Test Equipment Anonymous (TEA) : Discussion and Group Therapy Thread

[Robert]

Yep, that's the noise I'm worried about.

[tggzzz]

I hope all you left pondians enjoyed your celebrations, and that they concentrated on what brings Americans together to create a special country.

[nixiefreqq]

I spent 17 months in Pittsburgh. From 8 weeks to 18 months old.

Don't remember it!

spent one night there in the summer of 1977 (for a job interview).

wish I could forget it.

Wish you could forget the job interview or Pittsburgh, or both?

both. was right out of college. it was the first time I flew. first time I rented a car. first time I stayed alone at a hotel. scared the crap outa' me.
(they flew me from Philly to Pittsburgh! why?????).

the job was as a logistics review engineer with a major government contractor who specialized in nuke propulsion. it consisted of checking paperwork to make sure the real engineers had not put a space on a form where there was supposed to be a dash. (a drone who checked the work of other drones). the boss took all 4 of us college kid candidates to lunch together. the other 3 kids all had a couple of brews with their big t-bones....but I saw what was up and went with iced tea and a chef salad. am still convinced that got me the offer. turned them down and my family almost disowned me. waited 4 months and went to work in the design division at a naval shipyard instead...... and got to wear a hard hat half the day and sit at my own drafting board the other half.

maybe this experience tainted my view of pittsburgh? and maybe someday they will get a professional ice hockey team to come to Pittsburgh?

[nixiefreqq]

I hope all you left pondians enjoyed your celebrations, and that they concentrated on what brings Americans together to create a special country.

mid-afternoon it was 101F yesterday and both the blue and gray wool wearing re-enactors over at the "daniel lady farm" were reported to have been dropping for real. we did hear some cannon volleys here at the house. but not to worry.....my a/c was working fine and there were no interruptions to my jeremy brett binge watching.

[MED6753]

I hope all you left pondians enjoyed your celebrations, and that they concentrated on what brings Americans together to create a special country.

mid-afternoon it was 101F yesterday and both the blue and gray wool wearing re-enactors over at the "daniel lady farm" were reported to have been dropping for real. we did hear some cannon volleys here at the house. but not to worry.....my a/c was working fine and there were no interruptions to my jeremy brett binge watching.

Picnic at her Daughter's house. Same here with the temp. About 100 degrees F so most of the time inside with the A/C. Later in the evening thunderstorms rolled through but then it cleared up and fireworks enjoyed by all.

[Robert]

Quiet on here.
Some months ago I bought a somewhat tatty HP 8591E 1.8 GHz spectrum analyser. Looked like a bad display but it was just dirty. So easy fix. No options. Last month I put out a request to buy a HPIB interface for it. I had an offer of one from a 8594E free of charge. BIt far away but near a rally the following weekend. So I made a detour and picked it up. Turned out it wasn't a HPIB interface, it was a complete 8954E (2.9GHz) with tracking generator and manuals. One owner/driver from new. Only problem is it has the well known "economy" YIG (eYTO) tuned oscillator failure.
It is so nice otherwise I decided to look at options to repair it. Replacement eYTOs are available but there is no guarantee the issue won't return. And they aren’t cheap. Despite the eYTO being significantly different to standard types I thought as it is still linear tuning changes to the driver might make a standard wide range (2 octave) YTO work. I've since found information that this has been done before. So I've ordered a used Avantek 2-8 GHz from a ebay seller in the USA. It was a bit dearer than a 4-8GHz one in the UK but there is a chance that won't work down to the 3.9GHz required and the seller is a well known for breaking TE for gold content. USA seller is using DHL eCommerce so it should arrive tx and duty paid.
Update when it arrives.

[Zenith]

Quiet on here.

It goes through phases, this is a quiet phase.

I have a lot of things I'm trying to get done while the weather is good. The problem is it's a bit too hot to gather much enthusiasm. As for TE, lots of things I'm working on at the same time, but no particular problems to ask for help with, and no story to write up. I have a large order for parts I'm putting together.

A few of us have been to the radio rallies and there are write ups and discussions in the Events section.

[tggzzz]

Just so.

I was just about to write up some timenuts-style notes, based on 198kHz, OCXOs, "frequency microscope", and a GPSDO Zenith loaned me.

Then Events/Eventualities happened, to use the Harold Macmillan / gliding terminology.

Ought to get out of my bed chair and write them up.

[Zenith]

Your preliminary results were fascinating and encouraging.

I bought the cheap GPSDO on ebay and assumed it was essentially perfect for my purposes, but I wasn't quite sure. I wondered how it would compare against an off-air standard and there were still a few weeks before Droitwich 198kHz went off the air. As I recall Droitwich claimed 1 in 10^11 over 24 hours, being based on rubidium standards. The off-air standard had a fair amount of frequency noise, probably caused by interference and multipath propagation. The GPSDO and off-air standard agreed to within 2 in 10^10. I have confidence that the GPSDO is easily capable of anything I want from a frequency reference - better than 1 in 10^9.