Test Equipment Anonymous (TEA) group therapy thread

[beanflying]

31C at 10am and climbing to an ET of 44C  Going to be a very short day in the shack

3D printers reloaded, first coffee in and a quick second then shutdown the 3.5kW heater adding to the environment then go find a place to hide.

[med6753]

Just gotta wrap that messy cord ! 

Nah, I think this time I'll walk on the wild side and leave it messy. 

med, you are getting brave ! .......you've changed ! 

What can I say...you guys are a bad influence. 

Thank you! 



mnem
watt...?

There's a sucker born every minute. I lied. 

[med6753]

31C at 10am and climbing to an ET of 44C  Going to be a very short day in the shack

3D printers reloaded, first coffee in and a quick second then shutdown the 3.5kW heater adding to the environment then go find a place to hide.

I could never tolerate heat like that without A/C. Call me a wimp...don't care. 

[GreyWoolfe]

31C at 10am and climbing to an ET of 44C  Going to be a very short day in the shack

3D printers reloaded, first coffee in and a quick second then shutdown the 3.5kW heater adding to the environment then go find a place to hide.

I could never tolerate heat like that without A/C. Call me a wimp...don't care. 

I am with you med.  The only reason I stayed in Florida after the ex tossed me is because I hate moving more than heat.  Besides, Mrs GreyWoolfe doesn't want to move to anywhere snow can fall.

[beanflying]

31C at 10am and climbing to an ET of 44C  Going to be a very short day in the shack

3D printers reloaded, first coffee in and a quick second then shutdown the 3.5kW heater adding to the environment then go find a place to hide.

I could never tolerate heat like that without A/C. Call me a wimp...don't care. 

I am with you med.  The only reason I stayed in Florida after the ex tossed me is because I hate moving more than heat.  Besides, Mrs GreyWoolfe doesn't want to move to anywhere snow can fall.

At least unlike Florida it is a dry heat. 10.30am 36C and under 20% humidity. Second coffee done now time for the hiding bit.

[Cerebus]

Your cars OTOH; I think it would take like two of your IEC cords to fill up a Mini Cooper...

Tsk! Don't be an idiot boy, we fill then up with petrol. Oh, and leggy blondes...

[kj7e]

BG7TBL FA-2 and HP 53132a comparison.  Both counters have the same GPSDO external reference supplied and both are measuring a second GPSDO, both set to 10sec gate.  It seems to me the last digit is precise, just weird it has one more digit above 10MHz than the 53132a, I mean for a $110 come on!

[mnementh]

Seeing as I got that power supply for free, I bought something to power with it 

https://qrp-labs.com/50wpa.html

50W, full QSK for under £50. sold.

Awww, man... When I was hoeing out my "neverending bin of power bricks"... I Goodwill'd two huge HP "Studio Laptop" (The one with a freaking 19" screen) power bricks rated 20V/8A each. Would've been perfect for that little RF brick. 

What can I say...you guys are a bad influence. 

Thank you! 

mnem
watt...?

There's a sucker born every minute. I lied.     

Pffft. I wasn't thanking you for having mercy on the cord, ya big doofus. I was thanking you for the COMPLIMENT.   

   I do that one alla time; whenever I'm expecting "normals" in the house and wanna tidy up.

mnem
Thank you for having mercy on that poor cord. 

[mnementh]

I could never tolerate heat like that without A/C. Call me a wimp...don't care. 

I moved to the biggest, most badass air conditioner on the continent. *looks at the NEST* -7°C, WC -14°C. 

mnem
Okay; actual blue balls are a daily hazard, but hey...

[mnementh]

Your cars OTOH; I think it would take like two of your IEC cords to fill up a Mini Cooper...

Tsk! Don't be an idiot boy, we fill then up with petrol. Oh, and leggy blondes...

As long as you bring enough to share. Of BOTH. 

mnem
"There once was a young man from Boston,
who drove around in an Austin.
But the car was so small,
he had to hang out his balls;
and he drove past a phone pole & lost 'em..."

[med6753]

I could never tolerate heat like that without A/C. Call me a wimp...don't care. 

I moved to the biggest, most badass air conditioner on the continent. *looks at the NEST* -7°C, WC -14°C. 

mnem
Okay; actual blue balls are a daily hazard, but hey...

-7.5 C here.

 

[mnementh]

And there's med, bringin' it home for the "balls" Trifecta. 

mnem
 

[Neomys Sapiens]

Yeah... my HANTEK 6022BL arrived today; I just handed it to my wife & asked her to wrap it & put it under the tree.

I'm not buying ANYTHING ELSE online until February.

mnem
*fuel*

Let us know if it's horrible or not.  . Seriously I've considered one myself for a bit as they don't take up a lot of room and it's fine for LF stuff.

I MAY be going down the (Attachment Link) rabbit-hole; depends on how horrible the stock FW/Software is. We'll see.

Totes wish the Arrow Sale had happened a couple weeks ago; BEFORE I went into the red on Christmas prezzies for da kidzz... 

mnem

sigrok? small? lightweight? flexible? cheap? meh. get yourself a real logic analyzer...

(Attachment Link)

and because i like to be a helpful guy, here's a couple for you to choose from:

eBay auction: #264268058503

eBay auction: #153763329766

you are welcome. 

What? I'd rather get a 1241!

[beanflying]

Midday and my experimental stability testing shows around -0.25 PPM/C over a 25C ambient. 40C and I am out of here.......

[Neomys Sapiens]

You have to keep in mind, those meters were built mainly for education purpose. When the teacher is doing some experiments in front of the class, e.g.
demonstrating inducting current in a coil, so those meters were used to show the measurements and everybody in the class was able to see it.

Our school had meters for front of class demonstrations that looked like this:


(sorry, best quality image that I could find)

The scale was on a metal sheet that slid in and out of the meter, and had a shunt or dropper resistor on the scale that made a circuit as you inserted it. So one meter and case could work as either a voltmeter or ammeter for as many ranges as you had cards for.

The ones the students were given to use for experiments were like the smaller ones shown above, a standard meter movement in a sloping plastic case with a couple of 4mm binding posts on top.

I still rather like the latter, and a while back I was thinking about acquiring some for real, contemporary bench use. Sometimes an indication is all you need and the gentle waving of a meter needle can sometimes convey more useful information about what's actually going on then a digital display that's shooting up and down.

   


This is why some of us old punks young farts, even with all the technology at our disposal, STILL feel a need to keep ONE old 260 or a Micronta Dual-FET in the cupboard... there are times when the needle movement and a small amount of loading are EXACTLY what you need to see what's going on.

mnem
The right tool for the job.

When going somewhere with more than trivial troubleshooting expected, my second multimeter is always one with a movement. Whether passive or FET depends on the first one and the application.
Even in the 'Zwergzeug' I carry a SOAR Pen DMM and an ICE Microtest80.
https://www.eevblog.com/forum/chat/show-your-multimeter!/msg1193940/#msg1193940

[VK5RC]

Currently 43C, 13% RH, going to be 46C in Adelaide.
Thank goodness that the shack has A /C.
The TritiLED drains 13uA, so a CR2032 should last for a few years. Longer if I altered the duty cycle - currently about 150Hz, but I can't be bothered. Too hot to get out of the way of myself today!

[Neomys Sapiens]

Seeing as I got that power supply for free, I bought something to power with it 

https://qrp-labs.com/50wpa.html

50W, full QSK for under £50. sold.

There goes the neighbors Wi-Fi with RFI. 

Hey, you are giving me ideas right now. Like a 'reactive WiFi silencer'. Going off whenever someone actively accesses theirs.

[mnementh]

Midday and my experimental stability testing shows around -0.25 PPM/C over a 25C ambient. 40C and I am out of here.......

Well, we've confirmed the stability of this experiment, anyways. YOUR stability still remains in question, I'm afraid.

mnem
Eh; it's Thursday.

[beanflying]

Midday and my experimental stability testing shows around -0.25 PPM/C over a 25C ambient. 40C and I am out of here.......

Well, we've confirmed the stability of this experiment, anyways. YOUR stability still remains in question, I'm afraid.

mnem
Eh; it's Thursday.

I have no question about my stability at all, I know I have a problem which is the first step

[Kosmic]

Today I built the TritiLED, a coin cell powered micro light, used as a locator in very dark conditions (as an alternative to 'tritium' powered radio-luminous paints). It is supposed to last for years of continuous use off of the cr2032 cell. The author, Ted Yapo, of the project was on the Amp-hour recently. Details on https://hackaday.io/project/11864-tritiled/log/72301-v30-release
It fits inside a small lip-gloss container. Parts list (Digikey and Amazon) and software also included in the build details.
The biggest issue I had was learning MPLAB X IDE, PICKIT4 and finding a socket for SOIC8 as I like to pre-program my micros.

I like Ted, he is a good presenter. Got an incredible soldering technique too 

[Kosmic]

BG7TBL FA-2 and HP 53132a comparison.  Both counters have the same GPSDO external reference supplied and both are measuring a second GPSDO, both set to 10sec gate.  It seems to me the last digit is precise, just weird it has one more digit above 10MHz than the 53132a, I mean for a $110 come on!

Let me know if you need the manual got a version in English somewhere.

[kj7e]

BG7TBL FA-2 and HP 53132a comparison.  Both counters have the same GPSDO external reference supplied and both are measuring a second GPSDO, both set to 10sec gate.  It seems to me the last digit is precise, just weird it has one more digit above 10MHz than the 53132a, I mean for a $110 come on!

Let me know if you need the manual got a version in English somewhere.

Not really much to figure out, took me 10 seconds to figure out the button combo for input impedance and low pass filter select.  Do you know if anyone has any software for the USB port?

[Kosmic]

BG7TBL FA-2 and HP 53132a comparison.  Both counters have the same GPSDO external reference supplied and both are measuring a second GPSDO, both set to 10sec gate.  It seems to me the last digit is precise, just weird it has one more digit above 10MHz than the 53132a, I mean for a $110 come on!

Let me know if you need the manual got a version in English somewhere.

Not really much to figure out, took me 10 seconds to figure out the button combo for input impedance and low pass filter select.  Do you know if anyone has any software for the USB port?

texaspyro was supposed to add support in Lady Heather. Check this thread https://www.eevblog.com/forum/metrology/bg7tbl-fa1-frequency-analyzer/

[Specmaster]

31C at 10am and climbing to an ET of 44C  Going to be a very short day in the shack

3D printers reloaded, first coffee in and a quick second then shutdown the 3.5kW heater adding to the environment then go find a place to hide.

I could never tolerate heat like that without A/C. Call me a wimp...don't care. 

I am with you med.  The only reason I stayed in Florida after the ex tossed me is because I hate moving more than heat.  Besides, Mrs GreyWoolfe doesn't want to move to anywhere snow can fall.

Mrs Greywoolfe doesn't know what she is missing then, it is a welcome relief from the high temperatures of summer. We don't often get snow here in the South East of the UK. I think I can remember about 9 or 10 Christmases when we had snow.

[BravoV]

...
Here are some details (found them here: http://www.selkagmbh.com/product_info.php?pName=analog-multimeter-p-27)
...
    Operating voltage: 230V, 50Hz

BU508A , thanks for the details reply, appreciate the effort. 

Just realized and noticed its mains powered, I guess I have to re-consider again.