Test Equipment Anonymous (TEA) group therapy thread

[xrunner]

Here is the final Boonton button finishing test.

The finished 3D (meaning additional finishing after the print) printed button is on the left, original right. The last pic has the finished button left, original Boonton button middle, unfinished (except for the dot) 3D printed button at the right. The finishing of the 3D printed button involved sanding and priming (3 times), then final painting with Tamiya X-1 black gloss model paint. The white dot was applied with a toothpick using Tamiya XF-2 flat white.

Honestly, when I set up the two buttons for pics I left the room to do some things. When I came back I forgot how I set them up. I could not tell which was which until I got up very close. I do not think a person without prior knowledge would be able to distinguish the finished button from the originals when all are installed and the bezel in place - especially if they didn't even know a button had been replaced.

Heck, even if you don't want to go to all the trouble I did, just a few quick touches with a very fine sandpaper on all sides & painting once would make a great improvement.

So I hope this shows that you can do a whole lot more to the 3D printed object after it is removed from the printer, especially if you want a "museum quality" replacement part.

[AVGresponding]

Here is the final Boonton button finishing test.

The finished 3D (meaning additional finishing after the print) printed button is on the left, original right. The last pic has the finished button left, original Boonton button middle, unfinished (except for the dot) 3D printed button at the right. The finishing of the 3D printed button involved sanding and priming (3 times), then final painting with Tamiya X-1 black gloss model paint. The white dot was applied with a toothpick using Tamiya XF-2 flat white.

Honestly, when I set up the two buttons for pics I left the room to do some things. When I came back I forgot how I set them up. I could not tell which was which until I got up very close. I do not think a person without prior knowledge would be able to distinguish the finished button from the originals when all are installed and the bezel in place - especially if they didn't even know a button had been replaced.

Heck, even if you don't want to go to all the trouble I did, just a few quick touches with a very fine sandpaper on all sides & painting once would make a great improvement.

So I hope this shows that you can do a whole lot more to the 3D printed object after it is removed from the printer, especially if you want a "museum quality" replacement part.

Absolutely outstanding!

[Robert763]

   
Brrruce...? Brrrooo-a-oo-ooce...? Where ARE ya boy...?!?
BRRRRRUCE COME HOOOOOOME!!!   

mnem
*wondering what to do for the next day or 3 of being snowbound*

He's still there, breaching the surface occasionally to gasp some air.

LOL...     Wrong phylum altogether, buddy; Brrruce is a fish. 
Waitaminnit... he's a landshark. Guess he has to have some way of breathing air... supergills maybe?

<SNIP>
mnem
<SNIP>

This is a landshark, who happens to be in a punt....

[Kosmic]

Here is the final Boonton button finishing test.

The finished 3D (meaning additional finishing after the print) printed button is on the left, original right. The last pic has the finished button left, original Boonton button middle, unfinished (except for the dot) 3D printed button at the right. The finishing of the 3D printed button involved sanding and priming (3 times), then final painting with Tamiya X-1 black gloss model paint. The white dot was applied with a toothpick using Tamiya XF-2 flat white.

Honestly, when I set up the two buttons for pics I left the room to do some things. When I came back I forgot how I set them up. I could not tell which was which until I got up very close. I do not think a person without prior knowledge would be able to distinguish the finished button from the originals when all are installed and the bezel in place - especially if they didn't even know a button had been replaced.

Heck, even if you don't want to go to all the trouble I did, just a few quick touches with a very fine sandpaper on all sides & painting once would make a great improvement.

So I hope this shows that you can do a whole lot more to the 3D printed object after it is removed from the printer, especially if you want a "museum quality" replacement part.

Absolutely outstanding!

Yes, really really good job 

[m k]

How can you be sure which signals were used in the connection VCR<>TV  via SCART? I've seen SCART implementations where the RGB signals were unconnected as well as the other way round.

Somebody educated me here that VCRs have no RGBs.
It's just a bypass for the decryption device.

About the composite video quality, its actually is quite high.
The problem at the time was that receiving standard was lagging, being UHF and stuff.

BTW, this cycle has been 20cm recreational shovelings per set, and dang, not one or two, and dang dang, the year is young.

BTW2,
eevblog went offline.
vistcanberra.com.au was ok.
canberra.edu.au was a bit slower.

BTW3,
old login was accepted.

[mnementh]

   
Brrruce...? Brrrooo-a-oo-ooce...? Where ARE ya boy...?!?

...Where is the TOD parked then, we don't see it in your photos? It sure does look like a nice area, plenty of space, over here that be a sign that it's millionaires row 

It's just a jump to the right...     You can see it in the upper right corner of the previous pic.

Right now, there's nothing we can do with it; until the snow stops and the plows no longer coming through, the car has to stay parked in back of it, not in the street. That prevents putting up either the ramp or even really getting into the Garage of Doom. Not that we can do much with the GoD, either:



This was the result of yesterday's big push to get AMAP out of the ToD. Those two huge-arse filing cabinets (big looming black things against the wall to the left) are stuffed with 1.5ft³ bins full of tools and household hardwares. The SS ToolBox of Doom also made its way down the ramp, as did the Man-Eating Black Toolcart.

mnem
and there is similar carnage in the guest bedroom...

[McBryce]

@med6753:

Have you checked the clock in your Honda recently?

https://jalopnik.com/honda-clocks-are-stuck-20-years-in-the-past-and-this-mi-1848306970

Navi wasn't an option back then on my Honda S2000 and the display can't manage anything more than basic numbers in seven-seg goodness and lots of orange LED's.

McBryce.

[mnementh]

   Here is the final Boonton button finishing test...

Excellent fiddly-bits work, xrunner!   That's the kind of hand-crafting that I find most satisfying...

We who fix have to think of this as a recreational activity; Ifni help you if you dare think of it in terms of cost-effectiveness, as you'll usually come in due time to the sad contusion that the time & materials spent would buy you a shiny new whatever-inna-hell-it-is with all the new features and then some.

mnem
Keep the Faith, brother!

[Cerebus]

Nah, mine is charged mostly from my own solar and nuclear power. For the time being.

Also: that phrase reads as if I have my own nuclear power. 

Well, we live in a universe where all the solid bits are technically nuclear waste.

Hippy: "We are stardust"
Engineer: "We are nuclear waste"

[mansaxel]

Sort of reminds you of Y2K, don't it? That turned out to be a little mouse fart into a hurricane. 

Simply because the scare was large enough. A lot of people worked long hours to find and fix problems, and because they did, and because even the very definition of dim-wit, the MBA turned manager, realised there was significant risk in deferring the problem to reactive rather than proactive, there was enough push in the industry to fix the problems in time.

I declare Y2K a success, not a "mouse fart into a hurricane", because that is how good engineering in computing looks. It simply works.

[Specmaster]

   
Brrruce...? Brrrooo-a-oo-ooce...? Where ARE ya boy...?!?
BRRRRRUCE COME HOOOOOOME!!!   

mnem
*wondering what to do for the next day or 3 of being snowbound*

He's still there, breaching the surface occasionally to gasp some air.

LOL...     Wrong phylum altogether, buddy; Brrruce is a fish. 
Waitaminnit... he's a landshark. Guess he has to have some way of breathing air... supergills maybe?

<SNIP>
mnem
<SNIP>

This is a landshark, who happens to be in a punt....

Beautiful creature, when I had a dog, there is no way on earth that she would have been in a punt, she would have been in the river, she really was a dog fish. Paddling pool, river, pond or sea, made not a scrap of difference, she was always going to be in that water. In the summer and the hose pipe came out to water the garden she would be in front of the pipe jumping all over the place getting drenched, bless her.

[Cerebus]

Sort of reminds you of Y2K, don't it? That turned out to be a little mouse fart into a hurricane. 

It only turned out to be a mouse fart because a lot of people did a lot of hard work beforehand to make that true. The next time we need a flag day like that there will be a lot of people who take that "Y2K was a lot of fuss, let's do nothing" attitude and disaster will ensue.

[mnementh]

Nah, mine is charged mostly from my own solar and nuclear power. For the time being.   Also: that phrase reads as if I have my own nuclear power. 

Well, we live in a universe where all the solid bits are technically nuclear waste.

Hippy: "We are stardust"
Engineer: "We are nuclear waste"

Philosopher: "We are the universe made manifest in its desire to understand itself."

mnem
MBA: "We are... bleeding you dry. And there's nothing you can do about it."

[BU508A]

Just ordered:
1 Set of original GenRad GR900 adaptors.
(GR900<>N-f, GR900<>N-m, GR900<>BNC-m, GR900 50R Termination)

Wow, those are not very common. What's your use case?

I suppose: collecting RF adapters of all kind. 

[Robert763]

Nah, mine is charged mostly from my own solar and nuclear power. For the time being.

Also: that phrase reads as if I have my own nuclear power. 

Well, we live in a universe where all the solid bits are technically nuclear waste.

Hippy: "We are stardust"
Engineer: "We are nuclear waste"

Just had a thought and bet I could generate electricity using a nuclear source I have. 
Mind you a PV cell and bunch of old Betalights is not going to solve the energy crisis 

[mnementh]

Sort of reminds you of Y2K, don't it? That turned out to be a little mouse fart into a hurricane. 

It only turned out to be a mouse fart because a lot of people did a lot of hard work beforehand to make that true. The next time we need a flag day like that there will be a lot of people who take that "Y2K was a lot of fuss, let's do nothing" attitude and disaster will ensue.

We've had that over and over again in very recent history. To name but a few: Black Monday, Katrina, and COVID are literally the most-anticipated disasters of their kind in modern times, yet we continue to ignore the people who know their asses from a hole in the ground and cheer the smiling morons all the way as we march off the Global Warming cliff...

mnem
Don't worry; corporate spaceflight will save us all!!!

[mnementh]

Just ordered: 1 Set of original GenRad GR900 adaptors. (GR900<>N-f, GR900<>N-m, GR900<>BNC-m, GR900 50R Termination)

Wow, those are not very common. What's your use case?

I suppose: collecting RF adapters of all kind. 

That is the correct answer. 

mnem
You might be in the TEA if... 

[mnementh]

Nah, mine is charged mostly from my own solar and nuclear power. For the time being.

Also: that phrase reads as if I have my own nuclear power. 

Well, we live in a universe where all the solid bits are technically nuclear waste.

Hippy: "We are stardust"
Engineer: "We are nuclear waste"

Just had a thought and bet I could generate electricity using a nuclear source I have. 
Mind you a PV cell and bunch of old Betalights is not going to solve the energy crisis 

mnem
 

[Vince]

VCR / TV : yesterday was a good day, I managed to fix that 32" LCD TV I was given, so I could see if THAT one was working any better than the previous monitors I tried.... and it does, on this one SCART works, phew !  Not just that, but all my picture problems are gone now, picture is just fine on this TV ! No more black and white problem, no more fuzzy/"unfocused" image, no more unstable picture that keeps jumping up and down all the time... there is nothing to complain anymore, picture is as fine as it can be from a 20 year old VHS tape running on an unserviced 20 year old VCR ! 
(SNIP)
So that's good enough for me ! Repaired for 5 Euros (and have some spares now as well...), and a salvaged/free MOSFET. If the power supply ever blows again I can always fix it again, if I want / care. For now I call it a win.

Well MacGyverfied, Vince!

[..} the DPAK is the same part as its TO220 cousin aside from how the heat-sink tab and leads are formed.

Inmy case as I said the TO-220 replacement is wayyyyyyyyy larger than the original D-PAK.

So I guess it was not DPAK then... maybe a miniature derivative of it.... I call "DPAK" anything sitting flat on the PCB, with 3 terminals one of which is the thermal pad... didn't realize there were variants of it, oh well...  Don't know how to call it then ?! " Mini D-PAK " ?! 

The dead safety cap suggests probably a voltage surge on the mains; common failure modes with this COD include "Dead FET Walking" and other "zombie parts" downstream that test good at triage time, but fail on first or 3rd or 10th powerup, etc down the road. These can be very frustrating in a repair shop scenario.

Yes good idea, should have thought of that. That would be the only way I guess to crack open a 1kV ceramic cap that's otherwise known as indestructible...
My replacement is rated at 3kV ! 

   One thing you want to do is look for a Harmony remote for your lab.

I have several of the Harmony One "Roach Remote" like this one; they can be programmed to your model of TV, VCR, BluRay Player, HT, etc via USB, and unlike most of the crappy overpriced "punch in a code" remotes, actually have all the special buttons to control things like picture presets and most importantly, aspect ratio. These can often be found pretty cheap on eBay or at some Thrift stores (usually most likely in the more affluent neighborhoods).

Luckily the guy who gave me the VCR and this TV, also gave me their respective original remotes !

[Specmaster]

Today's epic fail, yesterday I ordered some C type batteries from Amazon, they were on prime, I needed them today so I ordered them and got a confirmation email telling me that they would be with today by 10PM.

This morning I got an email from the Royal Mail, informing me that they had a parcel for me and that it would be delivered today. I wasn't expecting anything by post, so I went on a hunt and discovered that it was infact those batteries because the tracking info gave the game away, they offloaded the delivery to them. Now I was concerned as because of the severity of Covid over here, we have a massive amount of postmen in my city off, either suffering with Covid or self-isolating that we for the last 3 weeks have been reduced from 2 deliveries a day to just 1 a week, that was yesterday, so now it seems I have to wait till next Thursday to get my batteries, I can't even collect them from delivery office as they have closed because of Covid. Thats the state of our once great country because our leaders have the white flag being waved over England and letting Covid run riot 

[mnementh]

Waitaminnit... he's a landshark. Guess he has to have some way of breathing air... supergills maybe?

   This is a landshark, who happens to be in a punt....

Gorgeous pup. Had me going  over "in a punt" tho; thought it was some weird slang like "taking a punt" or calling someone "a punter". Then I realized a punt is just what we rebels across the pond usually call a marsh boat or skiff. 

mnem
Doyt!

[factory]

VCR / TV :


Does not have a composite input though, which is a bummer. So might replace it with another TV if one day I am given one that has both SCART and video composite.
However SCART has both RGB and composite signals available, so maybe I can make a little adapter to feed a composite signal through SCART. However that's assuming the TV uses the composite signal of the SCART connector, rather than RGB. Have not tested for this. Anyway, for now I have a working TV and VCR so that's cool, it's handy.

How can you be sure which signals were used in the connection VCR<>TV  via SCART? I've seen SCART implementations where the RGB signals were unconnected as well as the other way round.

Just had a look at the manual for the Aiwa VCR I have, it makes no mention in the specs as to what is used on the Scart output for video (probably just composite), it does mention the 240 lines output that the "Secret life of machines" programme referred to.

It does have a 4:3/16:9 aspect ratio option in the menu, as well as some function to soften/sharpen the picture (probably crap).

David

[med6753]

Sort of reminds you of Y2K, don't it? That turned out to be a little mouse fart into a hurricane. 

Simply because the scare was large enough. A lot of people worked long hours to find and fix problems, and because they did, and because even the very definition of dim-wit, the MBA turned manager, realised there was significant risk in deferring the problem to reactive rather than proactive, there was enough push in the industry to fix the problems in time.

I declare Y2K a success, not a "mouse fart into a hurricane", because that is how good engineering in computing looks. It simply works.

I was also VERY heavily involved in Y2K remediation and MOST of what we found turned into a non-issue. I also spent my New Years at work for over 24 hours just in case something went south. There was nary a whimper.

[mnementh]

VCR / TV : yesterday was a good day, I managed to fix that 32" LCD TV I was given, so I could see if THAT one was working any better than the previous monitors I tried.... and it does, on this one SCART works, phew !  Not just that, but all my picture problems are gone now, picture is just fine on this TV ! No more black and white problem, no more fuzzy/"unfocused" image, no more unstable picture that keeps jumping up and down all the time... there is nothing to complain anymore, picture is as fine as it can be from a 20 year old VHS tape running on an unserviced 20 year old VCR ! 
(SNIP)
So that's good enough for me ! Repaired for 5 Euros (and have some spares now as well...), and a salvaged/free MOSFET. If the power supply ever blows again I can always fix it again, if I want / care. For now I call it a win.

Well MacGyverfied, Vince!

[..} the DPAK D2PAK is the same part as its TO220 cousin aside from how the heat-sink tab and leads are formed.

In my case as I said the TO-220 replacement is wayyyyyyyyy larger than the original D-PAK.

So I guess it was not DPAK then... maybe a miniature derivative of it.... I call "DPAK" anything sitting flat on the PCB, with 3 terminals one of which is the thermal pad... didn't realize there were variants of it, oh well...  Don't know how to call it then ?! " Mini D-PAK " ?! 

The dead safety cap suggests probably a voltage surge on the mains; common failure modes with this COD include "Dead FET Walking" and other "zombie parts" downstream that test good at triage time, but fail on first or 3rd or 10th powerup, etc down the road. These can be very frustrating in a repair shop scenario.

Yes good idea, should have thought of that. That would be the only way I guess to crack open a 1kV ceramic cap that's otherwise known as indestructible...   My replacement is rated at 3kV ! 

   One thing you want to do is look for a Harmony remote for your lab.

I have several of the Harmony One "Roach Remote" like this one; they can be programmed to your model of TV, VCR, BluRay Player, HT, etc via USB, and unlike most of the crappy overpriced "punch in a code" remotes, actually have all the special buttons to control things like picture presets and most importantly, aspect ratio. These can often be found pretty cheap on eBay or at some Thrift stores (usually most likely in the more affluent neighborhoods).

Luckily the guy who gave me the VCR and this TV, also gave me their respective original remotes !

D'OH! Brain-fart; D2PAK, not DPAK. Corrected!

Do yourself a favor tho, and keep your eyes peeled for one of those Harmony remotes with the touchscreen. If you find one for $30 or less in functional condition, jump on it. If you tinker on any kind of consumer electronics, they are TE no less important than a meter or scope. You can't troubleshoot something if you can't control it properly, and you rarely get the original remote with curb-scores or Thrift items.

mnem
 

[capt bullshot]

The VW inverter shown in the video was clearly designed to be repaired. Internally it contains a number of PCBs and modules. The interconnects are all re-usable. One power resistor had insulated 1/4" blades and insulated push-on crimps. This would be a service exchange module at dealer level and then go to a specialist sub-contractor to be repaired at an internal module level.
He actually showed the board from a Tesla for comparison and it clearly was not desigined to be repaired. One huge PCB and the discharge resistor was several SMDs in series/parallel.

Quite a lot to read from this particular post to now, so I'm skipping a bit:

Having worked in the power electronics business (especially servo drives for automation and machinery), you should know one thing:
A blown IGBT module can physically destroy the whole inverter unit just due to the available amount of energy. There's quite a large reservoir, aka know as the battery, and another one that's usually totally underestimated: the kinetic energy within the masses of the motor and whatever is coupled mechanically to it.
Even if the damage is limited, say only the IGBT is blown and the energy was contained within the module, it is highly recommended to replace the whole driver circuits as the IGBT driver chips usually are blown or pre-damaged by the IGBT failure. So in the wors case one could replace just the IGBT, but the inverter would fail soon after because of the pre / partially damaged driver. So one is better advised to at least replace the PCB containing the IGBTs and the related drivers. In some designs this just just the only PCB in the whole inverter.
For the inverters manufacturer, diagnosing, replacing and testing IGBT drivers on such kind of PCB just isn't economically viable. Same goes for certified repair shops. To repair such kind of traction inverters, you'd need some kind of certification just because of (safety and other) regulations.