Test Equipment Anonymous

Posted: **Mon Jul 03, 2023 3:31 pm**

The key to allow me to vary the parameters on my Hakko got misplaced or lost during the move. So I ordered a replacement. $12 USD for this piece of plastic. My original key was blue, this one is white. Guess what? It doesn't work. So today I opened up the Hakko to find out why.

The key is supposed to block the light from infra red LED's D17 and D18 from photo transistors PT1 and PT2. When the key was inserted nothing happen.

I suspected the white key wasn't blocking the infra red. Added 2 strips of black tape. That fixed it.

So now I can vary all parameters. Flashing digits indicate it's in set mode. The black tape on the key is an interim fix. I'll spray paint the key black. I wish all fixes were this easy.

Posted: **Mon Jul 03, 2023 3:56 pm**

If only you'd opened it up before ordering the dammed key, you could have made it yourself and saved the $12, once you understood how it worked, oh well, that's life.

Posted: **Mon Jul 03, 2023 4:33 pm**

Yea, I assumed....incorrectly obviously....that it was micro switches. Oh well.

Posted: **Mon Jul 03, 2023 4:41 pm**

$12? For a small piece of plastic? That doesn't even WORK?!?

Thieving BASTARDS

Glad you managed to fix it Mike.

Posted: **Mon Jul 03, 2023 5:23 pm**

Why the hell does it even have a key?!?!?

Posted: **Mon Jul 03, 2023 5:30 pm**

Maybe because if it is being used in a production process, you want to prevent the operators from making unauthorised changes to the settings in order to help prevent compromised solder joints from being made?

Posted: **Mon Jul 03, 2023 5:35 pm**

Stop hiring idiots then

Posted: **Mon Jul 03, 2023 6:01 pm**

bd139 wrote: ↑Mon Jul 03, 2023 5:35 pm Stop hiring idiots then

Pre-requisite: find HR-droids and managers that can reliably discriminate between idiots and sane people.

Good luck with that!

Posted: **Mon Jul 03, 2023 6:14 pm**

tggzzz wrote: ↑Mon Jul 03, 2023 6:01 pm
bd139 wrote: ↑Mon Jul 03, 2023 5:35 pm Stop hiring idiots then
Pre-requisite: find HR-droids and managers that can reliably discriminate between idiots and sane people.

Good luck with that!

Fire the HR droids first!

Posted: **Mon Jul 03, 2023 6:54 pm**

tggzzz wrote: ↑Mon Jul 03, 2023 6:01 pm
bd139 wrote: ↑Mon Jul 03, 2023 5:35 pm Stop hiring idiots then
Pre-requisite: find HR-droids and managers that can reliably discriminate between idiots and sane people.

Good luck with that!

We have a hiring process where we (software developers) do a "test", a small programming challenge. There is no right or wrong, we only want to get in a discussion with our potential co-workers. This step is usually at the end, where HR/Management already "eliminated" some they find inappropriate.

Fun fact: HR/Management complained that two participants got a thumbs down from us where they just found them very suitable. And the next one where we put the thumb up got disappointing marks from HR.

Posted: **Mon Jul 03, 2023 7:08 pm**

bd139 wrote: ↑Mon Jul 03, 2023 6:14 pm
tggzzz wrote: ↑Mon Jul 03, 2023 6:01 pm
bd139 wrote: ↑Mon Jul 03, 2023 5:35 pm Stop hiring idiots then
Pre-requisite: find HR-droids and managers that can reliably discriminate between idiots and sane people.

Good luck with that!
Fire the HR droids first!

What accellerant do you recommend?

Or what acceleration do you recommend?

"Fire" is a word useful in many situations

Posted: **Mon Jul 03, 2023 7:09 pm**

bd139 wrote: ↑Mon Jul 03, 2023 5:23 pm Why the hell does it even have a key?!?!?

So they can sell them for 12 dollarpounds. I'd have thought a Ferengi would have got that straight away.

Posted: **Mon Jul 03, 2023 7:50 pm**

bd139 wrote: ↑Mon Jul 03, 2023 5:35 pm Stop hiring idiots then

That my friend is easier said then done, as you should know better than most judging by some of the steaming piles of shit coding that you have had to unravel in some of your roles.

Posted: **Mon Jul 03, 2023 8:24 pm**

Specmaster wrote: ↑Mon Jul 03, 2023 7:50 pm
bd139 wrote: ↑Mon Jul 03, 2023 5:35 pm Stop hiring idiots then
That my friend is easier said then done, as you should know better than most judging by some of the steaming piles of shit coding that you have had to unravel in some of your roles.

I'm fine with that here. Unfucking those nightmares is amazingly profitable

Posted: **Mon Jul 03, 2023 8:41 pm**

bd139 wrote: ↑Mon Jul 03, 2023 5:35 pm Stop hiring idiots then

When I raised this point (in relation to the policy to make us wear full PPE all the time; if you don't know the appropriate PPE for the situation, you shouldn't be on a building site), I was told "We aren't allowed to discriminate".

bd139 wrote: ↑Mon Jul 03, 2023 6:14 pm
tggzzz wrote: ↑Mon Jul 03, 2023 6:01 pm Pre-requisite: find HR-droids and managers that can reliably discriminate between idiots and sane people.

Good luck with that!
Fire the HR droids first!

Frankly you could extend that to "most management", and I think most companies would experience a huge productivity boost overnight.

Posted: **Mon Jul 03, 2023 8:53 pm**

That is very true, so often it is management who stand in the way of progress, and from personal experience it tends to be those who came into into the role from an academic route rather than from the shop floor with actual knowledge of just what the job requires based on experience rather than a text book.

Posted: **Mon Jul 03, 2023 11:28 pm**

Specmaster wrote: ↑Mon Jul 03, 2023 8:53 pm That is very true, so often it is management who stand in the way of progress, and from personal experience it tends to be those who came into into the role from an academic route rather than from the shop floor with actual knowledge of just what the job requires based on experience rather than a text book.

It is little to do with academic vs apprentice.

A far more significant cultural problem is the "gentleman amateur" knowing better than the "skilled artisan". That crap is imbibed through countless mechanisms, e.g. Lord Peter Wimsey who breezes in and effortlessly solves the crime that stumped policeman Plod. Wimsey does, after all, have the most important attribute: the right breeding.

Real life examples include David Cameron, who thought he could have a good go at being prime minister. And didn't that turn out well.

Tied up with those attitudes is the concept of the generic manager who can breeze in and manage anything. While there certainly are transferable management skills, too often the result is seagull management - i.e. flies in, makes a lot of noise, and craps on those below him, and flies out again.

Posted: **Tue Jul 04, 2023 12:21 am**

Wish I could say that subsequent prime ministers have been better, but I'd be lying if I did.
Change "academic" for breeding, my interpretation of breeding is someone who went to one of the universities or Eaton for example and comes away with an air of entitlement, an air of arrogance. I know better than you because I've been to this or that (insert name of establishment) and I'm going to tell you what to do and how to it even though I've no actual experience of work let alone how to do the job that you do.

I have come across many people in management like that from actual managers all the way through to directors. In reality none of them generally stay in a company longer then about 2 years as they move on before they get pushed. Why, because they generally get the positions because they promise the moon on a stick and then when they work out that their methods of getting the moon on a stick are not working, they find someone to blame, force them out, and so the process repeats time and time again and when all the experienced personnel have gone and all that is left are the ones who that person recruited and the moon is still not on the stick, it then becomes clear where the problem actually is and they suddenly resign before getting the push themselves.

Such people have zero regard for others they only lookout for themselves and don't care about who they trample on, or what state they leave the companies in after they move on, they use everybody and every company they get involved with as a means of getting to their ultimate goal and trousering as much money as they can along the way. Does that remind you of anyone at all?

Posted: **Tue Jul 04, 2023 4:57 am**

Wow, this thread took an odd turn.

As Spec indicated the key is to prevent the production folks from changing the parameters after it's been set up by the responsible engineer.

Posted: **Tue Jul 04, 2023 7:57 am**

Specmaster wrote: ↑Tue Jul 04, 2023 12:21 am Wish I could say that subsequent prime ministers have been better, but I'd be lying if I did.
Change "academic" for breeding, my interpretation of breeding is someone who went to one of the universities or Eaton for example and comes away with an air of entitlement, an air of arrogance. I know better than you because I've been to this or that (insert name of establishment) and I'm going to tell you what to do and how to it even though I've no actual experience of work let alone how to do the job that you do.

I have come across many people in management like that from actual managers all the way through to directors. In reality none of them generally stay in a company longer then about 2 years as they move on before they get pushed. Why, because they generally get the positions because they promise the moon on a stick and then when they work out that their methods of getting the moon on a stick are not working, they find someone to blame, force them out, and so the process repeats time and time again and when all the experienced personnel have gone and all that is left are the ones who that person recruited and the moon is still not on the stick, it then becomes clear where the problem actually is and they suddenly resign before getting the push themselves.

Such people have zero regard for others they only lookout for themselves and don't care about who they trample on, or what state they leave the companies in after they move on, they use everybody and every company they get involved with as a means of getting to their ultimate goal and trousering as much money as they can along the way. Does that remind you of anyone at all?

Not just management. Marketing too.

Why do you think so many sales/profit forecasts have the shape of a hockey stick showing a steep rise after 2 years.

There's an old principle: if you start something, don't finish it. That way you can say either "I gave a good foundation but my successor fouled it up" or "given the crap foundation I made the best of a bad job".

Posted: **Tue Jul 04, 2023 9:51 am**

Cerebus wrote: ↑Mon Jul 03, 2023 7:09 pm
bd139 wrote: ↑Mon Jul 03, 2023 5:23 pm Why the hell does it even have a key?!?!?
So they can sell them for 12 dollarpounds. I'd have thought a Ferengi would have got that straight away.

I'd have thought that selling these things for $12 was more nuisance than it's worth, given the overheads and the number they are likely to sell. If it came to be a major problem affecting most customers, word would rapidly get out on the interweb of how you could make your own, by cutting it from a piece of plastic sheet.

Posted: **Tue Jul 04, 2023 10:21 am**

Specmaster wrote: ↑Mon Jul 03, 2023 7:50 pm
bd139 wrote: ↑Mon Jul 03, 2023 5:35 pm Stop hiring idiots then
That my friend is easier said then done, as you should know better than most judging by some of the steaming piles of shit coding that you have had to unravel in some of your roles.

A lot of it was written when coding was less of a worked out art. It started out with a limited specification which it met. It may have been intended as a quick flaker. It was added to by various people in various ways over the years and it was never designed to do what it ended up doing. No one had the time or courage to rewrite it.

I remember working on a 3000 line COBOL program the last line of which was a GO TO. The writer had been on a Jackson's Structured Programming course, and it came with documentation detailing how they'd agonised over structure clashes etc. Unfortunately the course didn't appear to cover how this should be implemented in code, and the result was 3000 lines of logical spaghetti. I don't believe the writer was exactly an idiot.

I took a week to find the problem, which was caused by an uninitialised variable. This thing had been in production for 18 months and had never shown the problem. All that time it had been loaded into an area of memory which happened to be binary zeroes. Something else changed and the variable was no longer initialised to binary zeroes.

Posted: **Tue Jul 04, 2023 5:17 pm**

The key is easily replaced with a 10mm wide slip of cardboard or anything opaque. Just Gurrgle "HAKKO Key Hack". Alternately, you can permanently disable the keylock by removing the phototransistor or applying a bit of heat-shrink tubing.

EDIT: Oh, wait... yours has the USER/SUPERVISOR key setup; that needs a bit of cardboard actually shaped like the key, or heat-shrink over both phototransistors to bypass as above.

The key you have appears to be printed... the one that came with my similar station was opaque blue plastic. I'd suggest you return it as it doesn't work and get your money back.

Everything aboot the UI on this family of soldering stations is absolutely for use as a production soldering station; it is intended to have temp set by a supervisor and then not fucked with by assembly monkeys. Said UI is also anti-intuitive and blows goats in general; the key gets in the way of using the buttons on some models FFS.

mnem
at least yours didn't come with the "flaming inferno" option...

Posted: **Tue Jul 04, 2023 7:46 pm**

mnementh wrote: ↑Tue Jul 04, 2023 5:17 pm The key is easily replaced with a 10mm wide slip of cardboard or anything opaque. Just Gurrgle "HAKKO Key Hack". Alternately, you can permanently disable the keylock by removing the phototransistor or applying a bit of heat-shrink tubing.

EDIT: Oh, wait... yours has the USER/SUPERVISOR key setup; that needs a bit of cardboard actually shaped like the key, or heat-shrink over both phototransistors to bypass as above.

The key you have appears to be printed... the one that came with my similar station was opaque blue plastic. I'd suggest you return it as it doesn't work and get your money back.

Everything aboot the UI on this family of soldering stations is absolutely for use as a production soldering station; it is intended to have temp set by a supervisor and then not fucked with by assembly monkeys. Said UI is also anti-intuitive and blows goats in general; the key gets in the way of using the buttons on some models FFS.

mnem
at least yours didn't come with the "flaming inferno" option...

Yes, If IRCC I think Louis Rossman said much the same thing in one of his videos.

Posted: **Wed Jul 05, 2023 2:23 am**

I've used them in that application. A pretty half-assed setup, actually, on both the supervisor and user profiles. I much prefer the solution used by both Weller and METCAL at the time; temperature was fixed based on the tip chosen for the soldering work being done.

mnem

Test Equipment Anonymous

Issue with Hakko Soldering Station.

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