[time-nuts] FW: HP-5372A operation with no CRT display.

Magnus Danielson magnus at rubidium.se
Tue Jun 30 15:08:51 UTC 2020 

Hi Lester,

The 5372A excels in a field where we usually do not go, "high" speed
signals. It can time-tag events every 75 ns (in fast mode, 100 ns in
normal mode) if needed, and it can also do hardware accelerated
histograms. Valuable skills for some tasks. Some have the FFT option.

For normal time-nuts work, you can often use a TAPR TICC and TimeLab to
do most of "our" exercises much more convenient than using the 5372A. To
some degree tha 5372A is old and arcane, but it still find it's uses and
you still can use it as a 200 ps resolution counter, which beat a bunch
of other options. The TAPR TICC has however higher resolution and is
therefore very useful.

The CRT module should not be too challenging to an old tube-ham like
yourself. I had to replace a capacitor. Some diodes looked like they had
been running hot, but they where still operational. I also had
deflection problems, but once the retrace oscillator started operating
things fell into place.

73 de SA0MAD

On 2020-06-30 15:33, Lester Veenstra via time-nuts wrote:
> Magnus:
>  Thanks for the advice. As a long time ham (1962 Tech and commercial RTO tickets), when one of the rites of passage was taking discarded Vacuum tube TVs and turning them into CW transmitters, the dangers of HV are well known.  Particularly what lurks under that anode feed through clip on the crt envelope.  Or learning not to grab the plate cap on a 6146 when using a cathode keyed rig.. (Only did that once)   
>
> On my 5372A, both horiz and Vert deflection drives do not look like what I would expect, particularly with the coils disconnected.
>
> That is why I am hoping the 5371 (arriving today) may give me a starting point.
> --------------------
> As an aside, does the 5372A offer any direct measurement capability that the TAPR TICC does not (with sufficient software post processing of course)
>
> I would like to get it going, as a point of personal pride ( I love cheeep, not working, for parts only deals), but having a TICC, should I let this project simmer on a low burner?
>
> Lester B Veenstra  K1YCM  MØYCM  W8YCM   6Y6Y
> lester at veenstras.com
>
> 452 Stable Ln (HC84 RFD USPS Mail)
> Keyser WV 26726
>
> GPS: 39.336826 N  78.982287 W (Google)
> GPS: 39.33682 N  78.9823741 W (GPSDO)
>
>
> Telephones:
> Home:                     +1-304-289-6057
> US cell                    +1-304-790-9192 
> Jamaica cell:           +1-876-456-8898 
>  
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: time-nuts [mailto:time-nuts-bounces at lists.febo.com] On Behalf Of Magnus Danielson
> Sent: Monday, June 29, 2020 5:24 PM
> To: time-nuts at lists.febo.com
> Subject: Re: [time-nuts] FW: HP-5732A operation with no CRT display.
>
> Hi Lester,
>
> I had this problem with the 5372A at work. As others have noted,
> documentation of the CRT unit is for sure leaving a lot to wish for when
> comparing how well the rest of the unit is documented. We could however
> fairly quickly see the problem, and it turned out that a capacitor had
> let out it's grey smoke. So, we replaced it and it fired up and worked.
> Took care of a little trimming and it went out the lab again. The CRT
> unit is fairly standard as for monochrome CRT goes, so nothing very
> advanced. I usually do not service CRTs but me and my colleague did not
> found it very challenging in the end. One just needs to be careful with
> voltages. It was a fair bit of unscrewing to "get to it" as I recall, so
> both top and bottom lid had to be popped, as well as the side lid which
> hides screws.
>
> Besides the CMOS-battery, the CRT failure is the only other service I've
> had to do to the 5372As.
>
> The "GUI" of the 5372A leaves a few things to desire, but it has it's
> good points too. The GPIB command structure may be daunting at first,
> but if one really reads the programming manual, your really get to learn
> how everything is processed from the hardware bits, because the
> preferred interface just dumps one of a number of subsets of data
> register read-outs, and all the processing one needs to do it explained
> in detail. It also becomes apparent that a sneak-feature is that 100 ps
> resolution may be possible to support by replacing the interpolator boards.
>
> If I had the time, I would do a modern hardware to grab data on the
> fast-port connectors and dump them out over Ethernet. This would be the
> way to keep the counter operating continuously with fast data gathering,
> but without being limited to the 8192 samples long memory, which when
> full being processed by the 68k processor before another run could be
> triggered. Offboarding that the existing CPU would be used to set the
> instrument up, and then all the data is gathered and processed in
> somewhat more modern hardware.
>
> Cheers,
> Magnus
>
> On 2020-06-28 16:22, Lester Veenstra via time-nuts wrote:
>>  
>>
>> TimeNuts:   
>>
>>  
>>
>>     I have a HP 5732A with a defective CRT driver board. Since this  (A17)
>> is undocumented (as no repairable) I am of course trying to work my way
>> around it to see if the defect is findable.
>>
>>  
>>
>> Any A17 boards loose out there, or even better, documentation?
>>
>> I see good H and V sync inputs as well as the ZMod (Video data) into the
>> board, bur the drive for the two deflection coils is not what I would
>> expect.
>>
>>  
>>
>> Trace is some where up off crt but with vertical coils disconnected, still
>> no horizontal line.
>>
>> With no drives connected to H & V coils, dim spot in center. Spot moves well
>> in both axis with low voltage DC applied. 
>>
>>  
>>
>>  
>>
>> However, it occurs to me; Does  anyone have HPIB code that allows use of the
>> instrument without the GUI user interface?
>>
>> I seem to recall some discussion of “raw data” dumps turned into useful
>> measurements.
>>
>>  
>>
>>  
>>
>> Lester B Veenstra  K1YCM  MØYCM  W8YCM   6Y6Y
>>
>> lester at veenstras.com
>>
>>  
>>
>> 452 Stable Ln (HC84 RFD USPS Mail)
>>
>> Keyser WV 26726
>>
>>  
>>
>> GPS: 39.336826 N  78.982287 W (Google)
>>
>> GPS: 39.33682 N  78.9823741 W (GPSDO)
>>
>>  
>>
>>  
>>
>> Telephones:
>>
>> Home:                     +1-304-289-6057
>>
>> US cell                    +1-304-790-9192 
>>
>> Jamaica cell:           +1-876-456-8898 
>>
>>  
>>
>>  
>>
>> _______________________________________________
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