[volt-nuts] HP 3458A repair.

Wed Sep 18 22:29:31 EDT 2013

You have to remember he is employed by Agilent and he has considerable
energy invested in this meter.  I'm not convinced he thinks moving
manufacturing to Malaysia was a smart move given the extreme performance
specs for this meter and the extreme performance specs required for the
parts that went into the meter.

It might be that he was giving you some hints about what to change to again
see if it would meet spec.

What 'standards' do you have that might address the scales in question?  Do
you have another 'calibrated' meter that you might use as a 'transfer
standard'?

IIRC, they call for an HP 3325A as the source for the AC scales.  I don't
have any 'thermal standards' but I did use an HP 3326A as the source and an
Ametek calibrated Solartron 7081 as the 'transfer standard' on the 3458A
that I calibrated but the two middle AC scales (can't recall right now as I
am OOT) did not meet spec in the 'as found' category but were able to be
calibrated by HP.  All I got was the 'Agilent Cal' for about $500 or so.  I
have since returned it to Agilent for 're-cal' just over a year later and it
was still 'in spec' 'as found'.  I also got the 'Repair Agreement' after it
was calibrated.  That way, if it fails in the next 5 years, it will be
repaired and calibrated 'no additional charge'.

So, if you have any insight from the conversation with Gary, you might try
changing the appropriate parts and see what you get.

I now have a Fluke 5100B and 5200A along with my 'in cal' 3458A and happy to
help in any way I can.

Good luck.

Joe

-----Original Message-----
From: volt-nuts-bounces at febo.com [mailto:volt-nuts-bounces at febo.com] On
Behalf Of John Phillips
Sent: Wednesday, September 18, 2013 3:51 PM
To: Discussion of precise voltage measurement
Subject: Re: [volt-nuts] HP 3458A repair.

I talked with Gary... it sounded more like a sales pitch like they replace
relays before they failed. The date code on the cal ram is 6 years past
replacement.  The only problem seems to be the amplifier/attenuator
 flatness. He said this could be caused by caps aging and changing value.
They tried calibrating the AC but it did not come withing spec so they did
not update the as left data... I think if they are going to send the as
left data it should be real as left or blank. This meter looks like a good
meter for what I will use it for so we will not use the AC above 2MHz as if
we ever did.

On Wed, Sep 18, 2013 at 9:17 AM, J. L. Trantham <jltran at att.net> wrote:

> I agree with your assessment of an 'old' meter being more desirable.
>
> I would recommend a conversation with Gary Bierman if you have not already
> done that.
>
> Joe
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: volt-nuts-bounces at febo.com [mailto:volt-nuts-bounces at febo.com] On
> Behalf Of John Phillips
> Sent: Wednesday, September 18, 2013 10:45 AM
> To: Discussion of precise voltage measurement
> Subject: Re: [volt-nuts] HP 3458A repair.
>
> The meter will be here in a few days. I did buy the ram. As far as the
> meter
> age goes, unless it is a very old hardware revision, I would rather have
an
> old meter because it is more stable. That is until it brakes.
>
> I do have before and after readings and the 4 readings are the only ones
> that failed. The after readings are better than the before readings.
> Because the 8 and 10 MHz failed we did not get a certificate but we do
have
> a good limited calibration up to 2 MHz. Just no official cal.
>
> The cal we wanted was $1600. We will still have to pay that after the
> repair.
> From what I can tell they did not run SCAL or the before/after readings
> would not have matched. Like they really did not run after readings or
> there
> would have been some mismatch.
>
>
>
>
>
> On Tue, Sep 17, 2013 at 6:50 PM, J. L. Trantham <jltran at att.net> wrote:
>
> > John,
> >
> > Can you give us more information?  Serial number, Rev. number, CALNUM?
> > How much to invest will be determined by age and other condition.
> >
> > It doesn't sound like a simple CALRAM issue but changing the CALRAM is
> > relatively easy.  I removed all three DALLAS chips in mine and
> > installed sockets.  The CALRAM can be read with a chip programmer and
> > the data written to a new DALLAS chip.
> >
> > I would also call Gary Bierman at the Loveland Cal Lab and have a long
> > talk with him.  He has a lot of insight into these meters and
> > generally prefers to do a component level repair rather than an
> > assembly level repair.  The charge sounds like their standard repair
> > charge, no matter what the problem is, and includes a 'fresh
> > calibration' along with a warranty, a year I think, but Gary will be
able
> to answer that question.
> >
> > Also, once you get the meter calibrated by Agilent (and thus prove it
> > is functioning normally) it will be eligible for their 'repair
agreement'
> > which
> > is $178.68 per year.  I would consider buying a 5 year agreement after
> > the repair.
> >
> > Good luck.
> >
> > Joe
> >
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: volt-nuts-bounces at febo.com [mailto:volt-nuts-bounces at febo.com]
> > On Behalf Of John Phillips
> > Sent: Tuesday, September 17, 2013 3:36 PM
> > To: Discussion of precise voltage measurement
> > Subject: [volt-nuts] HP 3458A repair.
> >
> > Hi,
> > I have a 3458A that we sent to Agilent for calibration which it failed.
> > Before we sent it we calibrated it and it looked good to us. The
> > infor. we revived led us to believe that the cal memory may have caused
> the failure.
> >  We ask that it be sent buck to us and paid half the cal charges
> > (about
> > $800) insted of the $2660.64 they wanted to repair it. We were just
> > going to repalce the ram in try again.
> > When we got the meter back it came with befor and afer data Like
> > before 10 volts read 9.9999957 and after it read 10.00009 so they did
> > something or the meter drifted that much.
> > The problem is  0.1 volt and 1.0 volts failed at 8 and 10 MHz but
> > passed at
> > 4 MHz.
> > 4MHZ 0.1 volt reads 0.097251 Lower Limit is 0.095930 PASSED 8MHZ 0.1
> > volt reads 0.085712 Lower Limit is 0.0959
> > 2
> > 0
> > FAILED
> > 10MHZ 0.1 volt reads 0.75569 Lower Limit is 0.084900 FAILED
> >
> > 4MHZ 1 volt reads 0.97272 Lower Limit is 0.95930 PASSED 8MHZ 1 volt
> > reads
> > 0.86389 Lower Limit is 0.95920 FAILED 10MHZ 1 volt reads 0.73514 Lower
> > Limit is 0.84900 FAILED
> >
> > The AC after readings are the same. I do not see how AC after could be
> > that identical even if they did not try to calibrate it. Did they just
> > copy the before data and call it after data?
> >
> > My best guess is that if the 4 MHz is in and the higher frequencies
> > are not the meter requires some kind of mechanical adjustment to get the
> frequency
> > response   withing spec or the AC board needs to be repaid.
> >
> > Are they charging a standard repair charge to do a calibration? I do
> > not see changing the memory to fix this.
> >
> > Where would you go from here if this was your meter?
> >
> >
> > --
> > John Phillips
> > _______________________________________________
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> >
>
>
>
> --
> John Phillips
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-- 
John Phillips
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