Test Equipment Anonymous (TEA) group therapy thread

[TERRA Operative]

Use a Pi-Hole with a high endurance SD card (as standard for a Raspberry Pi). They "just work". I just run update commands when I remember and besides that (which is rare), it needs no care or feeding.

I've created a cronjob which is doing an update every 24 hours.
A log file will be written as well. Can be helpful for troubleshooting.

Log file example:

Code: [Select]

#*****************************************
 
Tue 29 Mar 02:00:01 BST 2022
 
apt-get update
 
apt-get upgrade
 
apt-get dist-upgrade
 
apt-get auto-remove
 
pihole -up
 
Tue 29 Mar 02:00:31 BST 2022
rebooting now ...
 
#*****************************************
 
Wed 30 Mar 02:00:01 BST 2022
 
apt-get update
 
apt-get upgrade
 
apt-get dist-upgrade
 
apt-get auto-remove
 
pihole -up
 
Wed 30 Mar 02:01:57 BST 2022
rebooting now ...
 
#*****************************************


Because I'm lazy, can I get a copy of that cron job?   

[TERRA Operative]

Question for the coax aficionados here...

I'm looking for a 36" BNC - BNC cable, low loss for calibrating my TDS scopes. I have some nice crimped RG58 cables I made with Canare connectors but is there any recommendations for other cables out there that are good quality and low loss, good for up to maybe just over 1GHz?

[Neper]

~100 year old New England home; has copper plumbing so lead is a concern.

If you could look inside the plumbing you'd find that it's furred up to an extent that the water doesn't get into contact with the copper or lead (if any).

In a building as old as yours it might well look like this...

[BU508A]

Because I'm lazy, can I get a copy of that cron job?   

Sure. Go ahead. It is all in the first code fragment.

[tggzzz]

As for washing veggies... it's a mixed bag in our household. ~100 year old New England home; has copper plumbing so lead is a concern. As this is the first place since I was a kid where this is so, we're still trying to decide how to address the issue. For the meantime, everything we eat or drink is made with bottled water... which of course carries its own laundry list of potential ills. 

My house has lead between the road and the house.

My solution: work out the volume in that pipe and how long it takes for that water to flow out the tap. Run the tap for 2* that time before using it. It helps that my water isn't metered!

I'd be less worried about water used for steamed veg or veg that is drained, and more worried about water that rehydrates (e.g. rice/pasta/human).

[tggzzz]

~100 year old New England home; has copper plumbing so lead is a concern.

If you could look inside the plumbing you'd find that it's furred up to an extent that the water doesn't get into contact with the copper or lead (if any).

In a building as old as yours it might well look like this...

Possibly, possibly not. Factors will include the acidity and hardness of the water .

30 years ago my house had 49 whatevers per litre when the limit was 50, and zero after running the water. Now the limit is 10.

[mnementh]

~100 year old New England home; has copper plumbing so lead is a concern.

If you could look inside the plumbing you'd find that it's furred up to an extent that the water doesn't get into contact with the copper or lead (if any).

In a building as old as yours it might well look like this...

Yeah... That's a comforting conceit; however I prefer not to operate under that assumption until we've been able to do a proper lab test for lead on both hot and cold water circuits.

mnem
It's too late for me... Not so for my kids.

[mnementh]

As for washing veggies... it's a mixed bag in our household. ~100 year old New England home; has copper plumbing so lead is a concern. As this is the first place since I was a kid where this is so, we're still trying to decide how to address the issue. For the meantime, everything we eat or drink is made with bottled water... which of course carries its own laundry list of potential ills. 

My house has lead between the road and the house.

My solution: work out the volume in that pipe and how long it takes for that water to flow out the tap. Run the tap for 2* that time before using it. It helps that my water isn't metered!

I'd be less worried about water used for steamed veg or veg that is drained, and more worried about water that rehydrates (e.g. rice/pasta/human).

Already the SOP here, except cooking is done with bottled water.

I suspect that it prolly takes a wee bit longer than any of us imagine, considering 1-2mm orifice in most aerating faucets.

mnem
*in line at the DMV*

[salvagedcircuitry]

Just picked up a 34465a for $460. Seller stated it had an error but went away.
I had him run a dedicated self test and it showed no errors.
Interesting.
it has firmware A.02.04, early firmware

Read the instructions for the firmware upgrade carefully. There's a version below which you cannot upgrade directly to the latest firmware (I think from memory it's 02.17 but check for yourself) and have to go through a two step upgrade, first to an intermediate version (again, I think 2.17 but check) and only then can you upgrade to the latest which is 3.03.

You'll get the digitising and advanced triggering option added for free with the latest firmware.

You sir are a lifesaver. I remember doing staged upgrades with my 3000x oscilloscope, but I will definitely take that route when the 34465a arrives and look up the upgrade stages. Many thanks.

[salvagedcircuitry]

Fuses feeding feedthrough caps:

Those feed through caps look suspiciously similar to the ones found in older engine ignition coil assemblies.
https://www.corvettemods.com/C2-Corvette-1963-1967-Ignition-Coil-Capacitor-w-Bracket--327_p_16656.html
Crazy.

[Ice-Tea]

I am thinking to DIY the solar panel installation.

I'm not. I have no intention of climbing around my roof and handling 20+ kg panels alone. I don't fear the electrical tgggzzzzt poff side, but I don't know enough about proper mechanical installation of these things and I don't want to eff around with a house that has not yet been paid for ...(i.e. paid back the mortgage)

My roof, yesterday morning 

Izzat the start of mounting bracketry, or scaffolding hangers...?

mnem
I loathe working on the roof. Main reason I stopped doing satellite installs, even tho I was good at it.

Already had 4.5kW SW, 4.5kW SE and installed another 5kW NW. It's not my most favorite thing in the world but with the correct gear it's OK for a day

[SoundTech-LG]

00H15 here. Worked today for a change, on the garage construction. so am tired.

I think I have only a few minutes left of consciousness, minutes that I will spend here with you because I love you all so very much.

Last week I received this bad boy, a new addition to my collection of old glowing Tek instruments...

It's a type 180A, a " Time Mark Generator ". At least that's what it says on the face plate ! 

It's got a million and one buttons and output jacks, makes it look REALLY expensive ! 

.. and it has... an OCXO !!! I told you it was expensive !! 

I wanted one of those to calibrate my glowing Tek scopes when I will, eventually.. get round to restoring them.

It's more charming and cool to use, than an Arduino. Well, to me at least   

I saw it for sale a few weeks ago at 100 Euros here on Leboncoin.fr as always (yeah I know, I ought to check Ebay as well  )
Only one small pic of the front, super crappy, low res, can't enlarge it/zoom on it... so god knows what the inside looked like. Corrosion bucket, missing tubes, who knows...
Obviously sold "as is", what did you expect, a cal certificate or what ?! 

So... 100 Euros + shipping for that... no. Still, I added the ad to my "Like" list.

Last week what do you know, ad got relisted, with mucho reduction, straight from 100 down to 40 Euros !

At that price I was willing to take the gamble and bought it. Add 20 Euros shipping, and for 60 Euros shipped I get this beast of a TE.

Overall I am happy, it's in great nick inside out, I mean rust wise, and all the tubes are still in it, a true miracle these days.

However the exterior has suffered from shipping damage, plus 2 strange never seen before mutilations from a previous owner.

Shipping damage, inevitable given the guy shoe horned the Tek into a box with zero padding....
It happened in the lower left corner of the front panel. There lies the grounding post. It took a big hit and moved inward. The post is now bent, pointing upward badly, but the real problem is the impact made a deep dent into the panel. It's concave all around the post, something like a 1/4" deep, I measured. It's BAD.....
I would need to dismantle the chassis to pull the front panel assembly out completely, so I can work on it at the bench. Hopefully I can "massage" it back to soften the damage, but I don't dream of making it flat and flush ever again, seeing as the thin/delicate aluminium of the face plate has been stretched obviously 
So thank you fucktard for your packaging !!! 

Other 2 cosmetic problems, are two mutilations I can't quite fathom. See pics below obviously.

1) Bottom right corner of the face plate. There are 3 tiny nails stuck in there !? 
I removed them, having 3 tiny holes is better to me the having 3 FOD.

2) At the top of the instrument, front of the carry handle bar. There is some FOD again stuck there ! A kind of metallic cylinder...  again ! 
Again I removed it, now I am left with a threaded hole in the handle bar.. still less shocking to my eyes than this FOD. Maybe I can fill the hole and repaint the handle, since I am inclined to repaint the cabinet anyway as it's quite dark. A fresh coat of Tek blue would make it sparkle and shave decades off of it.

To finish with the cosmetic side of things, some attention is required at the top of the instrument. I have a large sticker residue to clean up, not too worried. Also, a black patch of gooey stuff toward the back... not too worried about that one either, should clean up fine I suspect. The leather handle, real leather this one, is actually not too bad. It's got lots of worn out spots as you can see, but otherwise it's in good nick. I mean it's not completely dried out. 90% of the leather is still there and in decent nick. No loss of material, it's not falling apart/ disintegrating like they often do. ... So I think I could just just clean the leather, then use some leather "repair" product, dyed black, to improve on the worn spots. Should look decent enough. If not well I will have a go at making a new leather handle..
The two chromed pads aren't pitted. They will buff out just fine with chrome polish.
The bare metal / non-chromed 'U' shaped piece that connects the leather with the chromed pads, has surface rust, but that's easy to fix.
So overall I think this handle can be made nice again. 


INSIDE
------------

Looks dusty but otherwise excellent. Design is "vertical" for a change. Main deck supports the PSU and the OCXO. Secondary deck holds a shit load of tubes ! 
That deck opens up like a book, type 310A style, for those in the know. Or like the secondary time base on a 500 scope...
What I don't like is that for some reason, the hinge mechanism for the deck, does not allow to open it fully, 90° wide... even though the wiring harness is not in the way at all. It's purely the hinge that's artificially limiting the opening angle. Sucks, access is therefore not as good as it could be. 

OCXO is self contained, in a blue anodized can, that's conveniently socketed, on a "tube like" big octal socket.


Electrical and testing...
--------------------------------------

I noticed about 10 caps that will need to go real soon, no question asked : the black/red Sprague ones. There is even one cap that looks ancient, with a paper body !    It's branded " Cornell Dubilier "...whatever... That one does not inspire a lot of confidence either...

On the secondary deck as you can see I am sure... right off the bat there is at least one bad tube : it's white inside....

Testing : don't have a Variac just yet, but as always I am just too impatient and curious to power it up to see what it might do, if anything.
But I did not want to blow this precious piece of TE either, so I did what I could : I dug out my dim bulb tester. See, I am making an effort here...

First with the power switch on the Tek in the OFF position, I turn the DBT on. The status light for the OCXO heater lights up, as expected.. a lovely bright green that I just love. Too bad the camera is incapable of capturing the actual green, and instead makes it look almost white 
OCXO and whatever circuitry might be supporting it on the deck, clearly work : light comes on from cold, for a few minutes... then light turns off and you can hear a relay click (can't see a relay in the cabinet so I guess it must be hiding in the OCXO can itself), then 30 seconds later it comes on again, etc etc... so the heart of the beast, this crucial OCXO, looks like it's working, GREAT ! 

Then I flip the power switch to the ON position. DBT lights up bright and solid, and the OCXO light turns off.... NOT good. A short somewhere. I am glad I used the DBT then 

So I need to find the short so I can test it further.

Stay tuned ! 

1AM, 45 minutes to type all this, and still the pics to attach ! 

Freaking going to BED... NOW !! 

Too tired for proof-reading, will do tomorrow. for now, you get what you get sorry....


EDIT : proof-reading inside now, free of charge. We hope to see you soon in our store.

Vince, welcome to the 180A owners club! I think I picked up mine in the 80s, possibly early 90s.
My first 10 MHz clock source.

[med6753]

The 2nd fan has been installed on the left (CRT side) just in front of the vertical and Z-axis boards. Everything buttoned up. The fans are not interfering with scope operation. 

The 7904 has been powered up for over 45 minutes and there is a significant reduction in heat build up on the top covers. In fact they feel almost ambient. This fan mod was well worth the effort and I would recommend it to anyone who has a 7904 (Non A). The long term benefit is obvious.   

I also gave the 7904 a good spit and polish. The front panel was looking a little dingy.   



Time for a new protection mat for bench 1. The old one was ripped and dog eared. It's nothing more than black poster board cut to size. Yes gang, it's not ESD safe. On the rare occasion where I have to work with new fangled ESD sensitive devices I'll wear my wrist strap and isolate the stuff from the poster board. But my vacuum tubes could not care less. 

   

[Robert763]

Question for the coax aficionados here...

I'm looking for a 36" BNC - BNC cable, low loss for calibrating my TDS scopes. I have some nice crimped RG58 cables I made with Canare connectors but is there any recommendations for other cables out there that are good quality and low loss, good for up to maybe just over 1GHz?

LMR-195 is a good option compatible with connectors made for RG-58. Much lower loss. Good to 5 GHz. Just get from a trusted source. Lots of fake stuff out there.

[SoundTech-LG]

Vince, also have the lesser known llittle brother, the RM181...

http://www.tekscope-museum.de/museum/generators/generators.html

[med6753]

Vince, also have the lesser known llittle brother, the RM181...

http://www.tekscope-museum.de/museum/generators/generators.html

That's neat and never knew about the RM 181. You just made me go out on Ebay to check. There's one in Greece for $399 USD. Nope, nope, and nope. Not worth that amount of cash. 

[Vince]

Last week I received this bad boy, a new addition to my collection of old glowing Tek instruments...

It's a type 180A, a " Time Mark Generator ". At least that's what it says on the face plate ! 

Vince, welcome to the 180A owners club! I think I picked up mine in the 80s, possibly early 90s.
My first 10 MHz clock source.

Thanks ! 

Progress has been made... it works now !!! 
Well, needs fixing but it powers up just fine, no short anywhere, it was the DBT fooling me ! The bulb is only 75Watts so I though might not be enough.

So I checked the power supply thoroughly and didn't find anything wrong with it, so got rid of the DBT, applied power and voilà, the Tek powers up just fine !   

I printed the schematic for the power supply so I know what I am doing. Check the primary and secondary windings of the transformer, no short.
Filter caps, not shorts. Cap values : still well within spec. The usual 10R series resistors on all the rails, checked OK as well.

There are no rectifier tube on this Tek. It's a late model / SN , 8000+ . The break point for all the mods is 5000, and one or two at 6000.

So mine has 100% solid state rectifiers, zero tubes. 3 full wave bridges. 12 diodes. Tested all of them, they were OK.

SO really, if really there was such a massive short like the DBT was suggesting, I would have found it ! 

That's why I took the risk to go without the DBT to see what I got.. thinking worse case the fuse will blow, that's what it's there for. Of course I did check that the fuse was the proper rating... it was. Looked like the original fuse to me.

So did that and as I said the instrument came to life just fine, no smoke no nothing... it just works ! 

At first the cooling fan would work. Pulled the air filter, saw that one blade was bent inward and interfering with the motor itself. Bent it back, now turns freely. Checked and adjusted the other 3 blades while I was at it, eye balling it. Fan now starts on the button and is quiet. A dream. The shaft does have an awful lot of axial play though, like a 1/4" or something... but apparently the motor doesn't mind.... 


So I fired up a scope to look if I could get something out of this Tek. First tried the sine wave output, on all 3 settings : 5MHz, 10MHz and 50MHz.
All work fine. I get a nice, clean, stable sine wave, with excellent amplitude, many volts peak to peak. Like 6 to 12Vpp depending on frequency. (the higher the frequency the lower the amplitude.

I measured it with my Ferisol Nixie counter, because it has an OCXO inside so it's my best counter for now.

Now I am basically measuring a 50+ year old OCXO with another 50+ year old OCXO, so it's hard to say which is which eh... but well, it's all I can do for now sorry ! 

The counter shows that the frequency is +100 Hz off at 5MHz, then +200Hz off at 10MHz, and  +1,000 Hz at 50MHz. So it's all consistent.

Looked at the manual, states that the OCXO inside is good for 3ppm, so 30Hz off at 10MHz, when I get 200Hz.
So can probably be tweaked.... but not until I have a proper GPSDO reference so I can first adjust my counter !
For now all I can assume is that the error is spread across these two old OCXO, but have no way to know more than that...

Anyway, the time base, the heart of this Tek , is basically well and alive, good ! 

So then I tried to see if I could get markers to show up.... that were the trouble really start !

There are 14 settings from 1us up to 5s (in 1 / 5 steps) . 9 of them produce zero signal, nada, not a sausage to be seen on my scope...
Out of the 5 markers that do produce something, it's not all perfect either.

1us : not sharp at all.. will have to check the rise time in the manual. Might be normal, as this is the fastest setting.

2us : works, but one can see a slight "undulation" in the amplitude of the markers, they aren't all 100% the same height.

5us : same as above, but undulation is a bit more visible / pronounced. Maybe just tired caps somewhere, I guess, so not too worried at this early stage...

50us: they measure more like 40us not 50, and the amplitude looks like a "comb" :  a short market, followed by a longer one, then a short, then a long... might again a ripple/tired cap problem... or something else entirely, not sure in this particular case...

100us : NO SIGNAL

500us : again more like 400us.. and signal was unstable, jumping to 300us then to 200+ or so, moving all over the place. After an hour testing all the 14 settings, I checked this one again and it looked like it improved : was stable now, and decided it wanted to be 400us. So 400us it is then    So maybe just dry and dodgy  contacts... will squeeze a bottle of contact cleaner in there.... but I have ran out of the stuff, need to order some....

1ms : NO SIGNAL
5ms : NO SIGNAL
10ms : NO SIGNAL
50ms : NO SIGNAL
100ms : NO SIGNAL
500ms : NO SIGNAL
1s : NO SIGNAL
5s : NO SIGNAL

Obviously I have this read / white tube, which does not help, but I doubt it's responsible for that much defectivness, I just like to invent new words, it's not a Dragon monopoly I pretend.
Will replace it of course, see what that changes, but I suspect all the black/red Sprague crapacitors are dodgy, and might be used to couple stages together, which would explain a lot of my problems.
So will prepare a BOM and see how much that would cost me to recap...

Also of course need to measure voltage rails including ripple to check the health of the can caps.
Adjust the reference -150V rail if need be, or course.

So it's looking good I say, this things is alive, heart is beating, and it can produce "some" markers ! So the fundamentals are all there, I say ! 

Just needs some basic maintenance and it should be all good, me think... stay tuned ! 

[med6753]

Vince, good deal!  But obviously you can't expect it to be fully functional when you have a dead tube. 

[Cubdriver]

Spent some time over the past few nights poking and prodding at an old counter made by an (apparently now defunct) company from Manchester, NH called Northeastern Engineering.  I haven't been able to find any documentation on it, and a web search resulted in nothing more than a video about an earlier boat-anchor counter they made that appears to be very similar to the big HP 524 units; this one is about the size of the HP 5245 family.  Bringing it up on a variac resulted in the crystal oscillator heater warming up and cycling, but nothing else.  Resistance readings across the power cord showed no change as the power switch was cycled, so I started tracing out the mains wiring - both sides of the line are fused, then pass through a pair of feedthrough capacitors and on to a 120/240V range switch stuffed into the corner of the back panel, then off in various directions bundled into harnesses, making it a bit challenging to suss things out.  Peering at things with a flashlight and some tracing with an ohmmeter ultimately led me to find that one side of the DPST power switch on the front panel is intermittent, so it'll need to be replaced.

That's a cool unit. Never heard of them either. However......and maybe it's because it's so dirty but the condition of that wiring does not inspire much confidence. It looks like at any moment that cloth wiring could break down resulting in magic smoke. 

And yes, definitely influenced by hp in overall design. A quick glance could easily convince you it was made by hp. 

I think it's the dirt - in person, the wiring looks reasonably solid and the fabric covered stuff is in good shape.  I need to schlep it out to the garage and blow it out with the air gun - it is rather filthy inside, and it's in there tightly enough that just vacuuming isn't denting the dust.  It appears to have been built in about 1965 (my searches on the company showed they incorporated in 1965, and component date codes I've seen are mid sixties), and the last cal date per a sticker on the front panel is May of 1977, so it's a bit past due...

Just took a quick video of it connected to a more accurate frequency source, and in parallel with another counter - in between jumping around a bit it seems to be pretty accurate.  I expect I'll be changing some filter caps in this thing (and the fan at least needs some lube - have had to hand prop it to get it spinning).



-Pat

<edit to add - need to get an external mic for recording with the iPhone - the front-facing mic did a great job of picking up the fan noise!>

[Cubdriver]

Spent some time over the past few nights poking and prodding at an old counter made by an (apparently now defunct) company from Manchester, NH called Northeastern Engineering.  I haven't been able to find any documentation on it, and a web search resulted in nothing more than a video about an earlier boat-anchor counter they made that appears to be very similar to the big HP 524 units; this one is about the size of the HP 5245 family.  Bringing it up on a variac resulted in the crystal oscillator heater warming up and cycling, but nothing else.  Resistance readings across the power cord showed no change as the power switch was cycled, so I started tracing out the mains wiring - both sides of the line are fused, then pass through a pair of feedthrough capacitors and on to a 120/240V range switch stuffed into the corner of the back panel, then off in various directions bundled into harnesses, making it a bit challenging to suss things out.  Peering at things with a flashlight and some tracing with an ohmmeter ultimately led me to find that one side of the DPST power switch on the front panel is intermittent, so it'll need to be replaced.

That's a cool unit. Never heard of them either. However......and maybe it's because it's so dirty but the condition of that wiring does not inspire much confidence. It looks like at any moment that cloth wiring could break down resulting in magic smoke. 

And yes, definitely influenced by hp in overall design. A quick glance could easily convince you it was made by hp. 

100x this. The first thing I thought when I saw that fabric-clad wiring was Eeeeep!   

Pat's a wee bit braver than I am, applying line voltage to that mess... or maybe he's just gotten to a point where he has no fear of The Reaper. 

mnem

It's not quite so bad in person as it appears in the pics, and I bring everything up on a Sencore Powerite II while closely monitoring the input voltage and current, and it's fused.  It always stayed well under (less than half) of what the instrument is fused at, so I figure it's safe enough as I'm right there keeping an eye on it until it gets some operating time on it.

-Pat

[cyclin_al]

This is the first batch; about 1/3 of 2 potatoes hand-cut into fries. Wifey is telling me I need to make more. 

They're really crispy right out of the air-fryer... but withing a minute or so they seem to soak up enough moisture from the air to get a little limp and more like traditional home fries.

The trick with air-fried chips is to soak them in water for 15 minutes after cutting them, in order to extract some of the starch, before drying them and adding the oil.

BTW, real Belgian chips aren't fried in oil but in suet. Gives them their unique flavour.

Yeah, I thought about making them with bacon fat... but realized that if I were gonna do that, might as well just dump them in the griddle right after cooking the bacon.

It might still happen... we make a lot of bacon when I'm on the Keto.

As for washing veggies... it's a mixed bag in our household. ~100 year old New England home; has copper plumbing so lead is a concern. As this is the first place since I was a kid where this is so, we're still trying to decide how to address the issue. For the meantime, everything we eat or drink is made with bottled water... which of course carries its own laundry list of potential ills. 

mnem

The general advice for similar homes in the GWN is to run the water for 10 minutes in the morning, or anytime the water has not been used in a while.
The leeching process is slow, so any lead levels are minimized by flushing the pipes and not having stagnant water sitting there.

PS.  I use Pi-Hole as well.  I add in items to the blacklist to keep the kid out of interesting stuff (ie. not being pestered to buy computer games), in addition to blocking ads.  Pi-Hole also covers the whole home network, rather than having to protect each device individually (or each user account individually in the case of Winbloze10  ).

[cyclin_al]

Vince, also have the lesser known llittle brother, the RM181...

http://www.tekscope-museum.de/museum/generators/generators.html

That's neat and never knew about the RM 181. You just made me go out on Ebay to check. There's one in Greece for $399 USD. Nope, nope, and nope. Not worth that amount of cash. 

Dangerous ... but not at that price.  I do like the RM rack mount gear...

[mansaxel]

The general advice for similar homes in the GWN is to run the water for 10 minutes in the morning, or anytime the water has not been used in a while.
The leeching process is slow, so any lead levels are minimized by flushing the pipes and not having stagnant water sitting there.

Good advice. We've got copper and HDPE in our pipes. Both are deemed reasonably safe. It is the faucets that are the problem; the brass has a minute amount of lead in it, especially for faucets made before about 2015; when the safe limit was reduced. A kitchen tap holds about 2,5 dl (half a pint) so it's both cheap and desirable to run the tap until cold. Even with metered water.

PS.  I use Pi-Hole as well.  I add in items to the blacklist to keep the kid out of interesting stuff (ie. not being pestered to buy computer games), in addition to blocking ads.

We once tried filters. That was circumvented. So, we're not running any filters at all, but instead we keep a continuous dialog on what is reasonable and sane, and what one ought not to visit, believe or desire.  It works. We have well informed children, who are online street smart to an extent; they've been fooled a couple times, with gaming accounts stolen. When that happens, we go all in in getting accounts back, and are so far 100% effective:  We keep track of in-game purchases, which is a very effective way to regain control. Afterwards, multi-factor authentication was implemented.

I do run my own resolver at home with a backup node in colo, though, and it's really a nice thing to have, even with the resolvers of our ISP's here mostly being well kept, and also validating DNSSEC. OTOH, our traffic runs in a tunnel to a downtown datacenter, and exits there, so can't really use the resolvers of our usual ISP.

One thing I've sortakinda been resisting is to make sure my home resolver can find my nodes if there's an outage; the normal way a resolver works is that it only knows the root servers and then finds it way downwards, including to my resources. Telling it where my name servers are (which are distinct from the resolvers) is possible but not elegant.  Mostly, because it can hide problems which you certainly want to know of.  But, I guess I should make more of an island of the home networks.

[Neper]

The general advice for similar homes in the GWN is to run the water for 10 minutes in the morning, or anytime the water has not been used in a while.

Or get a reverse-osmosis filter. After years of buying Spa water in bottles and throwing away tons of plastic bottles we got one of those. While our local tap water is absolutely fine and totally safe (indeed the requirements for tap water here are stricter than for bottled 'table water'), we don't like the taste and the water is very hard.

In the meantime, the reverse-osmosis filter has payed for itself several times over, we use the water for all coking and drinking and I haven't had to descale our espresso machine and the egg boiler for years.

[med6753]

7904 update: Scope has been on for over 4 hours. The entire cabinet is cool to the touch. All previous hot spots are gone. The large PSU heat sink on the back of the scope is warm, but not hot.

Winner, winner, chicken dinner.