Test Equipment Anonymous (TEA) group therapy thread

[mnementh]

Hmmm Cerebus's SWMBO is potty which may explain why he is like he is. 

No, it doesn't explain why I am like I am, but it possibly explains why I still have a SWMBO.

Same here. But as I am the beneficiary of said madness, I try not to bring it to her attention too frequently lest she actually come to her senses and park my sorry ass in the dumpster where it belongs.

mnem
"ooooooh... this one is nice, honey. Right behind a Denny's, so plenty of hot grease to keep me from freezing..."

[mnementh]

I didn't realize until I tried these NOS probes how much I hate the feel of Pliovic leads anymore; even my cheap Chinese probes are all silicone now. The probes that come with the 27  are shrouded, but the sockets are just a bit smaller and most of my extra probes don't fit; I may actually have to splurge on some Fluke or Pomonas in silicone.

That is interesting.  Some years ago I bought a Fluke 27 F/M packaged like yours, big probulator, crappy leads, hard case but no manuals.  Pitched the crappy leads and I have been using the Brymen leads that Frankie was selling on his website.  If fact, I have 5 sets of the leads and they fit fine in my Fluke.  I would have thought that they would use the same jacks for ease of inventory and lower BOM cost for more profit.

The other shrouded probes I have are all supposedly for the 87; it has a multipart socket with a plastic shroud for sensing lead placement. The 27 jacks are just a solid metal 4mm tube in a recessed socket.

Things change; devices evolve. My 189/87-IV uses the same jack assembly as all the other 87s and is a lot smarter than the 27. Doesn't surprise me the leads are a wee bit different to make up for that.

mnem
 

[mnementh]

Besides that, wasn't that you who has a t-shirt with "I hate people"? 

Yes, but do we count as 'people'? An aardvark, a dragon, a frog, a selection of 'kraut... 

Some of my friends do consider me as "The Mountain". 

No idea why ...   

a aardvard, a dwagon, a frog, and some kraut walk into a bar on a mountain...

Bartender looks up and asks "Can I help you...?"

The mountain speaks in a voice deep and vast, like the rumblings of a volcano... "Yeah, can you get these guys off my ass?"

mnem
Sorry, we don't serve your kind in here."
"a-whuuuuhhhh...?" 
"Comedians." *continues wiping beer mug with a towel*

[mnementh]

Are we happy now? 

I am NOT going fix the shitty seam.

Much better;  did you install the charge kit Terra Operative sent you...? 

mnem
*agitating-ily*

[mnementh]

Supper, part two. Just out of the oven and cooling down:

   Local apple season has really kicked in - that whole pie is two, count them 2, Bramley apples!

mnem
"pie, pie, oh me, oh my..."

[med6753]

TERRA Operative.....

In reference to the rectifier kit you sent me. I'm not sure I actually need this modification. The kit assumes you had to install new battery assembly P/N 146-0033-02. My scope came with the old battery pack P/N 146-0033-00. I disassembled that battery pack and ditched the dead Nicd batteries and installed Nimh batteries. I verified weeks ago in testing the PSU that while the charge profile is not ideal for the Nimh batteries it does keep them charged and doesn't over charge them. I'm not sure how this new kit would react to the Nimh batteries.

Second, I think you said you had a 211 scope. Well I have a 212 scope and that rectifier board is mounted differently. See diagram. The 211 scope has the board mounted as per figure 1. The 212 scope has the board mounted as per figure 2. The component side of the board faces the CRT. There should be an insulator installed on the foil side of the board which was not included with your kit. Without that insulator the foil of the board will contact and short out to the foil shield installed on the covers. That would not be a good thing.

I really do appreciate you taking the time and effort to send me this modification kit but I think for now I'm going to hold off installing it. 

 

[mansaxel]

I have an old railway about 10 miles from me. They run steam trains, old London Transport tube trains and also Diesel Electric locos as well along the line and every Christmas they run special services with Santa onboard for the kids and serve hot meals on it as well.

The British faiblesse for keeping old things and caring for them seems focused on undoing  the changes made in the 1950s and 60s, selectively, with an agenda.  Brutalism gets torn down (by royal decree). Canals get reopened and steam trains run frequently. There even is reality TV shows (a.k.a "Footage staged and edited for effect drama about ordinary things" ) about museum railways.

This is torn down:



This is frantically restored:

[med6753]

Woke up to check on this guy. Been running flawlessly for over 16 hours. Reasonably confident that all intermittent problems have been fixed but will continue to monitor.

[ch_scr]

A colleague of mine is a short wave listener at heart. For your enjoyment I'll present to you a translation of a Mail I got from him:
"The loop antenna is finished and in service. The results are very good.

Housed in the metal box is the amplifier, that is controlled and supplied over a RJ45 CAT6 cable.
On one pair of wires the recieved spectrum is transmitted to the control box. The balun to go from symmetric back to coax (BNC  ) is inside the control box,
together with the power supply and relay control for the for amplifier. To the right is a rod antena with BUF634 impedance converter - the previous installation 
The amplifier can be switched between "upper & lower loop parallel mag. field", "upper loop mag.", "lower loop mag." and "upper & lower loop in dipole mode".

The mount is a mast-mount kit for 33cm/45cm SAT-antennas (also in the background on the mast) from Technisat (sold seperately).
The loops are 28" bike rims (cheap on ebay, cheaper from the yard of the local hoarder house). The mounting block is made from PVC and was milled by "retired colleague".
The vacuum cleaner (held by me) made an impressive Wimshurst machine with me as Leiden(d)er jar. (German wordplay on Leyden jar / suffering)

On DCF77 (german time ref signal on 77.5kHz) the rod antenna reaches 33dB SNR. In magnetic mode the signal from the loop is much worse. But in dipole mode it
wins out with 37dB SNR. In LW and MW up to 1MHz the magnetic has throughout weaker signals, that are lower noise on occasion.
The reason is the small diameter of the loop. The reactance of the loop is smaller than the input impedance of the amplifier, through that the loop is not running in short circuit -
so it loses some efficiency. The directionality is there even below 1MHz in the seperate "upper mag." and "lower mag." modes.

Above 1MHz the signal is on average 10dB proud of the signal from the rod antenna. At the same time the SNR is (particularly in the magnetic modes) impressively better
than from the rod antenna. On the rod antenna the signal might be buried in noise, but on the loop there will be a mode that clearly improves reception.
See audio files on the end, they are not fake!

In total I would not have thought that the ugly HF-location near a 15kV train power could be improved!"
Rod antenna audio
Loop antenna audio

[tggzzz]

Today's amusement: for only £799.99 (and no offers allowed) you could be the proud owner of a "Vintage Solartron Voltmeter Digital CT469 ~ Nixie Tubes ~ Laboratory Use". https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/174991878233

Strangely some of his items have sensible prices.

[Saskia]

not buying anything right now. will be back at packing in a couple of minutes ...

[BU508A]

not buying anything right now. will be back at packing in a couple of minutes ...

The endless joy of moving households ... 

Hope, it'll be over soon without any losts.

[Saskia]

yarp. furthermore I did not do the medical required for renewal of the small truck license (up to 20 tons ...) so the license expired a while back.
grmpf.

[Andrew_Debbie]

Dana 5100 Update

Programming a 74188 requires pulsing Vcc to 10.5 with a specified rise time.    I found a '188 programmer on the web that used a relay to switch between 5V and 10.5. 

I'm going to do something like this instead.   

Notes:  The R and C values are approximate placeholders.   This works in LTSpice but I have not checkedC3 for the correct rise time.    The current through the adjust resistors is below the 10mA needed by the regulator.   I'll either reduce R2 or put an LED on the output.   

Vpp goes to the '188.   Vcc from the 7805 powers the rest of the programmer.   I may end up using a buck regulator  module instead of a 7805.






 

[Cerebus]

This is torn down:

That looks miserable even on a bright dry day. You spend a few winters on a university campus where all the the buildings were grey brutalist lumps, or have to go shopping year round in a brutalist shopping centre open to the (British) weather and you'd soon change your tune and be reaching for the demolition explosives and detonator. Brutalism looks fine, in isolation in architect's photos, but as something to live with en masse it's soul destroying.

Why do you think Kubrick chose the brutalist background of Brunel University to film the authoritarian parts of "A Clockwork Orange"? Because it looks like a prison camp.



Ditto Kubrick choosing Thamesmead to represent a kind of urban dystopia.




Ha! People who fête brutalist architecture should be made to live in it!

And of course nothing has been done by Royal Decree for two centuries or more.

[Specmaster]

Is it just me, or does anyone else find this ore crusher strangely hypnotic?

[med6753]

Hypnotized and near a deep hole is not a good combination. 

[ch_scr]

Dana 5100 Update

Programming a 74188 requires pulsing Vcc to 10.5 with a specified rise time.    I found a '188 programmer on the web that used a relay to switch between 5V and 10.5. 

I'm going to do something like this instead.   

Notes:  The R and C values are approximate placeholders.   I've just put this in LTSpice and it works but I have not checkedC3 for the correct rise time.    The current through the adjust resistors is below the 10mA needed by the regulator.   I'll either reduce R1 or put an LED on the output.   

Vpp goes to the '188.   Vcc from the 7805 powers the rest of the programmer.   I may end up using a buck regulator  module instead of a 7805.

Nice idea I've seen something like this,in a mains SMPS on the secondary side, done to the feedback of an TL431, to lower the voltage in standby.

[factory]

Ditto Kubrick choosing Thamesmead to represent a kind of urban dystopia.



Ha! People who fête brutalist architecture should be made to live in it!

And of course nothing has been done by Royal Decree for two centuries or more.

That estate in Thamesmead is no more, been demolished in the last couple of years, I remember seeing an Urbex video taken during the demolition.
No doubt it will be replaced with something even worse.

David

[Specmaster]

You can certainly say that again, I don't think you'd survive passing through that crusher. I find it rather odd that once the crusher is clear of everything, that the central spindle rotates slowly in reverse, also from the angle we observe it at, it hardly seems to move and yet it manages to exert enough force to crack those boulders like they were nothing 

[Martin.M]

only some resistors  ( 0,02% )

[Cerebus]

Hypnotized and near a deep hole is not a good combination. 

Oooh, Matron!. 

[Wolfgang]

What about this one ? 

[Cerebus]

What's obviously happened there is that someone left the plans in a closed car in summer, they stretched, and then they gave them to a builder who didn't understand what "Do not scale from drawing" meant. 

[Neomys Sapiens]

• When you want to adjust the hardware of old UK electric devices, having a B.A. spanner set is a necessity. I've used them perhaps 5 times, but I have the set and that, having the gear, is what counts, right? I must admit I've been looking at 1/4" socket sets in B.A. Just because! They exist, at insane prices from manufacturers like Ko-Ken, or as cheap sets, from Laser Tools in the UK.

Many thanks for this info. As my Belzer BA sockets are not complete, I will round out with Koken.