Test Equipment Anonymous (TEA) group therapy thread

[bitseeker]

Here's a photo of the GDM-9061

I am not taking it apart, it is brand spanking new and has 3 years warranty ... the box content was complete and undamaged.


Cannot compare it to the DMM royalty as I have none of those. It should be able to keep up with my MetraHit handheld, though (managing expectations here).

Plenty connectors at the back, need to read the manual. It is said to support 4 wire.
My favorite is still a Fluke 179 ...

That's a beauty, Saskia. It does indeed support 4-wire resistance measurements. Hence, the extra Sense jacks in addition to the Input ones.

[bitseeker]

I swear no more test equipment till 2022..

 

So, we'll see your next pic posted here in November? Maybe, December.

[cyclin_al]

The mechanics of the English language are as much aboot propagating the exceptions to the rule as they are in any way aboot actually communicating thought and intent with any accuracy or even reasonable measure of cogency.

Or being ambiguous. Try to unambiguously explain when to use/avoid could, should, would, might, may, must.

I kinda got this part through immersion while I lived in the UK, however one thing I would like answered is what the factual, objective difference between " THIS " and " THAT " is ..... it still boggles my mind... to thjis date I consider it as equivalent words and one just uses one or the other purely based on his personal habit or if he feels one "sounds" better (to him) than the other, in a particular sentence...

Those words certainly get abused and interchanged that way.
The difference is in proximity of the reference.
I have THIS object here with me, while I sent THAT object to you over there.
The frame of reference for the proximity is the subject, which is me ("I").

-- I try to avoid demonstrating that both my parents were school teachers; I vowed I would never be a teacher ... why is aeronautics teacher in my work description?

[capt bullshot]

ger, but thought someone here might be...

would happily buy, but need french address and phone number to register ...
[/quote]

Don't. You fancy keysight scope runs circles in the speed of light around ...
The TDS420 features the same UI concept and has many similar functions, at least the 524A is faster and has the colour screen, but that's all.

[cyclin_al]

I think I spent too much time in the UK and too much time reading and writing English on forums, e-mailing friends, reading datasheet, watching movies etc....    I am contaminated... I am neither French anymore, nor English just yet... I am a hybrid, a bastard, literally... 

I am also contaminated, but stuck here in the middle coming from the other side...

Hey someone on here already posted this one just a few weeks ago I remember, is that all you've got ?! 

I am certain there is more ... I did not hear enough church words ... 

[capt bullshot]

Here's a photo of the GDM-9061

Does it dual measurement (just like on the photo V and A) simultaneously? That's a cool feature 

[srb1954]

Where did you source the neons with the nice long leads?

I have the same problem of corroded neon leads with my 5245L but I haven't been able to find neons with sufficiently long leads to repair the decimal point assembly and still allow manipulation of this assembly when gaining access to other parts of the unit.

Couldn't you just solder on some extensions?

Yes, but I want to retain the original look as much as possible and there would be an increased risk of lead breakage during the difficult manipulation of the decimal point assembly as it is maneuvered back into its final position.

[dl6lr]

Progress with the first 5245L: Replaced all neon bulbs. What a mess. All copper wires were corroded, most have them already were destroyed at one leg.

Where did you source the neons with the nice long leads?

I have the same problem of corroded neon leads with my 5245L but I haven't been able to find neons with sufficiently long leads to repair the decimal point assembly and still allow manipulation of this assembly when gaining access to other parts of the unit.

First, I soldered some wires to the leads of the neons for the decimal point assembly A8, as my neons had slightly too short leads for that. The units assembly A9 shows the neons original leads with the insulation from the old neons being reused. I did not unsolder and remove the decimal point and unit assemblies: removing assemblies A10..A18, A22, A23 with the board holder from the unit, I managed to rework the neons (with a little bit of cursing...).
Now for the unhappy news: I got the neons from a friend quite some time ago. He had several hundreds of them and I thought it could be helpful some day to have some of them. I may try to contact him if he still has any of them.

Edit: Have a look at Digikey part no C2A-ND, those have longer leads https://www.digikey.de/product-detail/de/visual-communications-company-vcc/C2A/C2A-ND/ I did not separate the board from the plastic housing but fiddled the wires through the gap

[Zoli]

I don't know ?! 

Some things come to me naturally in English, others in French... often when I talk to someone I find myself wanting to say an English word then I have to think twice, pause for a bit and try to figure out the French word for it.... often I fail, pathetic....

I think I spent too much time in the UK and too much time reading and writing English on forums, e-mailing friends, reading datasheet, watching movies etc....    I am contaminated... I am neither French anymore, nor English just yet... I am a hybrid, a bastard, literally... 

Obviously, in true tradition of TEA, you NEED to learn a third language; choose between Nordic(Danish, Swedish,Norge, Finnish), east Asian(Mandarin, Japanese, Korean) or some Native NA/A/NZ(too long to list); let us know when fluent in any of those...

[Saskia]

I propose Finnish so that you can follow the pommijätkät channel.

[Wolfgang]

I propose Finnish so that you can follow the pommijätkät channel.

... and watch Kaurismäki film jokes in native Finnish language. 

[duckduck]

A new acquisition:

Tektronix PS280 DC Power Supply
0-30V @ 0-2A,  0-30V @ 0-2A,  5V @ 3A fixed
Made in Taiwan

This unit is painted Tek blue, but it's a bastard child and its real daddy is Goodwill Instruments / GW Instek. It was last calibrated on 2002-11-02. Not sure when this unit was born. Maybe in the late 80s or early 90s? The left channel voltage is bang-on. The right channel is off by 0.1V for most of its range. I hooked it up to my DC load and it cranks out 60W per channel as advertised.

I think that this Tek may steal the spot on my bench currently occupied by a Topward TPS-4000  power supply. The Topward uses wobbly-needle display technology and is outclassed by the LED displays on the Tek. The PS280 has an annoyingly loud fan, but I'm hoping that it will be muffled once it's on the shelf. Regardless, once I get time to fix the second channel on my Agilent power supply, both Tek and Topward will be banished to The Storage Shelf On The Other Side Of The Room™. In the past several months I have decided to start collecting electric organs. With the amount of garage sales and estate sales I've been to this year, I literally now have more than a lifetime supply of wrapping paper. There will be plenty of free rolls available several decades from now at my estate sale. The cycle of life.

https://w140.com/tekwiki/wiki/PS280

[Andrew_Debbie]

For those who want an old TDS 500 Tek scope but don't have much money to put in to it, a decent one poped up here :


A 524A, so 2 channels 500MHz, 500MSps, COLOUR screen, which appears to be in good nick too (often they leak, not so this one it seems).



Also supplies two new probes but from what I see on the pics, they are probably the cheap 10 buck china probes, and probably aren't even 500MHz rated, most likely 100MHz I bet, so I would consider the scope as not having probes at all as far as I am concerned.


Only 200 Euros, and well maybe you can negotiate  20 euros off of that who knows.. that would help pay for shipping.

Would happily buy it if I were looking for my first TDS... but I already have two of them now and many more other scopes so... I am not a candidate for this scope any longer, but thought someone here might be...

That is about the same price as my 100MHz (hackable to 150)  1Gs Hantek.   Hmmm.   

I'm committed to fixing the Dana 5100 before I buy anything else.   After that,  I've got another broken Racal Dana DMM on my watch list.

[Andrew_Debbie]

A new acquisition:

 The PS280 has an annoyingly loud fan,

You could probably swap the fan for a quieter one with the same airflow.   Of course the airflow itself could account for a large part of the noise.

[Vince]

I think I spent too much time in the UK and too much time reading and writing English on forums, e-mailing friends, reading datasheet, watching movies etc....    I am contaminated... I am neither French anymore, nor English just yet... I am a hybrid, a bastard, literally... 

I am also contaminated, but stuck here in the middle coming from the other side...

Hey someone on here already posted this one just a few weeks ago I remember, is that all you've got ?! 

I am certain there is more ... I did not hear enough church words ... 

That's strange because the very first word he says is precisely that ! 

" Nom de dieu "

[Vince]

I don't know ?! 

Some things come to me naturally in English, others in French... often when I talk to someone I find myself wanting to say an English word then I have to think twice, pause for a bit and try to figure out the French word for it.... often I fail, pathetic....

I think I spent too much time in the UK and too much time reading and writing English on forums, e-mailing friends, reading datasheet, watching movies etc....    I am contaminated... I am neither French anymore, nor English just yet... I am a hybrid, a bastard, literally... 

Obviously, in true tradition of TEA, you NEED to learn a third language; choose between Nordic(Danish, Swedish,Norge, Finnish), east Asian(Mandarin, Japanese, Korean) or some Native NA/A/NZ(too long to list); let us know when fluent in any of those...

I am sorry it will be German for me (I class that as Nordic), because :

1) It's easier
2) Germans are my neighbours so I more likely to be doing anything there than any other country.
3) I learned German at school before English, but was forced to stop aged 18, so I have acquired the basics already
4) My best friend is German so would be cool to converse with him in German a little bit.
5) TEA wise, I like modern R&S scopes and would not mind having one, so it would help me order it direct from Germany, cheaper 
6) My hand writing and "artistic" drawing skills are so terrible that writing any funky looking asian language is just out of the question.


I apologize for being a disappointment !! 

[Vince]

This is kind of TEA-ish if you want to get the right screw (or nut) to fix that TEA you are working on out of your screw stash. If you have a mixed-up box-o-screws you saved over the years it's a hassle to find what you want. Well a mixed-up box is what I have and I'm going to sort them all out with the help of this come hell or high water, so I don't have to fuss with finding what I need any more. I have had a cheap plastic screw gauge but this is much nicer.

Zinc Plated for Inch Size -

Includes 14 Inch Size part numbers: 6-32, 8-32, 10-24, 10-32, 1/4-20, 1/4-28, 5/16-18, 5/16-24, 3/8-16, 3/8-24, 7/16-14, 7/16-20, 1/2-13, 1/2-20

Black Oxide for Metric Size -

Includes 12 Metric Sizes part numbers: M4x0.7, M5x0.8, M6x1.0, M7x1.0, M8x1.0, M8x1.25, M10x1.0, M10x1.25, M10x1.5, M12x1.25, M12x1.5, M12x1.75

Thread sizes are permanently stamped onto each gauge. The individual gauges rotate freely on the wire cable for fast thread verification.

Yeah, I recommended these to Vince a while back when he was having shit-fit conniptions over all the American fractional/decimal machine screws on his HP gear. You can get them all over AliEx for $20-25 a set. A bargain, IMO.

mnem
*knocks self unconscious with a tap & die mallet*

Tek gear no HP, was about restoring my Type 575 curve tracer...

[Neper]

@Vince

BTW, regarding exceptions to the rule that the French don't change the spelling of English words, here's one, off he top of my head:

fioul

[Vince]

That's what we do here... whenever we use an English word, we just use it as is, we don't try to French-ize it...  We pronounce it in all sorts of weird and ridiculous ways but the correct one, we often don't really know what it means... but at least we don't try to modify its spelling. Well, maybe someone can come up with an exception to that but generally pseaking speaking I would say it holds true !

A sandwich is still a sandwich, a weekend is still a weekend. OK you are allowed to write it " week-end " if you want, but still...

Where you are, the language is supposedly curated by academia.

Just a bunch of old people gathering every now and then to have some tea and biscuits, that's about it.
In practice they have zero influence on what people speak or write. I admire their effort but it's sadly completely in vain, they might as well go fishing instead...

"weekend" is "la fin de semaine" in official quebecois, but canadian french is "la fin de la semaine" ...

Nobody here says "week-end " in French any more, or so rarely... I guess that's being lazy again, "weekend" is faster to pronounce.
As always language evolves based on the " laziness principle "  ! 

Exception : people always say, somehow "Challenge" instead of " défi ", even though the latter is so much faster and easier to pronounce right, than the former. But this is explained by another rule/factor : " The coolness factor " of spitting out an English word you can't even pronounce properly, rather than the readily available and much more convenient, FRENCH word !  Drives me nuts 

[Vince]

would happily buy, but need french address and phone number to register ...

Don't. You fancy keysight scope runs circles in the speed of light around ...
The TDS420 features the same UI concept and has many similar functions, at least the 524A is faster and has the colour screen, but that's all.

The only real problem with the 500 and 500A series are those leaky electrolytic caps...

To be honest I was surprised that Saskia would be interested in this scope, since any oif her Festool tools  would get her a much better TDS scope, like a TDS 784D or something, which I am still dreaming of acquiring one day. One day...

[Vince]

This is kind of TEA-ish if you want to get the right screw (or nut) to fix that TEA you are working on out of your screw stash. If you have a mixed-up box-o-screws you saved over the years it's a hassle to find what you want. Well a mixed-up box is what I have and I'm going to sort them all out with the help of this come hell or high water, so I don't have to fuss with finding what I need any more. I have had a cheap plastic screw gauge but this is much nicer.

Zinc Plated for Inch Size -

Includes 14 Inch Size part numbers: 6-32, 8-32, 10-24, 10-32, 1/4-20, 1/4-28, 5/16-18, 5/16-24, 3/8-16, 3/8-24, 7/16-14, 7/16-20, 1/2-13, 1/2-20

Black Oxide for Metric Size -

Includes 12 Metric Sizes part numbers: M4x0.7, M5x0.8, M6x1.0, M7x1.0, M8x1.0, M8x1.25, M10x1.0, M10x1.25, M10x1.5, M12x1.25, M12x1.5, M12x1.75

Thread sizes are permanently stamped onto each gauge. The individual gauges rotate freely on the wire cable for fast thread verification.

Looks like a neckless a guy from some ancient African tribes, would have made from the teeth he pulled out of the guys he killed from the other tribes next door, who dared venturing into his neck of the bush....

[ch_scr]

Well, I'm pretty happy with the resistors. Measured a total of 12 to get 4 pairs of 0.04% (or better match) 
0.5% measured difference between highest and lowest. 

[Neper]

Looks like a neckless a guy from some ancient African tribes, would have made from the teeth he pulled out of the guys he killed from the other tribes next door, who dared venturing into his neck of the bush....

...so that the guys who ventured into his neck of the bush were neck-less after he had dealt with them? 

[capt bullshot]

would happily buy, but need french address and phone number to register ...

Don't. You fancy keysight scope runs circles in the speed of light around ...
The TDS420 features the same UI concept and has many similar functions, at least the 524A is faster and has the colour screen, but that's all.

The only real problem with the 500 and 500A series are those leaky electrolytic caps...

To be honest I was surprised that Saskia would be interested in this scope, since any oif her Festool tools  would get her a much better TDS scope, like a TDS 784D or something, which I am still dreaming of acquiring one day. One day...

The 500 series is rather new, so I'm not totally sure if they ever had this particular issue, otherwise it's a well-known problem and fixable as long as it isn't too late.
And this particular one most probably is easily hackable to full 1GHz B/W and 2GSps - what cannot be done is adding the 2 missing channels, and it already has the colour screen, so it isn't far away from a 784.
Improvements from 784A to D IMHO are nothing revolutionary, just the usual evolution, so a D model won't give you too much improvement over a A model anyway - as in "no new features, but maybe faster user interface".

[Vince]

@Vince

BTW, regarding exceptions to the rule that the French don't change the spelling of English words, here's one, off he top of my head:

fioul

Oh no, I think we need to stop or we will get kicked out of TEA, people will hack the server to delete our accounts ! 

Yes " fioul " is a french-iazation of " fuel " you are right. Sounds the same but using a more French looking spelling so easier to remember.
What's more.... we use the term "fuel" to describe diesel fuel only, and only the kind you use for heating ion the house, not the one you put in your car, even though they are the same technically, whereas of course in English " fuel " can be either petrol or diesel fuel, or anything else that can burn really...