Test Equipment Anonymous (TEA) group therapy thread

[bd139]

Anyone here dead yet? Be sure to let us know when you are.

Only dead inside 

[bd139]

I've taken the last five days off work, so I've finally had some time to spend on some repair projects. 

First up was the Tek 485 options 4/78 which was rather uneventful. The channel 2 first stage amplifier IC was dead, I replaced a few dipped tantalum caps, and on the +50V rail U2042 was dead. After those issues were resolved, I calibrated the scope.

Second up was the other 485.  After some troubleshooting, I decided to sideline the project for now. Something is wrong with the CRT circuit and I don't feel like dealing with it just yet as I'd likely need to open the 485 I had just calibrated to do some comparisons.

Third project, which has been in pieces for almost a decade, is about to be posted in the "repair" section, but here's a teaser while I finish the first post:



Does anyone care to take a stab at what project #3 is?

Is that a standard Variable capacitor?

[Specmaster]

I've taken the last five days off work, so I've finally had some time to spend on some repair projects. 

First up was the Tek 485 options 4/78 which was rather uneventful. The channel 2 first stage amplifier IC was dead, I replaced a few dipped tantalum caps, and on the +50V rail U2042 was dead. After those issues were resolved, I calibrated the scope.

Second up was the other 485.  After some troubleshooting, I decided to sideline the project for now. Something is wrong with the CRT circuit and I don't feel like dealing with it just yet as I'd likely need to open the 485 I had just calibrated to do some comparisons.

Third project, which has been in pieces for almost a decade, is about to be posted in the "repair" section, but here's a teaser while I finish the first post:



Does anyone care to take a stab at what project #3 is?

Well, it looks like it has a variable cap, so it is something related to RF, so is some sort of tunable antenna trimmer?

[mnementh]

Since there was much talk of food yesterday and I am caught up reading, I made beef stew yesterday with appropriate amounts of carrots, celery, onion and skin on small red potatoes, along with appropriate amounts of seasoning.  Dinner last night and just had leftovers for lunch.  yum.

   Food's important, and around here (this thread) it's not helped by the fact that there's a lot of trenchermen/trencherwomen around (polite term for greedy pigs). Plus of course with bugger all else to do it's only too easy to turn to food for entertainment.

Guilty as charged officer.  I’m still undoing that monster kebab which was mostly entertainment

Does that mean I have to put this plate of roast beast back in the fridge...?

mnem

Okies... time to go walkies... that'll fix it.

[mnementh]

I've taken the last five days off work, so I've finally had some time to spend on some repair projects. 

First up was the Tek 485 options 4/78 which was rather uneventful. The channel 2 first stage amplifier IC was dead, I replaced a few dipped tantalum caps, and on the +50V rail U2042 was dead. After those issues were resolved, I calibrated the scope.

Second up was the other 485.  After some troubleshooting, I decided to sideline the project for now. Something is wrong with the CRT circuit and I don't feel like dealing with it just yet as I'd likely need to open the 485 I had just calibrated to do some comparisons.

Third project, which has been in pieces for almost a decade, is about to be posted in the "repair" section, but here's a teaser while I finish the first post:      Does anyone care to take a stab at what project #3 is?

Well, it looks like it has a variable cap, so it is something related to RF, so is some sort of tunable antenna trimmer?

Given the heavy brush contacts and relatively HV overall design, that sounds like a "confidence is high" answer... 

mnem
"RF burns are the worst." ~me

[Addicted2AnalogTek]

I've taken the last five days off work, so I've finally had some time to spend on some repair projects. 

First up was the Tek 485 options 4/78 which was rather uneventful. The channel 2 first stage amplifier IC was dead, I replaced a few dipped tantalum caps, and on the +50V rail U2042 was dead. After those issues were resolved, I calibrated the scope.

Second up was the other 485.  After some troubleshooting, I decided to sideline the project for now. Something is wrong with the CRT circuit and I don't feel like dealing with it just yet as I'd likely need to open the 485 I had just calibrated to do some comparisons.

Third project, which has been in pieces for almost a decade, is about to be posted in the "repair" section, but here's a teaser while I finish the first post:      Does anyone care to take a stab at what project #3 is?

Well, it looks like it has a variable cap, so it is something related to RF, so is some sort of tunable antenna trimmer?

Given the heavy brush contacts and relatively HV overall design, that sounds like a "confidence is high" answer... 

mnem
"RF burns are the worst." ~me

RF? Yes
Tunable? Yes

It's one of the early Tektronix calibration fixtures from when they were still located in Portland, OR.


https://www.eevblog.com/forum/repair/vintage-tektronix-067-0532-00-resurrection-project/msg3005858/#msg3005858

[Saskia]

It may be, and if it doesn't pass in the next few days, I'll probably need to think about that. But, headache is a symptom which together with fever and joint pain, would imply that I have influenza or COVID-19. I'm fairly certain I know what the answer will be if I talk to my local doctor's office - Stay at home, make sure you stay hydrated and see how you are in a week's time. Call the emergency services if you start to have trouble breathing.

I'm sure every medical service in the country has more than enough on their hands without me bugging them about something which is hardly life threatening.

I'm only 55 years young, so I'm not exactly in a risk group.

One of my colleagues had a nasty headache followed by a ruptured Aneurysm followed by an airlift to the neurosurgeon. He has been in rehab for the last 4 months and will most likely stay there for another few. He is not older than 45.

Headaches are not always harmless and there are different types of headaches.
If this does not improve you will need to go to the ER.
Also, I don't think there is a need to tell you about the addictive potential of Oxy.

[bd139]

Anyone in the US want a nice opamp?

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/383248354656

[Cubdriver]

I've taken the last five days off work, so I've finally had some time to spend on some repair projects. 

First up was the Tek 485 options 4/78 which was rather uneventful. The channel 2 first stage amplifier IC was dead, I replaced a few dipped tantalum caps, and on the +50V rail U2042 was dead. After those issues were resolved, I calibrated the scope.

Second up was the other 485.  After some troubleshooting, I decided to sideline the project for now. Something is wrong with the CRT circuit and I don't feel like dealing with it just yet as I'd likely need to open the 485 I had just calibrated to do some comparisons.

Third project, which has been in pieces for almost a decade, is about to be posted in the "repair" section, but here's a teaser while I finish the first post:      Does anyone care to take a stab at what project #3 is?

Well, it looks like it has a variable cap, so it is something related to RF, so is some sort of tunable antenna trimmer?

Given the heavy brush contacts and relatively HV overall design, that sounds like a "confidence is high" answer... 

mnem
"RF burns are the worst." ~me

RF? Yes
Tunable? Yes

It's one of the early Tektronix calibration fixtures from when they were still located in Portland, OR.


https://www.eevblog.com/forum/repair/vintage-tektronix-067-0532-00-resurrection-project/msg3005858/#msg3005858

Interesting - I thought initially that pile of parts looked vaguely familiar - looks like Tek was getting some stuff from GenRad...





-Pat

[Specmaster]

Off-topic but may be well worth the time to watch this is about a YouTuber that I follow who has just lost his father-in-law to Covid-19, very distressing but full of possible useful information as he had been at work as a Key Worker, taking all the precautions and had been seen by ambulance crews and told his oxygen levels were fine etc.

[BU508A]

Anyone here dead yet? Be sure to let us know when you are.

Me?



 

[Neomys Sapiens]

Let's hope all is well with our co-addict 0culus. Could not PM him because inbox full.

[Saskia]

small update: Willem eprom burner moved to W7 computer. No luck on 64bit. Tried to run in XPMode. VPC does not support parallel ports and is overwriting the XML config all the time flushin any edits. Tried to import XP mode into virtual box. No luck. Tried  to import XP Mode into VMPlayer. Nope.
Got a new 32bit Win7SP1 image from MSDN and created a Win732bit VM on the Win7 node.
Fooled around for an hour trying to arse that thing into recognizing the ECP port that it needed, found the magic switch in Host bios (set to ECP, enable), VM Settings -> Add printer Port and VM (search hardware -> set resources)
=> Programmer software is running under 32bit, recognizes Eprom burner and can read 27c010A and 27c256. Did not try programming one, need to fool around with that W7 VM.
BUUUUUT: it seems that I can replace that hardware *hammer* *clank* with some software integration shamanism and get that bloody thang to work.

It would have been easier to just buy a bloody USB burner.

[bd139]

That is incidentally why my Willem programmer is in a box in the cupboard 

[Specmaster]

Let's hope all is well with our co-addict 0culus. Could not PM him because inbox full.

Yes, lets hope that he is OK and that we are all still here at the end of this, in the meantime, take care.

[bsudbrink]

Re: Willem programmer: You may need the parallel port driver that "fakes" the "right" I/O addresses for port control.

Other:  No TEA traffic for almost two hours... is everybody OK?  Did I miss something big in the "real world"?

[Saskia]

yes, I absolutely concur. It had a positive side effect though. I now have been able to compare VPC, VBox and VMWare and VPC and VBOX are heaps of dung. I have learned how to configure and set up new VMs, map devices and get this grab-asstic piece of amphibian shit to work.
I also learned that I would very much like a faster PC for this, the old haswell is not really cutting edge.

[Saskia]

Re: Willem programmer: You may need the parallel port driver that "fakes" the "right" I/O addresses for port control.

Other:  No TEA traffic for almost two hours... is everybody OK?  Did I miss something big in the "real world"?

basically you can map the driver if the host supports an ECP. which in my case it does. The microsoft driver will do just fine, and you have to enable passthrough for parallel ports in the Hypervisor settings.
Microsoft VirtualPC and Oracle Virtualbox will not let you do that. VMWare will. If someone wants a howto, let me know, I think that this is not of particular interest to every reader here.

[Kosmic]

you should get a TL866II http://www.xgecu.com/en/. They just work.

[bd139]

VirtualBox is fairly good at this. I have 7 virtualised development environments that talk to all sorts of crap. It’s about the only thing that does decent hardware pass through. Really though I can never be arsed with the Willem or anything that touches a parallel or serial port as it never bloody works properly because of the poor electrical specification of most parallel and serial ports these days. Last time I had to suck an EPROM down I used an arduino and couple of hc595’s as address drivers to generate a hex dump over serial using some code I googled. Was much easier!

[beanflying]

Re: Willem programmer: You may need the parallel port driver that "fakes" the "right" I/O addresses for port control.

Other:  No TEA traffic for almost two hours... is everybody OK?  Did I miss something big in the "real world"?

About to spend a day in the Sunshine chopping and gluing sticks of wood together and pulling some weeds hopefully getting my 'Bored' Mother to join in where she can. I am sure I rember uttering the statement 'I am so BORED' to her many many years ago and being dismissed at the time

[Carl_Smith]

Anyone here dead yet? Be sure to let us know when you are.

Reminds me of the Monty Python "Bring out yer dead" scene.

Dead Collector: Bring out yer dead. [Hits gong]
Large Man: Here's one.
Dead Collector: Ninepence.
Dead Body: I'm not dead!
Dead Collector: What?
Large Man: Nothing. Here's your ninepence.
Dead Body: I'm not dead!
Dead Collector: 'Ere, he says he's not dead.
Large Man: Yes he is.
Dead Body: I'm not!
Dead Collector: He isn't!
Large Man: Well, he will be soon, he's very ill.
Dead Body: I'm getting betta!
Large Man: No you're not, you'll be stone dead in a moment.
Dead Collector: I can't take 'im like that! It's against regulation!
Dead Body: I don't want to go on the cart!
Large Man: Oh, don't be such a baby!
Dead Collector: I can't take him.
Dead Body: I feel fine!

[Specmaster]

You mean this one?

[Neomys Sapiens]

yes, I absolutely concur. It had a positive side effect though. I now have been able to compare VPC, VBox and VMWare and VPC and VBOX are heaps of dung. I have learned how to configure and set up new VMs, map devices and get this grab-asstic piece of amphibian shit to work.

Whats it with you and insults to frogs and newts?

I also learned that I would very much like a faster PC for this, the old haswell is not really cutting edge.

Come on, you could run a perfectly fast CPM86 on it!

[Carl_Smith]

You mean this one?

Yup.  That's the one.  I thought I'd just post the text of it because I figure most everyone would know what I was talking about and I've always found it hard to understand everything they were saying.