Test Equipment Anonymous (TEA) group therapy thread

[mnementh]

There's a curve where there is an intersection of "these parts are really cheap" and "I've lost half a cut tape of parts in the carpet" which is a sweet spot of efficiency for hand building. 0603 / 0805 is about the middle.

• I always do my part stuffing at the living room table, where there is a reasonably clear wooden floor. A combination of that and the "shine a torch sideways across the floor" trick means that I'm:
  
  • Doing pretty well on the "lost parts count" front, and
  • acutely aware quite how much dust, fluff and other crap is on the living room floor.
• I'm occasionally and casually trying to mentally design a tray that parts don't b^o_uⁿ_ce off but that still has a smooth ESD safe surface and with a lip that will catch parts as they try to ping off into the distance.
  
  JLC use the used backing boards from PCB drilling as the flat, rigid packing for stencils.  I was using the one that came with my stencil as my working surface (nice and smooth, neutral grey) when stuffing boards the other day. One part tried to get away from me, but got trapped in the registration holes that go through the edge of the backing board as it tried to skitter off. Thus it strikes me that perforated hardboard might make quite a good margin for an SMD hand assembly area as a part catcher.
  

I put my silicone work mat in a old cafeteria lunch tray. Works a treat for keeping itty-bits captive, aside from the occasional crease in the bottom of my forearm if I absently rest it on the edge too long. And of course, finding itty-bits stuck there from time to time...

I suppose I should work up some actually grounded ESD-safe solution; for now I just lay it on my ESD mat and takes my chances.

mnem
 

I wasn't thinking ESD safe in the sense of grounded etcetera, rather in the sense of "not made of a material that is inherently prone to making ESD problems for me". Wood or hardboard is quite conductive enough to be 'ESD safe' in this context, but is a bit hard and bounce inducing in my experience. I can't quite think of a material that's smooth enough to slide SMD parts around on, while also being a bit energy absorbing, and also has suitably low resistivity.

Yeah, that's the point I was making. The tray I'm referring to is packed away; it's a old-school one made of fiberglass laminate very similar in overall composition to FR4. ESD-wise I dunno if that's better or worse than the typical plastic trays we see nowadays.

Now that I think of it, maybe a better solution to buy a smaller ESD mat that will fit inside the tray, then my silicone soldering mat on top...?

mnem

[bd139]

Pleasingly youngsters have become far less interested in accumulating stuff, being more interested in accumulating experiences. That's the only good side I can see to current house prices.

What I find concerning is that a lot of that "having experiences" is being done in a consumeristic rather than an organic way. There seems to be an attitude in some that an "experience" is a package that you go out and buy, and of course there is a whole platoon of soul dead wastes of oxygen marketing people who are only too happy to pander to that. (Where's "Ark B" when you need it.)

Ah yes I’m with you there. However you have to consider that most experiences in life start from making contacts first. And the main value the packaged experiences have is contact building not the actual experience. Usually in the pub after the experience.

Once you have contacts, throw in some impulsive thinking and you have a fine recipe for serendipitous deviant carnage, which is fundamentally all the memorable moments of life 

This is my mid life crisis at the moment and it is working out to be a ridiculous female to male ratio

[Cerebus]

Project of the day. I'm trying out BD's assertion that it's cheaper to design and order adapter boards from JLCPCB that it is to order off the shelf ones. I'm down to my last two SOIC-16 adapter boards and need some more.

Killing two birds with one stone, I'm also trying to remove a personal annoyance at the same time. When you use SMT to DIP adapters you always end up either with the decoupling caps a long way away, or awkwardly soldered to the adapter board. So I've added footprints for a decoupling cap and a couple of zero ohm jumper resistors to deal with the commonest situation - Vcc in the top right corner on pin 14/16 and ground in the bottom left on pin 7/8.

Voila:



By the way, panellising by hand in KiCad is a PITA.

Edit: Also, doing it my way I get a decent ground plane, and rounded corners, both of which the commercial adapters lack unless you buy the ones that cost a few dollars each.

Edit to edit: Can I not even type straight anymore?

[mnementh]

   Just finished my little project.

My JLC boards are just fine. They fit just fine in the DB9 Amphenol shell I bought. Board is electrically fine. So I went to solder the components...

Ummm... you know JLC offers parts population services as well, right? And these quantities... very possibly cheaper completely populated boards than you can buy the components yourself.

mnem
 

Wow, no didn't know, wil have to check for that next time / project ! 

No big deal in the case at hand as I was on a shoe string budget and already had bought the parts anyway. Plus only 6 components to solder and only 5 boards to make or so...

But will keep that in mind in case it might make financial and practical sense in a future project...

Yeah, you mentioned 20-50 pieces earlier. Those quantities for sure worth looking into.

mnem
 

[tggzzz]

Pleasingly youngsters have become far less interested in accumulating stuff, being more interested in accumulating experiences. That's the only good side I can see to current house prices.

What I find concerning is that a lot of that "having experiences" is being done in a consumeristic rather than an organic way. There seems to be an attitude in some that an "experience" is a package that you go out and buy, and of course there is a whole platoon of soul dead wastes of oxygen marketing people who are only too happy to pander to that. (Where's "Ark B" when you need it.)

I take your point, but with the subset of experiences that really floats their boat, with care and guidance that could be converted to something less passive.

In any case, it is a better starting point than being dissatisfied with life because Mrs Net Curtain has just got a super duper washing machine.

[tggzzz]

This is my mid life crisis at the moment and it is working out to be a ridiculous female to male ratio

Q1: N:1 or 1:N?
Q2: haven't you learned your lesson yet? "If if floats, flies or f???s, it is cheaper to rent than buy."

A2: no, based on your flipping TE

[mnementh]

In a prior life where others were living in the same residence I always knew when someone was into my tools/equipment. They never put it back in the right spot or would forget to put it back. And I would ask where so-and-so was and no one would own up. Never again will that repeat itself. 

The last person to do that to my tools is dead - and I'm not talking natural causes.

The truth is that Dave was killed by a combination of alcohol, recklessness, a motorbike and a big tree. But I don't tell them that. Dave was, however, the last person to mess with my tools - largely I suspect because ever since I've been able to tell people that he was the last man to abuse my tools, and that he's dead, with a straight face and my hand on my heart.

So when you hear the old "Dave's not here, man..." gag... I suspect the context is not entirely the same as for the rest of us. Fair enuf.   

mnem
 

[Cerebus]

Ah yes I’m with you there. However you have to consider that most experiences in life start from making contacts first. And the main value the packaged experiences have is contact building not the actual experience. Usually in the pub after the experience.

Once you have contacts, throw in some impulsive thinking and you have a fine recipe for serendipitous deviant carnage, which is fundamentally all the memorable moments of life 

This is my mid life crisis at the moment and it is working out to be a ridiculous female to male ratio

The contacts always seem to have arrived naturally. One of my favourite memories is of going skinny dipping in Regents Park (after it was closed) with a couple of folks from work - we'd been in the Park for an official work's outing earlier in the evening and managed to get ignored by the rangers closing up the park at dusk.

OK, off to the shops for some Ciabatta - dinner/tea/supper/whatever-you-call-it-in-your-neck-of-the-woods is going to be pasta, salad and bruchetta.

[mnementh]

Project of the day. I'm trying out BD's assertion that it's cheaper to design and order adapter boards from JLCPCB that it is to order off the shelf ones. I'm down to my last two SOIC-16 adapter boards and need some more.

Killing two birds with one stone, I'm also trying to remove a personal annoyance at the same time. When you use SMT to DIP adapters you always end up either with the decoupling caps a long way away, or awkwardly soldered to the adapter board. So I've added footprints for a decoupling cap and a couple of zero ohm jumper resistors to deal with the commonest situation - Vcc in the top right corner on pin 14/16 and ground in the bottom left on pin 7/8.

Voila:      By the way, panellising by hand in KiCad is a PITA.

Edit: Also, doing it my way I get a decent ground plane, and rounded corners, both of which the commercial adapters lack unless you buy the ones that cost a few dollars each.

Yeah, I find myself in a near bipolar love/hate relationship with these things; mostly due to the fact they're almost always double-sided with a different footprint on each side. Sometimes I love them because it's easy to add a few random support components to the wrong side... sometimes I hate them for their complete lack of a decent ground fill and the spurious noise/unexpected capacitance (even ringing in some cases) those unnecessary traces introduce. 

The only thing they have in their favor is they're A) cheap as chips as I don't buy any other kind, and 2) they're right there when I'm in a tinkery mood.

mnem
 

[bd139]

This is my mid life crisis at the moment and it is working out to be a ridiculous female to male ratio

Q1: N:1 or 1:N?
Q2: haven't you learned your lesson yet? "If if floats, flies or f???s, it is cheaper to rent than buy."

A2: no, based on your flipping TE

A1: Ratio is about 1:5 M:F  . Also being activity based, zero smokers and high professional content.

A2: Nope. Not gonna happen. Never going to learn. Also quite frankly I’m an ordained member of the Church of the Subgenius so it’s about money for nothing. Renting is slavery. 

[bd139]

Ah yes I’m with you there. However you have to consider that most experiences in life start from making contacts first. And the main value the packaged experiences have is contact building not the actual experience. Usually in the pub after the experience.

Once you have contacts, throw in some impulsive thinking and you have a fine recipe for serendipitous deviant carnage, which is fundamentally all the memorable moments of life 

This is my mid life crisis at the moment and it is working out to be a ridiculous female to male ratio

The contacts always seem to have arrived naturally. One of my favourite memories is of going skinny dipping in Regents Park (after it was closed) with a couple of folks from work - we'd been in the Park for an official work's outing earlier in the evening and managed to get ignored by the rangers closing up the park at dusk.

OK, off to the shops for some Ciabatta - dinner/tea/supper/whatever-you-call-it-in-your-neck-of-the-woods is going to be pasta, salad and bruchetta.

Going places when they’re closed is always the best.

I broke into Highgate cemetery with an ex girlfriend once. The rest of the story is TMI but even the statue on the grave of Karl Marx frowned upon us.

[med6753]

A2: Nope. Not gonna happen. Never going to learn. Also quite frankly I’m an ordained member of the Church of the Subgenius so it’s about money for nothing. Renting is slavery. 

And the chicks for free?   

[Zucca]

I set Gixen at 431 USD and I won. The higher second bidder was a 420USD (oh wooow).
Normally it goes used for >750USD so meeeh, but overkill for me for sure.

Oh Lord I am so sick... What is it? Will do a video for this huge sadomaso sin (I mean 425+ tax+ shipp I banked out 500USD....) 

Anyway, never use round easy numbers in Gixen.

[med6753]

In a prior life where others were living in the same residence I always knew when someone was into my tools/equipment. They never put it back in the right spot or would forget to put it back. And I would ask where so-and-so was and no one would own up. Never again will that repeat itself. 

The last person to do that to my tools is dead - and I'm not talking natural causes.

The truth is that Dave was killed by a combination of alcohol, recklessness, a motorbike and a big tree. But I don't tell them that. Dave was, however, the last person to mess with my tools - largely I suspect because ever since I've been able to tell people that he was the last man to abuse my tools, and that he's dead, with a straight face and my hand on my heart.

So when you hear the old "Dave's not here, man..." gag... I suspect the context is not entirely the same as for the rest of us. Fair enuf.   

mnem
 

I don't wish anyone dead but if I could get back all the money (and misery, but mostly the money) the Puerto Rican princesa and all her kids cost me I could retire on a deserted island.   

[mnementh]

Ah yes I’m with you there. However you have to consider that most experiences in life start from making contacts first. And the main value the packaged experiences have is contact building not the actual experience. Usually in the pub after the experience.

Once you have contacts, throw in some impulsive thinking and you have a fine recipe for serendipitous deviant carnage, which is fundamentally all the memorable moments of life 

This is my mid life crisis at the moment and it is working out to be a ridiculous female to male ratio

The contacts always seem to have arrived naturally. One of my favourite memories is of going skinny dipping in Regents Park (after it was closed) with a couple of folks from work - we'd been in the Park for an official work's outing earlier in the evening and managed to get ignored by the rangers closing up the park at dusk.

OK, off to the shops for some Ciabatta - dinner/tea/supper/whatever-you-call-it-in-your-neck-of-the-woods is going to be pasta, salad and bruchetta.

Going places when they’re closed is always the best.

I broke into Highgate cemetery with an ex girlfriend once. The rest of the story is TMI but even the statue on the grave of Karl Marx frowned upon us.

So was this a "Dirty Little Girl" escapade, or something a bit more plebian...? 

mnem

[AVGresponding]

Circuit breakers are down for OFF as the gravity effect also aids faster operation in the event of an overload occurring.

Nope. An MCCB, MCB, RCD, or RCBO will happily trip even if you jam the lever, with no impact on trip time. The mass of the components involved is tiny compared to the tripping spring force. If you pull different branded ones apart you'll find a fair variation in internal layout and orientation.

On larger boards, it's quite common for them to be horizontally mounted:



The one at the bottom is just a switch-disconnector, not an over-current device.

[Specmaster]

I set Gixen at 431 USD and I won. The higher second bidder was a 420USD (oh wooow).
Normally it goes used for >750USD so meeeh, but overkill for me for sure.

Oh Lord I am so sick... What is it? Will do a video for this huge sadomaso sin (I mean 425+ tax+ shipp I banked out 500USD....) 

Anyway, never use round easy numbers in Gixen.

Exactly, sometimes putting something after the decimal point can also be a successful ploy

[mnementh]

In a prior life where others were living in the same residence I always knew when someone was into my tools/equipment. They never put it back in the right spot or would forget to put it back. And I would ask where so-and-so was and no one would own up. Never again will that repeat itself. 

The last person to do that to my tools is dead - and I'm not talking natural causes.

The truth is that Dave was killed by a combination of alcohol, recklessness, a motorbike and a big tree. But I don't tell them that. Dave was, however, the last person to mess with my tools - largely I suspect because ever since I've been able to tell people that he was the last man to abuse my tools, and that he's dead, with a straight face and my hand on my heart.

So when you hear the old "Dave's not here, man..." gag... I suspect the context is not entirely the same as for the rest of us. Fair enuf.   

mnem
 

I don't wish anyone dead but if I could get back all the money (and misery, but mostly the money) the Puerto Rican princesa and all her kids cost me I could retire on a deserted island.   

I'm going to try and avoid incurring the wrath of Murphy here... and just state simply that I am a lifelong machine-head with a now-teenage son. The balance between teaching tolerance and respect for another man's tools is proving as hard for me as it was for grand-dad.

mnem
*toolish-dwagon*

[AVGresponding]

I see that Solartron 7150 went for £47, hopefully to someone here. I didn't include any description as it was my first post from my new phone, and I just discovered how shit the keyboard is; there's no square brackets, so I can't format anything or even manually enter links!

If anyone has any keyboard app recommendations I'd appreciate it.

[med6753]

In a prior life where others were living in the same residence I always knew when someone was into my tools/equipment. They never put it back in the right spot or would forget to put it back. And I would ask where so-and-so was and no one would own up. Never again will that repeat itself. 

The last person to do that to my tools is dead - and I'm not talking natural causes.

The truth is that Dave was killed by a combination of alcohol, recklessness, a motorbike and a big tree. But I don't tell them that. Dave was, however, the last person to mess with my tools - largely I suspect because ever since I've been able to tell people that he was the last man to abuse my tools, and that he's dead, with a straight face and my hand on my heart.

So when you hear the old "Dave's not here, man..." gag... I suspect the context is not entirely the same as for the rest of us. Fair enuf.   

mnem
 

I don't wish anyone dead but if I could get back all the money (and misery, but mostly the money) the Puerto Rican princesa and all her kids cost me I could retire on a deserted island.   

I'm going to try and avoid incurring the wrath of Murphy here... and just state simply that I am a lifelong machine-head with a now-teenage son. The balance between teaching tolerance and respect for another man's tools is proving as hard for me as it was for grand-dad.

mnem
*toolish-dwagon*

Oh I hear you. How many times did I catch hell for being into my Father's tools? You don't have enough fingers and toes. 

[bd139]

I see that Solartron 7150 went for £47, hopefully to someone here. I didn't include any description as it was my first post from my new phone, and I just discovered how shit the keyboard is; there's no square brackets, so I can't format anything or even manually enter links!

If anyone has any keyboard app recommendations I'd appreciate it.

Oh fuck it. Missed it 

Plug a usb keyboard into it. That will actually work.

[Specmaster]

Circuit breakers are down for OFF as the gravity effect also aids faster operation in the event of an overload occurring.

Nope. An MCCB, MCB, RCD, or RCBO will happily trip even if you jam the lever, with no impact on trip time. The mass of the components involved is tiny compared to the tripping spring force. If you pull different branded ones apart you'll find a fair variation in internal layout and orientation.

On larger boards, it's quite common for them to be horizontally mounted:



The one at the bottom is just a switch-disconnector, not an over-current device.

Yep, I know all this, I worked at Crabtree and Hagar for years and a breaker must be able to trip even if the handle / toggle / lever etc is jammed / wedged ON to prevent anyone from holding the power on to a fault condition and possibly causing a fire. I was chucking fuel into the great debate, up or down for ON

[Specmaster]

I see that Solartron 7150 went for £47, hopefully to someone here. I didn't include any description as it was my first post from my new phone, and I just discovered how shit the keyboard is; there's no square brackets, so I can't format anything or even manually enter links!

If anyone has any keyboard app recommendations I'd appreciate it.

Use Microsoft Swiftkey app, works on Android and IOs and offers loads of different configurations. Downloadable for free from their respective app stores.

EDIT It also allows you to speed up text entry by using if you wish, swiping your finger through the letters that make up the word you want to enter, without lifting your finger, and it will enter that word for you. It also learns the way you write and will quickly offer complete words to select just from the first few letters as it selects those that you use most often, thats clever little app.

[duckduck]

Some pictures of TE having done a detail wrong:

Get yer flamethrowers ready, folks!

 

Hopping on the wagon. Famous foul up of the binding posts on the Riden RD-series DC power supplies. It even got a "Why?!" from Dave. The problem: green is not ground! On these models, the green binding post is the positive terminal for charging batteries.

EDIT:

This is personal for me because that is my RD6006P in the picture. I put a note on the top of the unit to remind me. It's a exceptional power supply for the price.

[AVGresponding]

Some pictures of TE having done a detail wrong:

Get yer flamethrowers ready, folks!

 

Hopping on the wagon. Famous foul up of the binding posts on the Riden RD-series DC power supplies. It even got a "Why?!" from Dave. The problem: green is not ground! On these models, the green binding post is the positive terminal for charging batteries.

That is... so bad.