reference for drift. If that's OK then suspect the input dividers. If they are OK then it's going get real messy and may not be worth it to go any further.