Test Equipment Anonymous (TEA) group therapy thread

[bitseeker]

Mmm...lasagna! Gotta get me some.

[med6753]

holy crap ....... what a unique bunch of wingnuts hang out on this thread!

christmas day and you decide to argue over which feckin' potato peeler design is best!

merry christmas you wacky bastards!

The best Vegetable Peeler I have had was a 25 year old Bouncy Blonde Chick who worked for me 

Pictures or I call wishful thinking. 

[beanflying]

holy crap ....... what a unique bunch of wingnuts hang out on this thread!

christmas day and you decide to argue over which feckin' potato peeler design is best!

merry christmas you wacky bastards!

The best Vegetable Peeler I have had was a 25 year old Bouncy Blonde Chick who worked for me 

Pictures or I call wishful thinking. 

On the left  Her Sister also worked for me for 6 or 7 years but was slightly less aPeeling due to being married 

[med6753]

holy crap ....... what a unique bunch of wingnuts hang out on this thread!

christmas day and you decide to argue over which feckin' potato peeler design is best!

merry christmas you wacky bastards!

The best Vegetable Peeler I have had was a 25 year old Bouncy Blonde Chick who worked for me 

Pictures or I call wishful thinking. 

On the left  Her Sister also worked for me for 6 or 7 years but was slightly less aPeeling due to being married 

Blonde....check
Bouncy....check
You delivered.....check

 

[Ice-Tea]

Accidently, on a slightly more TEA related note: I've been looking for a working 15GHz+ RF generator. Doesn't have to be super accurate, but does have to work. I'm not looking for another project (God, no..).

So if one of you eBay addicts comes accross something: let me know!

[Saskia]

holy crap ....... what a unique bunch of wingnuts hang out on this thread!

christmas day and you decide to argue over which feckin' potato peeler design is best!

merry christmas you wacky bastards!

The best Vegetable Peeler I have had was a 25 year old Bouncy Blonde Chick who worked for me 

Pictures or I call wishful thinking. 

On the left  Her Sister also worked for me for 6 or 7 years but was slightly less aPeeling due to being married 

Blonde....check
Bouncy....check
You delivered.....check

 

Lacking a mate who peels veggies for me (I don't know why he expects me to do that kind of work, honestly, no idea), I am looking for a suitable lathe.

[tautech]

I am looking for a suitable lathe.

For peeling veggies ? 

At least the tooling will be cheaper than for steel. 

[med6753]

Started the PSU re-cap of the Type 503. The backside of these 3 cans were out in the open so I was able to leave them in place (disconnected of course) and mount the new caps as shown. There are 3 more cans to do but they are hidden under ceramic strips so at least two of them will definitely have to be removed. The 3rd one I may be able to work around.

Once the re-cap is complete then calibration/compensation.

 

[Specmaster]

Some of those hidden behind the ceramic strips could surely be left in situ and use the spare ceramic slots that are there to terminate the new caps in?

[med6753]

Some of those hidden behind the ceramic strips could surely be left in situ and use the spare ceramic slots that are there to terminate the new caps in?

There are no "spare" or unused ceramic strips. There are a lot of factors in determining to pull a can or not. Number 1 consideration is space which is plentiful in this scope...unlike the prior Type 310A and Type 561B. Pulling all the cans in those two scopes was a no choice because there was no space for the new.

[factory]

Accidently, on a slightly more TEA related note: I've been looking for a working 15GHz+ RF generator. Doesn't have to be super accurate, but does have to work. I'm not looking for another project (God, no..).

So if one of you eBay addicts comes accross something: let me know!

A HP 8620C* series sweeper with a 86290B or C module would go to 18.6GHz, CW mode if you want a fixed frequency, but finding a working one with all the correct frequency scales will be expensive. I have one working frame and two lower frequency modules, still looking for a cheap 86290A module as I have the scales for that one and need something to higher frequency check some of the counters here.

*There are more in the US and some aren't to expensive, but shipping is way too much, lots of sellers asking way to much for untested modules without the scales too.
https://www.ebay.com/itm/184534651374

David

[factory]

Some of those hidden behind the ceramic strips could surely be left in situ and use the spare ceramic slots that are there to terminate the new caps in?

There are no "spare" or unused ceramic strips. There are a lot of factors in determining to pull a can or not. Number 1 consideration is space which is plentiful in this scope...unlike the prior Type 310A and Type 561B. Pulling all the cans in those two scopes was a no choice because there was no space for the new.

Maybe you can see better than us (I haven't looked at any manuals either), but a few of the tags of the ceramic strips do appear unoccupied in your picture


David

[AVGresponding]

[Specmaster]

Some of those hidden behind the ceramic strips could surely be left in situ and use the spare ceramic slots that are there to terminate the new caps in?

There are no "spare" or unused ceramic strips. There are a lot of factors in determining to pull a can or not. Number 1 consideration is space which is plentiful in this scope...unlike the prior Type 310A and Type 561B. Pulling all the cans in those two scopes was a no choice because there was no space for the new.

As David also pointed out, there are what seems empty slots where a cap could be located and if needed the "legs" extended?

[med6753]

Some of those hidden behind the ceramic strips could surely be left in situ and use the spare ceramic slots that are there to terminate the new caps in?

There are no "spare" or unused ceramic strips. There are a lot of factors in determining to pull a can or not. Number 1 consideration is space which is plentiful in this scope...unlike the prior Type 310A and Type 561B. Pulling all the cans in those two scopes was a no choice because there was no space for the new.

Maybe you can see better than us (I haven't looked at any manuals either), but a few of the tags of the ceramic strips do appear unoccupied in your picture


David

Yes, there are a few unoccupied strips. But in order to utilize them I would have to run wires back and forth which could possibly introduce hum or crosstalk and is just plain poor practice.

I've caught a lot of flak on Tek Facebook group concerning my removal of cans to accommodate the replacement capacitors. It destroys, according to these critics, the "vintage aesthetics" of the instrument. Well...boo hoo. I will retain the cans if possible but that is not a priority. My priority is an instrument which functions to spec and is reliable. You can't guarantee any long term reliability with those aluminum time bombs. These are the same guys who will run to fail and then only replace what has failed. That's dumb. Better to be proactive and replace them all in one shot and be done with it.       

[Saskia]

I am looking for a suitable lathe.

For peeling veggies ? 

At least the tooling will be cheaper than for steel. 

I need to adhere to stereotypes which state that German humor is anywhere from bad to nonexistent.

[AVGresponding]

I am looking for a suitable lathe.

For peeling veggies ? 

At least the tooling will be cheaper than for steel. 

I need to adhere to stereotypes which state that German humor is anywhere from bad to nonexistent.

Well I found it amusing.

[Specmaster]

Some of those hidden behind the ceramic strips could surely be left in situ and use the spare ceramic slots that are there to terminate the new caps in?

There are no "spare" or unused ceramic strips. There are a lot of factors in determining to pull a can or not. Number 1 consideration is space which is plentiful in this scope...unlike the prior Type 310A and Type 561B. Pulling all the cans in those two scopes was a no choice because there was no space for the new.

Maybe you can see better than us (I haven't looked at any manuals either), but a few of the tags of the ceramic strips do appear unoccupied in your picture


David

Yes, there are a few unoccupied strips. But in order to utilize them I would have to run wires back and forth which could possibly introduce hum or crosstalk and is just plain poor practice.

I've caught a lot of flak on Tek Facebook group concerning my removal of cans to accommodate the replacement capacitors. It destroys, according to these critics, the "vintage aesthetics" of the instrument. Well...boo hoo. I will retain the cans if possible but that is not a priority. My priority is an instrument which functions to spec and is reliable. You can't guarantee any long term reliability with those aluminum time bombs. These are the same guys who will run to fail and then only replace what has failed. That's dumb. Better to be proactive and replace them all in one shot and be done with it.       

Totally agree, boo hoo to them on Tek group. That being said, I really doubt that you'd be introducing any hum what so ever if the cap was to anchored at the spare slots right adjacent  to the old caps location, after all is said and done, the leads are being run from wherever to the old cap, admitted, they are kept close to the chassis. So what is to prevent you from doing the same?

[med6753]

Seems lately I have to constantly justify my methods of repair/restoration to the point to where maybe I'll stop sharing. Or perhaps I'm just in a bad mood. Hasn't been a very Merry Christmas.

Anyway, one more time. See pix. Those 2 cans buried on chassis. They WILL be pulled. Why? Well....lookie right above them. That's a 5642 HV rectifier. Yep, -3kV floating right there. And that black sleeve is the HV from the HV transformer. Yep, all sorts of open ceramic strips. For good reason. Clearance against corona discharge. You would have to be an idiot to utilize those open strips. 

So the replacement capacitors will be mounted on terminal strips on the opposite side of the chassis previously occupied by the cans.

[Specmaster]

In that location yes, I'd agree, and I'm sure others will as well, but you never showed us that view before therefore we couldn't base any judgement on your logic for this position. In your earlier shared photo there is what appears to another cap located to the left of the existing one that have replaced, located between the ceramic strips and another up in the top left of the photo and those are the ones I was commenting on I think possibly David as well? 

[mnementh]

https://www.cp24.com/world/downtown-nashville-explosion-knocks-communications-offline-1.5245060

A recreational vehicle parked in the deserted streets of downtown Nashville exploded early Christmas morning, causing widespread communications outages that took down police emergency systems and grounded holiday travel at the city's airport...

Jeebus. Bet you a dollar it was another home-grown terrorist Anti-5G wingnut. 

mnem
*crawls back into his cave*

[factory]

Seems lately I have to constantly justify my methods of repair/restoration to the point to where maybe I'll stop sharing. Or perhaps I'm just in a bad mood. Hasn't been a very Merry Christmas.

It's your scope and you can do whatever you choose, just don't call me "dumb" because I don't want to shotgun replace* every single old capacitor in my equipment, they do however get measured to check the value & ESR and ripple when powered up.
Capacitors that have obviously failed with perished/cracked seals or electrolyte leakage do get replaced, as do paper bumble bombs/black beauties & wax paper capacitors, I still give them a Megger leakage test after replacing to find out how bad they are.

*Towards the end of the lab at work it got very boring just shotgun replacing all electrolytic capacitors, but that was very necessary due to corrosive leakage, much preferred fault finding.

David

[med6753]

The last can to be done is buried under those coils. I might be able save it by careful tracing of the wiring and jumpering into existing tie points. But the complicating factor is that it is a three section can therefore there will be three discrete capacitors stuffed into that vicinity.



 

[mnementh]

I am looking for a suitable lathe.

For peeling veggies ? 

At least the tooling will be cheaper than for steel. 

I need to adhere to stereotypes which state that German humor is anywhere from bad to nonexistent.

Fuck, I do wish SMF would add a plugin for Yarn... or at least some sanitized method for handling embedded video.

mnem

[mnementh]

I've caught a lot of flak on Tek Facebook group concerning my removal of cans to accommodate the replacement capacitors. It destroys, according to these critics, the "vintage aesthetics" of the instrument. Well...boo hoo. I will retain the cans if possible but that is not a priority. My priority is an instrument which functions to spec and is reliable. You can't guarantee any long term reliability with those aluminum time bombs. These are the same guys who will run to fail and then only replace what has failed. That's dumb. Better to be proactive and replace them all in one shot and be done with it.

I tend to agree up to the point where the alterations are plainly visible from the outside.

I think the best answer is probably to make up bespoke adapter PCBs that screw down in place of the original can; with places like JLCPCB and OSH Park at your disposal, it certainly is not a dollars and sense choice anymore, but more just the time to design a ~75¢ board, which most likely in the long run would take a library of a dozen or so designs to cover pretty much any scenario.

But I can't hate on anybody for saying "that's too much assache" after the lifetime of "creative soldering bodges" I'm guilty of. 

mnem