Discussion:
Instead scopes
(too old to reply)
Martin Rid
2024-08-27 14:40:15 UTC
Permalink
Anyone own the gds-1202b ?

Any good?

$350 at tequipment

Cheers
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Martin Rid
2024-08-27 14:48:49 UTC
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Anyone own the gds-1202b ?Any good?$350 at tequipmentCheers-- ----Android NewsGroup Reader----https://piaohong.s3-us-west-2.amazonaws.com/usenet/index.html
Spell check error.

Title should be: 'Instek scopes'
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Phil Hobbs
2024-08-27 15:07:56 UTC
Permalink
Post by Martin Rid
Anyone own the gds-1202b ?Any good?$350 at tequipmentCheers--
----Android NewsGr
up Reader----https://piaohong.s3-us-west-2.amazonaws.com/usenet/index.html
Spell check error.
Title should be: 'Instek scopes'
I suspect that it was right the first time. ;)

Cheers

Phil Hobbs
--
Dr Philip C D Hobbs Principal Consultant ElectroOptical Innovations LLC /
Hobbs ElectroOptics Optics, Electro-optics, Photonics, Analog Electronics
wmartin
2024-08-29 19:24:19 UTC
Permalink
Post by Phil Hobbs
Post by Martin Rid
Anyone own the gds-1202b ?Any good?$350 at tequipmentCheers--
----Android NewsGr
up Reader----https://piaohong.s3-us-west-2.amazonaws.com/usenet/index.html
Spell check error.
Title should be: 'Instek scopes'
I suspect that it was right the first time. ;)
Cheers
Phil Hobbs
Hmm, how much did you get paid for that ringing endorsement? :-)
Phil Hobbs
2024-08-29 19:42:30 UTC
Permalink
Post by wmartin
Post by Phil Hobbs
Post by Martin Rid
Anyone own the gds-1202b ?Any good?$350 at tequipmentCheers--
----Android NewsGr
up Reader----https://piaohong.s3-us-west-2.amazonaws.com/usenet/index.html
Spell check error.
Title should be: 'Instek scopes'
I suspect that it was right the first time. ;)
Hmm, how much did you get paid for that ringing endorsement? :-)
Three bags of Scopie Treats. Mmm—mmmm. ;)

I’m not at all against cheap scopes with fancy specs. For most of my
stuff, I need something faster than 1GSa/s, but a 12 bit digitizer could
certainly come in handy.

Thing is, if I have to average 16 or more traces to get the noise floor
down far enough for that resolution to be meaningful, I really haven’t
gained that much.

By Widrow’s theorem, if there’s at least an LSB or two worth of real noise,
quantization noise averages out the same as any other sort.

So the ENOB spec is key.

Cheers

Phil Hobbs
--
Dr Philip C D Hobbs Principal Consultant ElectroOptical Innovations LLC /
Hobbs ElectroOptics Optics, Electro-optics, Photonics, Analog Electronics
john larkin
2024-08-27 16:30:33 UTC
Permalink
On Tue, 27 Aug 2024 10:48:49 -0400 (EDT), Martin Rid
Post by Martin Rid
Anyone own the gds-1202b ?Any good?$350 at tequipmentCheers-- ----Android NewsGroup Reader----https://piaohong.s3-us-west-2.amazonaws.com/usenet/index.html
Spell check error.
Title should be: 'Instek scopes'
Spelling is over-rated. People used to just spell things any way that
sounded right.
john larkin
2024-08-27 16:04:42 UTC
Permalink
On Tue, 27 Aug 2024 10:40:15 -0400 (EDT), Martin Rid
Post by Martin Rid
Anyone own the gds-1202b ?
Any good?
$350 at tequipment
Cheers
I haven't tried that one. We like the Rigols.

I recently acquired a Siglent

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B06XZML6RD/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1

and gave it to one of my engineers. I'll ask him how he likes it.

It has an up-front DEFAULT button, which a digital scope needs to get
you out of nightmare states.
Martin Rid
2024-08-27 18:55:32 UTC
Permalink
john larkin <jlarkin_highland_tech> Wrote in message:r
Other than the lack of software features, the 200mhz bw for 350
dollars is intriguing.

Cheers
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john larkin
2024-08-28 02:23:33 UTC
Permalink
On Tue, 27 Aug 2024 14:55:32 -0400 (EDT), Martin Rid
Post by Martin Rid
john larkin <jlarkin_highland_tech> Wrote in message:r
Other than the lack of software features, the 200mhz bw for 350
dollars is intriguing.
Cheers
It sounds pretty good to me.

https://siglentna.com/wp-content/uploads/dlm_uploads/2020/02/SDS1000X-E_DataSheet_DS0101E-E04C.pdf

What's missing?

I like the 500 uV/div.
Sergey Kubushyn
2024-08-28 04:28:02 UTC
Permalink
Post by john larkin
On Tue, 27 Aug 2024 14:55:32 -0400 (EDT), Martin Rid
Post by Martin Rid
john larkin <jlarkin_highland_tech> Wrote in message:r
Other than the lack of software features, the 200mhz bw for 350
dollars is intriguing.
Cheers
It sounds pretty good to me.
https://siglentna.com/wp-content/uploads/dlm_uploads/2020/02/SDS1000X-E_DataSheet_DS0101E-E04C.pdf
What's missing?
I like the 500 uV/div.
If you want to save the last penny, maybe. But you can get way better scope
for slightly more -- Rigol DHO800/DHO900. It is 12-bit, same 550uV/div, has
all standard serial protocols decoding, very light and compact, can work
from a battery with USB-C power connector, way better than that Siglent that
feels like relic next to those DHOs.

I don't have any relation to Rigol, just have DHO924S as a go-to scope on my
bench and DHO814 for use as an advanced multimeter wherever I need a
portable one. I like them and I can run them in a web browser if needed.

I do have an advanced LeCroy WR640Zi with all options for serious jobs -- it
is 40GS/s 4GHz bandwidth instrument with all features imaginable -- but I
rarely power it up. It makes a noise like a jet at takeoff (Rigol DHO is
very quite) and it is 8-bit so what you get on the screen looks ugly
comparing with 12-bit DHO. DHO924 covers 99% of real world debugging so
LeCroy is mostly gathering dust...

BTW, DHO924S has built-in Arbitrary Function Generator with 25MHz max and it
can make Bode plots using that AFG which is quite useful for SMPS debugging
and loop response tuning. Sure, it is not the best AFG but totally adequate
for most practical purposes.

---
******************************************************************
* ***@home KOI8 Net < > The impossible we do immediately. *
* Las Vegas NV, USA < > Miracles require 24-hour notice. *
******************************************************************
john larkin
2024-08-28 15:08:04 UTC
Permalink
On Wed, 28 Aug 2024 04:28:02 -0000 (UTC), Sergey Kubushyn
Post by Sergey Kubushyn
Post by john larkin
On Tue, 27 Aug 2024 14:55:32 -0400 (EDT), Martin Rid
Post by Martin Rid
john larkin <jlarkin_highland_tech> Wrote in message:r
Other than the lack of software features, the 200mhz bw for 350
dollars is intriguing.
Cheers
It sounds pretty good to me.
https://siglentna.com/wp-content/uploads/dlm_uploads/2020/02/SDS1000X-E_DataSheet_DS0101E-E04C.pdf
What's missing?
I like the 500 uV/div.
If you want to save the last penny, maybe. But you can get way better scope
for slightly more -- Rigol DHO800/DHO900. It is 12-bit, same 550uV/div, has
all standard serial protocols decoding, very light and compact, can work
from a battery with USB-C power connector, way better than that Siglent that
feels like relic next to those DHOs.
We use almost all Rigols at work. My slow bench scope is a 500 MHz
DS4034 (upgraded from 350 MHz)

https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fo/ns08x686afbayjsw8c2ab/h?rlkey=iu4h89057t755pueg4ijnldbo&dl=0

and my fast scope is a Tek 11802 sampler.
Post by Sergey Kubushyn
I don't have any relation to Rigol, just have DHO924S as a go-to scope on my
bench and DHO814 for use as an advanced multimeter wherever I need a
portable one. I like them and I can run them in a web browser if needed.
I bought the Siglent as a gift, and I was curious about it.
Post by Sergey Kubushyn
I do have an advanced LeCroy WR640Zi with all options for serious jobs -- it
is 40GS/s 4GHz bandwidth instrument with all features imaginable -- but I
rarely power it up. It makes a noise like a jet at takeoff (Rigol DHO is
very quite) and it is 8-bit so what you get on the screen looks ugly
comparing with 12-bit DHO. DHO924 covers 99% of real world debugging so
LeCroy is mostly gathering dust...
So is ours! It cost $50K. It doesn't make much sense and there is
basically no support. It doesn't make sense to them either.
Sergey Kubushyn
2024-08-28 15:21:00 UTC
Permalink
Post by john larkin
On Wed, 28 Aug 2024 04:28:02 -0000 (UTC), Sergey Kubushyn
Post by Sergey Kubushyn
Post by john larkin
On Tue, 27 Aug 2024 14:55:32 -0400 (EDT), Martin Rid
Post by Martin Rid
john larkin <jlarkin_highland_tech> Wrote in message:r
Other than the lack of software features, the 200mhz bw for 350
dollars is intriguing.
Cheers
It sounds pretty good to me.
https://siglentna.com/wp-content/uploads/dlm_uploads/2020/02/SDS1000X-E_DataSheet_DS0101E-E04C.pdf
What's missing?
I like the 500 uV/div.
If you want to save the last penny, maybe. But you can get way better scope
for slightly more -- Rigol DHO800/DHO900. It is 12-bit, same 550uV/div, has
all standard serial protocols decoding, very light and compact, can work
from a battery with USB-C power connector, way better than that Siglent that
feels like relic next to those DHOs.
We use almost all Rigols at work. My slow bench scope is a 500 MHz
DS4034 (upgraded from 350 MHz)
https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fo/ns08x686afbayjsw8c2ab/h?rlkey=iu4h89057t755pueg4ijnldbo&dl=0
and my fast scope is a Tek 11802 sampler.
I also have one, 11801C. Couple of SD-24s, SD-20, and SD-22 heads :)
Post by john larkin
Post by Sergey Kubushyn
I don't have any relation to Rigol, just have DHO924S as a go-to scope on my
bench and DHO814 for use as an advanced multimeter wherever I need a
portable one. I like them and I can run them in a web browser if needed.
I bought the Siglent as a gift, and I was curious about it.
Post by Sergey Kubushyn
I do have an advanced LeCroy WR640Zi with all options for serious jobs -- it
is 40GS/s 4GHz bandwidth instrument with all features imaginable -- but I
rarely power it up. It makes a noise like a jet at takeoff (Rigol DHO is
very quite) and it is 8-bit so what you get on the screen looks ugly
comparing with 12-bit DHO. DHO924 covers 99% of real world debugging so
LeCroy is mostly gathering dust...
So is ours! It cost $50K. It doesn't make much sense and there is
basically no support. It doesn't make sense to them either.
Yep, all those features are nice but very rarely needed in the real life.

---
******************************************************************
* ***@home KOI8 Net < > The impossible we do immediately. *
* Las Vegas NV, USA < > Miracles require 24-hour notice. *
******************************************************************
john larkin
2024-08-28 16:32:58 UTC
Permalink
On Wed, 28 Aug 2024 15:21:00 -0000 (UTC), Sergey Kubushyn
Post by Sergey Kubushyn
Post by john larkin
On Wed, 28 Aug 2024 04:28:02 -0000 (UTC), Sergey Kubushyn
Post by Sergey Kubushyn
Post by john larkin
On Tue, 27 Aug 2024 14:55:32 -0400 (EDT), Martin Rid
Post by Martin Rid
john larkin <jlarkin_highland_tech> Wrote in message:r
Other than the lack of software features, the 200mhz bw for 350
dollars is intriguing.
Cheers
It sounds pretty good to me.
https://siglentna.com/wp-content/uploads/dlm_uploads/2020/02/SDS1000X-E_DataSheet_DS0101E-E04C.pdf
What's missing?
I like the 500 uV/div.
If you want to save the last penny, maybe. But you can get way better scope
for slightly more -- Rigol DHO800/DHO900. It is 12-bit, same 550uV/div, has
all standard serial protocols decoding, very light and compact, can work
from a battery with USB-C power connector, way better than that Siglent that
feels like relic next to those DHOs.
We use almost all Rigols at work. My slow bench scope is a 500 MHz
DS4034 (upgraded from 350 MHz)
https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fo/ns08x686afbayjsw8c2ab/h?rlkey=iu4h89057t755pueg4ijnldbo&dl=0
and my fast scope is a Tek 11802 sampler.
I also have one, 11801C. Couple of SD-24s, SD-20, and SD-22 heads :)
At the original purchase price, adjusted for inflation, I must have
half a million dollars worth of sampling heads.

The color grading and jitter measurement is great on the 11801C, but
the old B+W screens photograph better.

I'll miss my 11802 when it eventually dies.

The TDR is great. I'm going to give my new kids a lecture on
transmission lines, and I'll show them some TDR.

It is apparently possible these days to get an EE degree and be
completely ignorant of transmission lines. Or even electricity.
Jan Panteltje
2024-08-29 05:46:54 UTC
Permalink
On a sunny day (Wed, 28 Aug 2024 09:32:58 -0700) it happened john larkin
Post by john larkin
On Wed, 28 Aug 2024 15:21:00 -0000 (UTC), Sergey Kubushyn
Post by Sergey Kubushyn
Post by john larkin
On Wed, 28 Aug 2024 04:28:02 -0000 (UTC), Sergey Kubushyn
Post by Sergey Kubushyn
Post by john larkin
On Tue, 27 Aug 2024 14:55:32 -0400 (EDT), Martin Rid
Post by Martin Rid
john larkin <jlarkin_highland_tech> Wrote in message:r
good?>>$350 at tequipment>>CheersI haven't tried that one. We like the Rigols.I recently acquired a
Siglenthttps://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B06XZML6RD/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1and gave it to one of my engineers. I'll ask him how he
likes it.It has an up-front DEFAULT button, which a digital scope needs to getyou out of nightmare states.
Other than the lack of software features, the 200mhz bw for 350
dollars is intriguing.
Cheers
It sounds pretty good to me.
https://siglentna.com/wp-content/uploads/dlm_uploads/2020/02/SDS1000X-E_DataSheet_DS0101E-E04C.pdf
What's missing?
I like the 500 uV/div.
If you want to save the last penny, maybe. But you can get way better scope
for slightly more -- Rigol DHO800/DHO900. It is 12-bit, same 550uV/div, has
all standard serial protocols decoding, very light and compact, can work
from a battery with USB-C power connector, way better than that Siglent that
feels like relic next to those DHOs.
We use almost all Rigols at work. My slow bench scope is a 500 MHz
DS4034 (upgraded from 350 MHz)
https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fo/ns08x686afbayjsw8c2ab/h?rlkey=iu4h89057t755pueg4ijnldbo&dl=0
and my fast scope is a Tek 11802 sampler.
I also have one, 11801C. Couple of SD-24s, SD-20, and SD-22 heads :)
At the original purchase price, adjusted for inflation, I must have
half a million dollars worth of sampling heads.
The color grading and jitter measurement is great on the 11801C, but
the old B+W screens photograph better.
I'll miss my 11802 when it eventually dies.
The TDR is great. I'm going to give my new kids a lecture on
transmission lines, and I'll show them some TDR.
It is apparently possible these days to get an EE degree and be
completely ignorant of transmission lines. Or even electricity.
oops!

Then what DO they know?
john larkin
2024-08-29 13:55:15 UTC
Permalink
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Wed, 28 Aug 2024 09:32:58 -0700) it happened john larkin
Post by john larkin
On Wed, 28 Aug 2024 15:21:00 -0000 (UTC), Sergey Kubushyn
Post by Sergey Kubushyn
Post by john larkin
On Wed, 28 Aug 2024 04:28:02 -0000 (UTC), Sergey Kubushyn
Post by Sergey Kubushyn
Post by john larkin
On Tue, 27 Aug 2024 14:55:32 -0400 (EDT), Martin Rid
Post by Martin Rid
john larkin <jlarkin_highland_tech> Wrote in message:r
good?>>$350 at tequipment>>CheersI haven't tried that one. We like the Rigols.I recently acquired a
Siglenthttps://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B06XZML6RD/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1and gave it to one of my engineers. I'll ask him how he
likes it.It has an up-front DEFAULT button, which a digital scope needs to getyou out of nightmare states.
Other than the lack of software features, the 200mhz bw for 350
dollars is intriguing.
Cheers
It sounds pretty good to me.
https://siglentna.com/wp-content/uploads/dlm_uploads/2020/02/SDS1000X-E_DataSheet_DS0101E-E04C.pdf
What's missing?
I like the 500 uV/div.
If you want to save the last penny, maybe. But you can get way better scope
for slightly more -- Rigol DHO800/DHO900. It is 12-bit, same 550uV/div, has
all standard serial protocols decoding, very light and compact, can work
from a battery with USB-C power connector, way better than that Siglent that
feels like relic next to those DHOs.
We use almost all Rigols at work. My slow bench scope is a 500 MHz
DS4034 (upgraded from 350 MHz)
https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fo/ns08x686afbayjsw8c2ab/h?rlkey=iu4h89057t755pueg4ijnldbo&dl=0
and my fast scope is a Tek 11802 sampler.
I also have one, 11801C. Couple of SD-24s, SD-20, and SD-22 heads :)
At the original purchase price, adjusted for inflation, I must have
half a million dollars worth of sampling heads.
The color grading and jitter measurement is great on the 11801C, but
the old B+W screens photograph better.
I'll miss my 11802 when it eventually dies.
The TDR is great. I'm going to give my new kids a lecture on
transmission lines, and I'll show them some TDR.
It is apparently possible these days to get an EE degree and be
completely ignorant of transmission lines. Or even electricity.
oops!
Then what DO they know?
How to type c++
john larkin
2024-08-29 14:16:58 UTC
Permalink
On Thu, 29 Aug 2024 06:55:15 -0700, john larkin
Post by john larkin
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Wed, 28 Aug 2024 09:32:58 -0700) it happened john larkin
Post by john larkin
On Wed, 28 Aug 2024 15:21:00 -0000 (UTC), Sergey Kubushyn
Post by Sergey Kubushyn
Post by john larkin
On Wed, 28 Aug 2024 04:28:02 -0000 (UTC), Sergey Kubushyn
Post by Sergey Kubushyn
Post by john larkin
On Tue, 27 Aug 2024 14:55:32 -0400 (EDT), Martin Rid
Post by Martin Rid
john larkin <jlarkin_highland_tech> Wrote in message:r
good?>>$350 at tequipment>>CheersI haven't tried that one. We like the Rigols.I recently acquired a
Siglenthttps://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B06XZML6RD/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1and gave it to one of my engineers. I'll ask him how he
likes it.It has an up-front DEFAULT button, which a digital scope needs to getyou out of nightmare states.
Other than the lack of software features, the 200mhz bw for 350
dollars is intriguing.
Cheers
It sounds pretty good to me.
https://siglentna.com/wp-content/uploads/dlm_uploads/2020/02/SDS1000X-E_DataSheet_DS0101E-E04C.pdf
What's missing?
I like the 500 uV/div.
If you want to save the last penny, maybe. But you can get way better scope
for slightly more -- Rigol DHO800/DHO900. It is 12-bit, same 550uV/div, has
all standard serial protocols decoding, very light and compact, can work
from a battery with USB-C power connector, way better than that Siglent that
feels like relic next to those DHOs.
We use almost all Rigols at work. My slow bench scope is a 500 MHz
DS4034 (upgraded from 350 MHz)
https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fo/ns08x686afbayjsw8c2ab/h?rlkey=iu4h89057t755pueg4ijnldbo&dl=0
and my fast scope is a Tek 11802 sampler.
I also have one, 11801C. Couple of SD-24s, SD-20, and SD-22 heads :)
At the original purchase price, adjusted for inflation, I must have
half a million dollars worth of sampling heads.
The color grading and jitter measurement is great on the 11801C, but
the old B+W screens photograph better.
I'll miss my 11802 when it eventually dies.
The TDR is great. I'm going to give my new kids a lecture on
transmission lines, and I'll show them some TDR.
It is apparently possible these days to get an EE degree and be
completely ignorant of transmission lines. Or even electricity.
oops!
Then what DO they know?
How to type c++
One issue here is that it's cheaper and easier to teach coding, than
it is to teach electronics.

I walked through the Cornell EE school. I saw about 25 computer
screens and one oscilloscope.
Bill Sloman
2024-08-29 14:43:39 UTC
Permalink
Post by john larkin
On Thu, 29 Aug 2024 06:55:15 -0700, john larkin
Post by john larkin
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Wed, 28 Aug 2024 09:32:58 -0700) it happened john larkin
Post by john larkin
On Wed, 28 Aug 2024 15:21:00 -0000 (UTC), Sergey Kubushyn
Post by Sergey Kubushyn
Post by john larkin
On Wed, 28 Aug 2024 04:28:02 -0000 (UTC), Sergey Kubushyn
Post by Sergey Kubushyn
Post by john larkin
On Tue, 27 Aug 2024 14:55:32 -0400 (EDT), Martin Rid
Post by Martin Rid
john larkin <jlarkin_highland_tech> Wrote in message:r
good?>>$350 at tequipment>>CheersI haven't tried that one. We like the Rigols.I recently acquired a
Siglenthttps://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B06XZML6RD/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1and gave it to one of my engineers. I'll ask him how he
likes it.It has an up-front DEFAULT button, which a digital scope needs to getyou out of nightmare states.
Other than the lack of software features, the 200mhz bw for 350
dollars is intriguing.
Cheers
It sounds pretty good to me.
https://siglentna.com/wp-content/uploads/dlm_uploads/2020/02/SDS1000X-E_DataSheet_DS0101E-E04C.pdf
What's missing?
I like the 500 uV/div.
If you want to save the last penny, maybe. But you can get way better scope
for slightly more -- Rigol DHO800/DHO900. It is 12-bit, same 550uV/div, has
all standard serial protocols decoding, very light and compact, can work
from a battery with USB-C power connector, way better than that Siglent that
feels like relic next to those DHOs.
We use almost all Rigols at work. My slow bench scope is a 500 MHz
DS4034 (upgraded from 350 MHz)
https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fo/ns08x686afbayjsw8c2ab/h?rlkey=iu4h89057t755pueg4ijnldbo&dl=0
and my fast scope is a Tek 11802 sampler.
I also have one, 11801C. Couple of SD-24s, SD-20, and SD-22 heads :)
At the original purchase price, adjusted for inflation, I must have
half a million dollars worth of sampling heads.
The color grading and jitter measurement is great on the 11801C, but
the old B+W screens photograph better.
I'll miss my 11802 when it eventually dies.
The TDR is great. I'm going to give my new kids a lecture on
transmission lines, and I'll show them some TDR.
It is apparently possible these days to get an EE degree and be
completely ignorant of transmission lines. Or even electricity.
oops!
Then what DO they know?
How to type c++
One issue here is that it's cheaper and easier to teach coding, than
it is to teach electronics.
I walked through the Cornell EE school. I saw about 25 computer
screens and one oscilloscope.
It's lot easier and quicker to bread-board a circuit in LTSpice than it
is to wire up a test circuit, but what that means is that you need to
make fewer real circuits and they are a lot more likely to work when tested.

That, on it's own, is enough to explain why labs look different today
than they did in the dark ages.
--
Bill Sloman, Sydney
john larkin
2024-08-29 15:49:13 UTC
Permalink
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by john larkin
On Thu, 29 Aug 2024 06:55:15 -0700, john larkin
Post by john larkin
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Wed, 28 Aug 2024 09:32:58 -0700) it happened john larkin
Post by john larkin
On Wed, 28 Aug 2024 15:21:00 -0000 (UTC), Sergey Kubushyn
Post by Sergey Kubushyn
Post by john larkin
On Wed, 28 Aug 2024 04:28:02 -0000 (UTC), Sergey Kubushyn
Post by Sergey Kubushyn
Post by john larkin
On Tue, 27 Aug 2024 14:55:32 -0400 (EDT), Martin Rid
Post by Martin Rid
john larkin <jlarkin_highland_tech> Wrote in message:r
good?>>$350 at tequipment>>CheersI haven't tried that one. We like the Rigols.I recently acquired a
Siglenthttps://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B06XZML6RD/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1and gave it to one of my engineers. I'll ask him how he
likes it.It has an up-front DEFAULT button, which a digital scope needs to getyou out of nightmare states.
Other than the lack of software features, the 200mhz bw for 350
dollars is intriguing.
Cheers
It sounds pretty good to me.
https://siglentna.com/wp-content/uploads/dlm_uploads/2020/02/SDS1000X-E_DataSheet_DS0101E-E04C.pdf
What's missing?
I like the 500 uV/div.
If you want to save the last penny, maybe. But you can get way better scope
for slightly more -- Rigol DHO800/DHO900. It is 12-bit, same 550uV/div, has
all standard serial protocols decoding, very light and compact, can work
from a battery with USB-C power connector, way better than that Siglent that
feels like relic next to those DHOs.
We use almost all Rigols at work. My slow bench scope is a 500 MHz
DS4034 (upgraded from 350 MHz)
https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fo/ns08x686afbayjsw8c2ab/h?rlkey=iu4h89057t755pueg4ijnldbo&dl=0
and my fast scope is a Tek 11802 sampler.
I also have one, 11801C. Couple of SD-24s, SD-20, and SD-22 heads :)
At the original purchase price, adjusted for inflation, I must have
half a million dollars worth of sampling heads.
The color grading and jitter measurement is great on the 11801C, but
the old B+W screens photograph better.
I'll miss my 11802 when it eventually dies.
The TDR is great. I'm going to give my new kids a lecture on
transmission lines, and I'll show them some TDR.
It is apparently possible these days to get an EE degree and be
completely ignorant of transmission lines. Or even electricity.
oops!
Then what DO they know?
How to type c++
One issue here is that it's cheaper and easier to teach coding, than
it is to teach electronics.
I walked through the Cornell EE school. I saw about 25 computer
screens and one oscilloscope.
It's lot easier and quicker to bread-board a circuit in LTSpice than it
is to wire up a test circuit, but what that means is that you need to
make fewer real circuits and they are a lot more likely to work when tested.
That, on it's own, is enough to explain why labs look different today
than they did in the dark ages.
Except that many recent EE grads don't know how to run LT Spice.

I guess you don't meet many young engineers any more. I do. If they
are really smart, I can teach them the basics in about a year. I've
got two cases in my new design center.

Today's lecture will be about transmission lines, starting with the
Pony Express and Morse and the first telegraphs, and the transatlantic
fiasco and Heaviside.

I'll show them an LT Spice transmission line example on our giant new
OLED screen, and a real TDR on my 11802.
Bill Sloman
2024-08-30 04:10:11 UTC
Permalink
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by john larkin
On Thu, 29 Aug 2024 06:55:15 -0700, john larkin
Post by john larkin
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Wed, 28 Aug 2024 09:32:58 -0700) it happened john larkin
Post by john larkin
On Wed, 28 Aug 2024 15:21:00 -0000 (UTC), Sergey Kubushyn
Post by Sergey Kubushyn
Post by john larkin
On Wed, 28 Aug 2024 04:28:02 -0000 (UTC), Sergey Kubushyn
Post by Sergey Kubushyn
Post by john larkin
On Tue, 27 Aug 2024 14:55:32 -0400 (EDT), Martin Rid
Post by Martin Rid
john larkin <jlarkin_highland_tech> Wrote in message:r
good?>>$350 at tequipment>>CheersI haven't tried that one. We like the Rigols.I recently acquired a
Siglenthttps://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B06XZML6RD/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1and gave it to one of my engineers. I'll ask him how he
likes it.It has an up-front DEFAULT button, which a digital scope needs to getyou out of nightmare states.
Other than the lack of software features, the 200mhz bw for 350
dollars is intriguing.
Cheers
It sounds pretty good to me.
https://siglentna.com/wp-content/uploads/dlm_uploads/2020/02/SDS1000X-E_DataSheet_DS0101E-E04C.pdf
What's missing?
I like the 500 uV/div.
If you want to save the last penny, maybe. But you can get way better scope
for slightly more -- Rigol DHO800/DHO900. It is 12-bit, same 550uV/div, has
all standard serial protocols decoding, very light and compact, can work
from a battery with USB-C power connector, way better than that Siglent that
feels like relic next to those DHOs.
We use almost all Rigols at work. My slow bench scope is a 500 MHz
DS4034 (upgraded from 350 MHz)
https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fo/ns08x686afbayjsw8c2ab/h?rlkey=iu4h89057t755pueg4ijnldbo&dl=0
and my fast scope is a Tek 11802 sampler.
I also have one, 11801C. Couple of SD-24s, SD-20, and SD-22 heads :)
At the original purchase price, adjusted for inflation, I must have
half a million dollars worth of sampling heads.
The color grading and jitter measurement is great on the 11801C, but
the old B+W screens photograph better.
I'll miss my 11802 when it eventually dies.
The TDR is great. I'm going to give my new kids a lecture on
transmission lines, and I'll show them some TDR.
It is apparently possible these days to get an EE degree and be
completely ignorant of transmission lines. Or even electricity.
oops!
Then what DO they know?
How to type c++
One issue here is that it's cheaper and easier to teach coding, than
it is to teach electronics.
I walked through the Cornell EE school. I saw about 25 computer
screens and one oscilloscope.
It's lot easier and quicker to bread-board a circuit in LTSpice than it
is to wire up a test circuit, but what that means is that you need to
make fewer real circuits and they are a lot more likely to work when tested.
That, on it's own, is enough to explain why labs look different today
than they did in the dark ages.
Except that many recent EE grads don't know how to run LTSpice.
They were trained on some other version of Spice? Or some other
simulation program?
I guess you don't meet many young engineers any more.
I'm treasurer of the NSW branch of the IEEE. I get to met a few from
time to time. One had just finished a Ph.D. on a flexible implantable
liquid crystal electrode for nerve cells (which you interrograted with a
laser). I passed on one her papers to Australia's then chief scientist
(whom I happened to know) who made his money out of measuring nerve cell
potentials exactly. He liked the paper, but said it was thirty years too
late for him.
I do. If they are really smart, I can teach them the basics in about a year.
Or your version of the basics, which seems to be odd enough that they
might take a year to find out what kind of responses you expect to get.
I've got two cases in my new design center.
They've got my sympathy.
Today's lecture will be about transmission lines, starting with the
Pony Express and Morse and the first telegraphs, and the transatlantic
fiasco and Heaviside.
Heaviside is where it starts to get interesting. William Thompson -
later Lord Kelvin - was directly involved with the early transatlantic
telegraph links. Heaviside came later.
I'll show them an LT Spice transmission line example on our giant new
OLED screen, and a real TDR on my 11802.
What are you doing about the math? - not that I ever needed to get into
that though it did prompt me to go for calculators that could handle
hyperbolic trigometrical functions.
--
Bill Sloman, Sydney
Jan Panteltje
2024-08-29 16:21:21 UTC
Permalink
On a sunny day (Fri, 30 Aug 2024 00:43:39 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
Post by Bill Sloman
It's lot easier and quicker to bread-board a circuit in LTSpice than it
is to wire up a test circuit, but what that means is that you need to
make fewer real circuits and they are a lot more likely to work when tested.
That, on it's own, is enough to explain why labs look different today
than they did in the dark ages.
All it explains is boeings falling apart and astronuts ending up stuck at the ISS
and no moonlanding from the US, not even a probe.
Slimulations are _not_ realty and never will be.
mamamatical bullshit much of the time
That is why we are stuck with Albert onestone crap and wrong cosmological models
that even a 10 year old can see are wrong.
john larkin
2024-08-29 18:47:42 UTC
Permalink
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Fri, 30 Aug 2024 00:43:39 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
Post by Bill Sloman
It's lot easier and quicker to bread-board a circuit in LTSpice than it
is to wire up a test circuit, but what that means is that you need to
make fewer real circuits and they are a lot more likely to work when tested.
That, on it's own, is enough to explain why labs look different today
than they did in the dark ages.
All it explains is boeings falling apart and astronuts ending up stuck at the ISS
and no moonlanding from the US, not even a probe.
The ISS and moon landings are super-expensive theatre. Neither
accomplishes anything.

Boeing and Microsoft have the same problem, bean counter money-mongers
have taken over from engineers.
Post by Jan Panteltje
Slimulations are _not_ realty and never will be.
Spice can be very handy. As Mike says, LT Spice's real function is to
train your instincts.
Jan Panteltje
2024-08-30 06:47:54 UTC
Permalink
On a sunny day (Thu, 29 Aug 2024 11:47:42 -0700) it happened john larkin
Post by john larkin
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Fri, 30 Aug 2024 00:43:39 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
Post by Bill Sloman
It's lot easier and quicker to bread-board a circuit in LTSpice than it
is to wire up a test circuit, but what that means is that you need to
make fewer real circuits and they are a lot more likely to work when tested.
That, on it's own, is enough to explain why labs look different today
than they did in the dark ages.
All it explains is boeings falling apart and astronuts ending up stuck at the ISS
and no moonlanding from the US, not even a probe.
The ISS and moon landings are super-expensive theatre. Neither
accomplishes anything.
Boeing and Microsoft have the same problem, bean counter money-mongers
have taken over from engineers.
Post by Jan Panteltje
Slimulations are _not_ realty and never will be.
Spice can be very handy. As Mike says, LT Spice's real function is to
train your instincts.
I dunno, much I learned from working with tubes and transistors was by building small circuits and measuring what happened.
Sure spice is great for math intensive stuff such as filters.. but you still need to know the basics.
These days with chips doing much of the work and limited knowledge what is actually _in_ those chips
it is hard to tell if a real circuit will behave like spice tells you
You will still need real testing.
Maybe boeing just spiced their thrusters :-)
john larkin
2024-08-30 14:13:23 UTC
Permalink
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Thu, 29 Aug 2024 11:47:42 -0700) it happened john larkin
Post by john larkin
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Fri, 30 Aug 2024 00:43:39 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
Post by Bill Sloman
It's lot easier and quicker to bread-board a circuit in LTSpice than it
is to wire up a test circuit, but what that means is that you need to
make fewer real circuits and they are a lot more likely to work when tested.
That, on it's own, is enough to explain why labs look different today
than they did in the dark ages.
All it explains is boeings falling apart and astronuts ending up stuck at the ISS
and no moonlanding from the US, not even a probe.
The ISS and moon landings are super-expensive theatre. Neither
accomplishes anything.
Boeing and Microsoft have the same problem, bean counter money-mongers
have taken over from engineers.
Post by Jan Panteltje
Slimulations are _not_ realty and never will be.
Spice can be very handy. As Mike says, LT Spice's real function is to
train your instincts.
I dunno, much I learned from working with tubes and transistors was by building small circuits and measuring what happened.
Sure spice is great for math intensive stuff such as filters.. but you still need to know the basics.
These days with chips doing much of the work and limited knowledge what is actually _in_ those chips
it is hard to tell if a real circuit will behave like spice tells you
You will still need real testing.
Sure, but if I wake up at 3AM in Truckee, I can Spice an idea and go
back to bed.



Actually, I have designed useful circuits by randomly fiddling with
Spice, stupid topologies that turn out to work.
Post by Jan Panteltje
Maybe boeing just spiced their thrusters :-)
SpaceX is having trouble with helium leaks too. Helium is the chemical
equivalent of slippery eels. It will leak though almost anything, even
solid metals. If they need an inert gas, why don't they use argon or
neon or nitrogen?
john larkin
2024-08-30 15:29:20 UTC
Permalink
On Fri, 30 Aug 2024 07:13:23 -0700, john larkin
Post by john larkin
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Thu, 29 Aug 2024 11:47:42 -0700) it happened john larkin
Post by john larkin
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Fri, 30 Aug 2024 00:43:39 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
Post by Bill Sloman
It's lot easier and quicker to bread-board a circuit in LTSpice than it
is to wire up a test circuit, but what that means is that you need to
make fewer real circuits and they are a lot more likely to work when tested.
That, on it's own, is enough to explain why labs look different today
than they did in the dark ages.
All it explains is boeings falling apart and astronuts ending up stuck at the ISS
and no moonlanding from the US, not even a probe.
The ISS and moon landings are super-expensive theatre. Neither
accomplishes anything.
Boeing and Microsoft have the same problem, bean counter money-mongers
have taken over from engineers.
Post by Jan Panteltje
Slimulations are _not_ realty and never will be.
Spice can be very handy. As Mike says, LT Spice's real function is to
train your instincts.
I dunno, much I learned from working with tubes and transistors was by building small circuits and measuring what happened.
Sure spice is great for math intensive stuff such as filters.. but you still need to know the basics.
These days with chips doing much of the work and limited knowledge what is actually _in_ those chips
it is hard to tell if a real circuit will behave like spice tells you
You will still need real testing.
Sure, but if I wake up at 3AM in Truckee, I can Spice an idea and go
back to bed.
http://youtu.be/x6TrbD7-IwU
Actually, I have designed useful circuits by randomly fiddling with
Spice, stupid topologies that turn out to work.
Post by Jan Panteltje
Maybe boeing just spiced their thrusters :-)
SpaceX is having trouble with helium leaks too. Helium is the chemical
equivalent of slippery eels. It will leak though almost anything, even
solid metals. If they need an inert gas, why don't they use argon or
neon or nitrogen?
https://nypost.com/2024/08/30/us-news/boeing-execs-fought-nasa-to-bring-home-stranded-astronauts-in-starliner-sources/

This is a reversal from the Challenger disaster. NASA is being careful
this time, and the contractor is not.

Musk is cool. He annoys a lot of fatheads.
Bill Sloman
2024-08-31 06:08:05 UTC
Permalink
Post by john larkin
On Fri, 30 Aug 2024 07:13:23 -0700, john larkin
Post by john larkin
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Thu, 29 Aug 2024 11:47:42 -0700) it happened john larkin
Post by john larkin
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Fri, 30 Aug 2024 00:43:39 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
Post by Bill Sloman
It's lot easier and quicker to bread-board a circuit in LTSpice than it
is to wire up a test circuit, but what that means is that you need to
make fewer real circuits and they are a lot more likely to work when tested.
That, on it's own, is enough to explain why labs look different today
than they did in the dark ages.
All it explains is boeings falling apart and astronuts ending up stuck at the ISS
and no moonlanding from the US, not even a probe.
The ISS and moon landings are super-expensive theatre. Neither
accomplishes anything.
Boeing and Microsoft have the same problem, bean counter money-mongers
have taken over from engineers.
Post by Jan Panteltje
Slimulations are _not_ realty and never will be.
Spice can be very handy. As Mike says, LT Spice's real function is to
train your instincts.
I dunno, much I learned from working with tubes and transistors was by building small circuits and measuring what happened.
Sure spice is great for math intensive stuff such as filters.. but you still need to know the basics.
These days with chips doing much of the work and limited knowledge what is actually _in_ those chips
it is hard to tell if a real circuit will behave like spice tells you
You will still need real testing.
Sure, but if I wake up at 3AM in Truckee, I can Spice an idea and go
back to bed.
http://youtu.be/x6TrbD7-IwU
Actually, I have designed useful circuits by randomly fiddling with
Spice, stupid topologies that turn out to work.
Post by Jan Panteltje
Maybe boeing just spiced their thrusters :-)
SpaceX is having trouble with helium leaks too. Helium is the chemical
equivalent of slippery eels. It will leak though almost anything, even
solid metals. If they need an inert gas, why don't they use argon or
neon or nitrogen?
https://nypost.com/2024/08/30/us-news/boeing-execs-fought-nasa-to-bring-home-stranded-astronauts-in-starliner-sources/
This is a reversal from the Challenger disaster. NASA is being careful
this time, and the contractor is not.
Musk is cool. He annoys a lot of fatheads.
If paying way too much for Twitter and halving its value after getting
control of it is actually cool, you may be right. More rational
observers see that as evidence that Musk is an ego-driven fathead.
--
Bill Sloman, Sydney
Bill Sloman
2024-08-30 15:39:37 UTC
Permalink
Post by john larkin
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Thu, 29 Aug 2024 11:47:42 -0700) it happened john larkin
Post by john larkin
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Fri, 30 Aug 2024 00:43:39 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
Post by Bill Sloman
It's lot easier and quicker to bread-board a circuit in LTSpice than it
is to wire up a test circuit, but what that means is that you need to
make fewer real circuits and they are a lot more likely to work when tested.
That, on it's own, is enough to explain why labs look different today
than they did in the dark ages.
All it explains is boeings falling apart and astronuts ending up stuck at the ISS
and no moonlanding from the US, not even a probe.
The ISS and moon landings are super-expensive theatre. Neither
accomplishes anything.
Boeing and Microsoft have the same problem, bean counter money-mongers
have taken over from engineers.
Post by Jan Panteltje
Slimulations are _not_ realty and never will be.
Spice can be very handy. As Mike says, LT Spice's real function is to
train your instincts.
I dunno, much I learned from working with tubes and transistors was by building small circuits and measuring what happened.
Sure spice is great for math intensive stuff such as filters.. but you still need to know the basics.
These days with chips doing much of the work and limited knowledge what is actually _in_ those chips
it is hard to tell if a real circuit will behave like spice tells you
You will still need real testing.
Sure, but if I wake up at 3AM in Truckee, I can Spice an idea and go
back to bed.
http://youtu.be/x6TrbD7-IwU
Actually, I have designed useful circuits by randomly fiddling with
Spice, stupid topologies that turn out to work.
What a creationist would call intelligent design. The rest of us call it
evolving your circuits, rather than designing them, and you have
described that as insanely inefficient.
Post by john larkin
Post by Jan Panteltje
Maybe boeing just spiced their thrusters :-)
SpaceX is having trouble with helium leaks too. Helium is the chemical
equivalent of slippery eels. It will leak though almost anything, even
solid metals. If they need an inert gas, why don't they use argon or
neon or nitrogen?
Argon and neon aren't all that inert, nitrogen even less so. For
thrusters, helium's low molecular weight is a real advantage. Hydrogen
would be about the same, but it is anything but inert, and leaks almost
as fast a helium, and atomic hydrogen can produce hydrogen embrittlement.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydrogen_embrittlement
--
Bill Sloman, Sydney
john larkin
2024-08-30 17:18:52 UTC
Permalink
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by john larkin
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Thu, 29 Aug 2024 11:47:42 -0700) it happened john larkin
Post by john larkin
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Fri, 30 Aug 2024 00:43:39 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
Post by Bill Sloman
It's lot easier and quicker to bread-board a circuit in LTSpice than it
is to wire up a test circuit, but what that means is that you need to
make fewer real circuits and they are a lot more likely to work when tested.
That, on it's own, is enough to explain why labs look different today
than they did in the dark ages.
All it explains is boeings falling apart and astronuts ending up stuck at the ISS
and no moonlanding from the US, not even a probe.
The ISS and moon landings are super-expensive theatre. Neither
accomplishes anything.
Boeing and Microsoft have the same problem, bean counter money-mongers
have taken over from engineers.
Post by Jan Panteltje
Slimulations are _not_ realty and never will be.
Spice can be very handy. As Mike says, LT Spice's real function is to
train your instincts.
I dunno, much I learned from working with tubes and transistors was by building small circuits and measuring what happened.
Sure spice is great for math intensive stuff such as filters.. but you still need to know the basics.
These days with chips doing much of the work and limited knowledge what is actually _in_ those chips
it is hard to tell if a real circuit will behave like spice tells you
You will still need real testing.
Sure, but if I wake up at 3AM in Truckee, I can Spice an idea and go
back to bed.
http://youtu.be/x6TrbD7-IwU
Actually, I have designed useful circuits by randomly fiddling with
Spice, stupid topologies that turn out to work.
What a creationist would call intelligent design. The rest of us call it
evolving your circuits, rather than designing them, and you have
described that as insanely inefficient.
It's not inefficient if it's done insanely fast, in parallel,
preferably asleep.

It doesn't matter how you describe the process. It works better if you
don't.
Bill Sloman
2024-08-31 05:40:53 UTC
Permalink
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by john larkin
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Thu, 29 Aug 2024 11:47:42 -0700) it happened john larkin
Post by john larkin
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Fri, 30 Aug 2024 00:43:39 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
Post by Bill Sloman
It's lot easier and quicker to bread-board a circuit in LTSpice than it
is to wire up a test circuit, but what that means is that you need to
make fewer real circuits and they are a lot more likely to work when tested.
That, on it's own, is enough to explain why labs look different today
than they did in the dark ages.
All it explains is boeings falling apart and astronuts ending up stuck at the ISS
and no moonlanding from the US, not even a probe.
The ISS and moon landings are super-expensive theatre. Neither
accomplishes anything.
Boeing and Microsoft have the same problem, bean counter money-mongers
have taken over from engineers.
Post by Jan Panteltje
Slimulations are _not_ realty and never will be.
Spice can be very handy. As Mike says, LT Spice's real function is to
train your instincts.
I dunno, much I learned from working with tubes and transistors was by building small circuits and measuring what happened.
Sure spice is great for math intensive stuff such as filters.. but you still need to know the basics.
These days with chips doing much of the work and limited knowledge what is actually _in_ those chips
it is hard to tell if a real circuit will behave like spice tells you
You will still need real testing.
Sure, but if I wake up at 3AM in Truckee, I can Spice an idea and go
back to bed.
http://youtu.be/x6TrbD7-IwU
Actually, I have designed useful circuits by randomly fiddling with
Spice, stupid topologies that turn out to work.
What a creationist would call intelligent design. The rest of us call it
evolving your circuits, rather than designing them, and you have
described that as insanely inefficient.
It's not inefficient if it's done insanely fast, in parallel,
preferably asleep.
Efficiency is the ratio of how long something actually takes compared
with the time taken by some sort of ideal process. We don't know what
the ideal process might look like, and have no idea how long it would
take, so talking about the "efficiency" of the process is mere
illiterate bullshit.

You brain isn't wildly different from any other human brain and isn't
going to do anything insanely fast, even when you are asleep.
Post by john larkin
It doesn't matter how you describe the process. It works better if you
don't.
What makes you think that? I suspect the claim reflects the fact that
you aren't good at explaining things and want an excuse to avoid trying
to do so.
--
Bill Sloman, Sydney
john larkin
2024-08-31 13:53:28 UTC
Permalink
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by john larkin
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Thu, 29 Aug 2024 11:47:42 -0700) it happened john larkin
Post by john larkin
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Fri, 30 Aug 2024 00:43:39 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
Post by Bill Sloman
It's lot easier and quicker to bread-board a circuit in LTSpice than it
is to wire up a test circuit, but what that means is that you need to
make fewer real circuits and they are a lot more likely to work when tested.
That, on it's own, is enough to explain why labs look different today
than they did in the dark ages.
All it explains is boeings falling apart and astronuts ending up stuck at the ISS
and no moonlanding from the US, not even a probe.
The ISS and moon landings are super-expensive theatre. Neither
accomplishes anything.
Boeing and Microsoft have the same problem, bean counter money-mongers
have taken over from engineers.
Post by Jan Panteltje
Slimulations are _not_ realty and never will be.
Spice can be very handy. As Mike says, LT Spice's real function is to
train your instincts.
I dunno, much I learned from working with tubes and transistors was by building small circuits and measuring what happened.
Sure spice is great for math intensive stuff such as filters.. but you still need to know the basics.
These days with chips doing much of the work and limited knowledge what is actually _in_ those chips
it is hard to tell if a real circuit will behave like spice tells you
You will still need real testing.
Sure, but if I wake up at 3AM in Truckee, I can Spice an idea and go
back to bed.
http://youtu.be/x6TrbD7-IwU
Actually, I have designed useful circuits by randomly fiddling with
Spice, stupid topologies that turn out to work.
What a creationist would call intelligent design. The rest of us call it
evolving your circuits, rather than designing them, and you have
described that as insanely inefficient.
It's not inefficient if it's done insanely fast, in parallel,
preferably asleep.
Efficiency is the ratio of how long something actually takes compared
with the time taken by some sort of ideal process. We don't know what
the ideal process might look like, and have no idea how long it would
take, so talking about the "efficiency" of the process is mere
illiterate bullshit.
You brain isn't wildly different from any other human brain and isn't
going to do anything insanely fast, even when you are asleep.
Post by john larkin
It doesn't matter how you describe the process. It works better if you
don't.
What makes you think that? I suspect the claim reflects the fact that
you aren't good at explaining things and want an excuse to avoid trying
to do so.
People, especially people with advanced degrees, who can't invent
things, often resent people who do invent things. We just fired one
case.

They should accept that people are different, and pitch in to develop
the new ideas that others invent. Their resentment often stops them
from helping, so they become useless.

I suppose this could be a new idea to you.
Bill Sloman
2024-08-31 16:11:45 UTC
Permalink
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by john larkin
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Thu, 29 Aug 2024 11:47:42 -0700) it happened john larkin
Post by john larkin
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Fri, 30 Aug 2024 00:43:39 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
Post by Bill Sloman
It's lot easier and quicker to bread-board a circuit in LTSpice than it
is to wire up a test circuit, but what that means is that you need to
make fewer real circuits and they are a lot more likely to work when tested.
That, on it's own, is enough to explain why labs look different today
than they did in the dark ages.
All it explains is boeings falling apart and astronuts ending up stuck at the ISS
and no moonlanding from the US, not even a probe.
The ISS and moon landings are super-expensive theatre. Neither
accomplishes anything.
Boeing and Microsoft have the same problem, bean counter money-mongers
have taken over from engineers.
Post by Jan Panteltje
Slimulations are _not_ realty and never will be.
Spice can be very handy. As Mike says, LT Spice's real function is to
train your instincts.
I dunno, much I learned from working with tubes and transistors was by building small circuits and measuring what happened.
Sure spice is great for math intensive stuff such as filters.. but you still need to know the basics.
These days with chips doing much of the work and limited knowledge what is actually _in_ those chips
it is hard to tell if a real circuit will behave like spice tells you
You will still need real testing.
Sure, but if I wake up at 3AM in Truckee, I can Spice an idea and go
back to bed.
http://youtu.be/x6TrbD7-IwU
Actually, I have designed useful circuits by randomly fiddling with
Spice, stupid topologies that turn out to work.
What a creationist would call intelligent design. The rest of us call it
evolving your circuits, rather than designing them, and you have
described that as insanely inefficient.
It's not inefficient if it's done insanely fast, in parallel,
preferably asleep.
Efficiency is the ratio of how long something actually takes compared
with the time taken by some sort of ideal process. We don't know what
the ideal process might look like, and have no idea how long it would
take, so talking about the "efficiency" of the process is mere
illiterate bullshit.
You brain isn't wildly different from any other human brain and isn't
going to do anything insanely fast, even when you are asleep.
Post by john larkin
It doesn't matter how you describe the process. It works better if you
don't.
What makes you think that? I suspect the claim reflects the fact that
you aren't good at explaining things and want an excuse to avoid trying
to do so.
People, especially people with advanced degrees, who can't invent
things, often resent people who do invent things. We just fired one
case.
I can't say I've seen that. I do have an advanced degree, but I can
invent things and, and I've hung out with people with rather more
patents than I can claim, some of them with equally advanced degrees.
Post by john larkin
They should accept that people are different, and pitch in to develop
the new ideas that others invent. Their resentment often stops them
from helping, so they become useless.
Again, not something I've seen. Some of the people who think they have
invented something useful get attached to some rather bad ideas, and
resent informed criticism.
Post by john larkin
I suppose this could be a new idea to you.
I worked at EMI Central Research where you were encouraged to patent
stuff. The engineers were much more relaxed about it than others I'd
worked with in other places.

My father got most of his 25-odd patents while I growing up, so I got to
hear about the interactions in his work-place. It all seemed to run
pretty smoothly.

There's book that covers the period -"The Pulp" ISBN 978-0-9870915-5-0 -
which records some resentful observations from some people well down the
pecking order, but the guy that wrote the book didn't join the firm
until after my father had moved on, and didn't know all that much about
the period.

It is a subject that I do know quite a bit about. You've got your name
on just one patent that was taken out by a group you worked with. You
may be less well-informed than you like to think.
--
Bill Sloman, Sydney
Jan Panteltje
2024-08-30 18:22:20 UTC
Permalink
On a sunny day (Fri, 30 Aug 2024 07:13:23 -0700) it happened john larkin
Post by john larkin
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Thu, 29 Aug 2024 11:47:42 -0700) it happened john larkin
Post by john larkin
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Fri, 30 Aug 2024 00:43:39 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
Post by Bill Sloman
It's lot easier and quicker to bread-board a circuit in LTSpice than it
is to wire up a test circuit, but what that means is that you need to
make fewer real circuits and they are a lot more likely to work when tested.
That, on it's own, is enough to explain why labs look different today
than they did in the dark ages.
All it explains is boeings falling apart and astronuts ending up stuck at the ISS
and no moonlanding from the US, not even a probe.
The ISS and moon landings are super-expensive theatre. Neither
accomplishes anything.
Boeing and Microsoft have the same problem, bean counter money-mongers
have taken over from engineers.
Post by Jan Panteltje
Slimulations are _not_ realty and never will be.
Spice can be very handy. As Mike says, LT Spice's real function is to
train your instincts.
I dunno, much I learned from working with tubes and transistors was by building small circuits and measuring what happened.
Sure spice is great for math intensive stuff such as filters.. but you still need to know the basics.
These days with chips doing much of the work and limited knowledge what is actually _in_ those chips
it is hard to tell if a real circuit will behave like spice tells you
You will still need real testing.
Sure, but if I wake up at 3AM in Truckee, I can Spice an idea and go
back to bed.
http://youtu.be/x6TrbD7-IwU
Nice hat!

Not much news there now is it?
Post by john larkin
Actually, I have designed useful circuits by randomly fiddling with
Spice, stupid topologies that turn out to work.
I have used spice a couple of times, mostly out of curiosity.
Last one was in Linux Wine (windows emulator).
There were some problems with those simulations... they were not reality (scoped the stuff)
But maybe it is hard to match so many years of human experience
Having better models of parts is an other requirement.
It _is_ all math and math is by definion a limited descriptopn of reality, VERY limited
reality equations represent...
Insight is what counts.
Post by john larkin
Post by Jan Panteltje
Maybe boeing just spiced their thrusters :-)
SpaceX is having trouble with helium leaks too. Helium is the chemical
equivalent of slippery eels. It will leak though almost anything, even
solid metals. If they need an inert gas, why don't they use argon or
neon or nitrogen?
Yep, I wondered the same thing

Maybe AI will learn.... and be the next thing after spice.
There is an AI test at tomshardware.com,
I asked it the question "how to speed up my Raspberry"

https://www.tomshardware.com/news/tomshardware-ai-chatbot#main

The answer was:

-----------
HammerBot:

To make a Raspberry Pi 4 faster, you can overclock it. Here's a step-by-step guide on how to overclock your Raspberry Pi 4 to 2.3 GHz:

Ensure Adequate Cooling: Before starting the overclock process, make sure your Raspberry Pi 4 has adequate cooling. Options include:
Pimoroni Fan Shim
52Pi Ice Tower Cooler

Edit the config.txt File:
Open the config.txt file for editing in a terminal window on your Pi:

sudo nano /boot/config.txt

Add the following lines to set the CPU and GPU speeds, and provide extra voltage:

# Overclock Instructions
arm_freq=2300
gpu_freq=500
over_voltage=14
force_turbo=1

Save and Exit:
Press CTRL + X, then Y, and hit Enter to save and exit the file.

Reboot the Raspberry Pi:
Reboot your Raspberry Pi to apply the changes:

sudo reboot

Verify the Overclock:
After rebooting, open a terminal and use the vcgencmd command to show the current ARM CPU speed:

vcgencmd measure_clock arm

For more detailed instructions and considerations, you can refer to the full guide on Tom's Hardware.

Keep in mind that overclocking can invalidate your warranty and may cause instability if not done properly. Ensure you have sufficient cooling to prevent thermal throttling.
------------


Now serching with google works too and I am sure hammerbot uses it,
but still that saved time (if you woke up at 3 AM and wondered...).
Was just a test (not going to try it) but imagine the same for design.

?
Where will it go?
Jan Panteltje
2024-08-31 07:38:28 UTC
Permalink
Post by Jan Panteltje
?
Where will it go?
PS
https://www.electronicdesign.com/technologies/embedded/machine-learning/article/55135389/electronic-design-tiny-ai-on-the-edge-ai-edas-transforming-the-future-of-design
https://www.electronicdesign.com/magazine/50472
lots to read....
and try I suppose.
Then all from a central censored server?
AI to refuse - or mess up your latest mil design?
;-)
Bill Sloman
2024-09-01 07:45:46 UTC
Permalink
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Fri, 30 Aug 2024 00:43:39 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
Post by Bill Sloman
It's lot easier and quicker to bread-board a circuit in LTSpice than it
is to wire up a test circuit, but what that means is that you need to
make fewer real circuits and they are a lot more likely to work when tested.
That, on it's own, is enough to explain why labs look different today
than they did in the dark ages.
All it explains is boeings falling apart and astronuts ending up stuck at the ISS
and no moonlanding from the US, not even a probe.
Slimulations are _not_ realty and never will be.
But they can capture useful parts of reality, if you know what you are
doing.

John Larkin's simulated inductors tend not to have any parallel capacitance.
Post by Jan Panteltje
mathematical bullshit much of the time.
It does happen. You do have to know what to look out for.
Post by Jan Panteltje
That is why we are stuck with Albert onestone crap and wrong cosmological models
that even a 10 year old can see are wrong.
Ten year-old don't usually know all that much, and quite a lot of
perfectly correct ideas look wrong to them, as they do to you, for much
the same reasons.
--
Bill Sloman, Sydney
Jan Panteltje
2024-09-01 11:06:20 UTC
Permalink
On a sunny day (Sun, 1 Sep 2024 17:45:46 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Fri, 30 Aug 2024 00:43:39 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
Post by Bill Sloman
It's lot easier and quicker to bread-board a circuit in LTSpice than it
is to wire up a test circuit, but what that means is that you need to
make fewer real circuits and they are a lot more likely to work when tested.
That, on it's own, is enough to explain why labs look different today
than they did in the dark ages.
All it explains is boeings falling apart and astronuts ending up stuck at the ISS
and no moonlanding from the US, not even a probe.
Slimulations are _not_ realty and never will be.
But they can capture useful parts of reality, if you know what you are
doing.
John Larkin's simulated inductors tend not to have any parallel capacitance.
Post by Jan Panteltje
mathematical bullshit much of the time.
It does happen. You do have to know what to look out for.
Post by Jan Panteltje
That is why we are stuck with Albert onestone crap and wrong cosmological models
that even a 10 year old can see are wrong.
Ten year-old don't usually know all that much,
'Usually'
I was looking back at stuff I worked at at <10 years old, like OLED TV display
long before anyone even had the idea AFAIK.
I made conductors with carbon pencil on paper and tried stuff if it would light up if
the crossings were powered.
Post by Bill Sloman
and quite a lot of perfectly correct ideas look wrong to them, as they do to you, for much
the same reasons.
The whole stuff of what they call big bang is sold the wrong way around
If indeed there was a big explosion the resulting fragments were black holes that then later started spewing out
material that formed galaxies or was - and became stars
Like fireworks.
In a space that is NOT empty, like a garden sprinkler in the air.
Albert onestone crap is jewish brainwash that has indoctrinated science now for long enough
The creep never did an experiment in his life apart from a bad working fridge,
his mamamatical stuff he likely stole from his wife who was a mamatician and his relatitvitty stuff
came from the same source, nothing related the the atom bomb really came from him apart
from suggesting to the then US precedent to use it for genocide on the Japanese
He took Bose's paper and put his own name on it (Bose onestone condensate).
Albert's way of thinking was proven wrong in the eighties by Aspect.
His time / space is curved shit means he had no clue of any mechanism...
Look up Le Sage wikidia for a mechanism.
Albert's is as dumb as is electrickety without electrons
Billions are wasted in job creation programs for parrots of his crap,
like CERN and ITER that never go anywhere.

:-)
Bill Sloman
2024-09-01 11:38:47 UTC
Permalink
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Sun, 1 Sep 2024 17:45:46 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Fri, 30 Aug 2024 00:43:39 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
Post by Bill Sloman
It's lot easier and quicker to bread-board a circuit in LTSpice than it
is to wire up a test circuit, but what that means is that you need to
make fewer real circuits and they are a lot more likely to work when tested.
That, on it's own, is enough to explain why labs look different today
than they did in the dark ages.
All it explains is boeings falling apart and astronuts ending up stuck at the ISS
and no moonlanding from the US, not even a probe.
Slimulations are _not_ realty and never will be.
But they can capture useful parts of reality, if you know what you are
doing.
John Larkin's simulated inductors tend not to have any parallel capacitance.
Post by Jan Panteltje
mathematical bullshit much of the time.
It does happen. You do have to know what to look out for.
Post by Jan Panteltje
That is why we are stuck with Albert onestone crap and wrong cosmological models
that even a 10 year old can see are wrong.
Ten year-old don't usually know all that much,
'Usually'
I was looking back at stuff I worked at at <10 years old, like OLED TV display
long before anyone even had the idea AFAIK.
I made conductors with carbon pencil on paper and tried stuff if it would light up if
the crossings were powered.
That's not any kind of organic light-emitting diode. Graphite is
elemental carbon, not any kind of organic compound. A ten-ear-old might
not know that. You still don't seem to be aware of it.
Post by Jan Panteltje
Post by Bill Sloman
and quite a lot of perfectly correct ideas look wrong to them, as they do to you, for much
the same reasons.
The whole stuff of what they call big bang is sold the wrong way around.
It's not "sold". It's published as model that fits pretty much all the
observations we've collected.
Post by Jan Panteltje
If indeed there was a big explosion the resulting fragments were black holes that then later started spewing out
material that formed galaxies or was - and became stars.
Explosion isn't quite the right concept. The universe is pictured as
starting off very small, very dense, and expanding rapidly, but it
created the space it expanded into as it expanded.

If shrank back into what it started off as it would clearly be a black
hole, but if it were it wouldn't have expanded. There weren't any
fragments - the early inhomogeneities are visible as small variations in
the cosmic microwave background, and they have been measured.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cosmic_microwave_background.
Post by Jan Panteltje
Like fireworks.
From a ten-year-old's point of view.

<snipped more toxic ignorance>
Post by Jan Panteltje
His time / space is curved shit means he had no clue of any mechanism...
Look up Le Sage wikipedia for a mechanism.
One that doesn't work.
Post by Jan Panteltje
Albert's is as dumb as is electricity without electrons.
The discovery of electricity preceded the discovery of electrons
- J J Thompson didn't discover them until 1897.
Post by Jan Panteltje
Billions are wasted in job creation programs for parrots of his crap,
like CERN and ITER that never go anywhere.
Neither CERN nor ITER is designed to go anywhere - they are static
installations. CERN has managed to find the Higg's Boson, so it has made
some progress. ITER is still being put together

https://www.world-nuclear-news.org/Articles/ITER-s-proposed-new-timeline-initial-phase-of-oper

Try to post about stuff you do know something about.
--
Bill Sloman, Sydney
Jan Panteltje
2024-09-01 12:41:42 UTC
Permalink
On a sunny day (Sun, 1 Sep 2024 21:38:47 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Sun, 1 Sep 2024 17:45:46 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Fri, 30 Aug 2024 00:43:39 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
Post by Bill Sloman
It's lot easier and quicker to bread-board a circuit in LTSpice than it
is to wire up a test circuit, but what that means is that you need to
make fewer real circuits and they are a lot more likely to work when tested.
That, on it's own, is enough to explain why labs look different today
than they did in the dark ages.
All it explains is boeings falling apart and astronuts ending up stuck at the ISS
and no moonlanding from the US, not even a probe.
Slimulations are _not_ realty and never will be.
But they can capture useful parts of reality, if you know what you are
doing.
John Larkin's simulated inductors tend not to have any parallel capacitance.
Post by Jan Panteltje
mathematical bullshit much of the time.
It does happen. You do have to know what to look out for.
Post by Jan Panteltje
That is why we are stuck with Albert onestone crap and wrong cosmological models
that even a 10 year old can see are wrong.
Ten year-old don't usually know all that much,
'Usually'
I was looking back at stuff I worked at at <10 years old, like OLED TV display
long before anyone even had the idea AFAIK.
I made conductors with carbon pencil on paper and tried stuff if it would light up if
the crossings were powered.
That's not any kind of organic light-emitting diode. Graphite is
elemental carbon, not any kind of organic compound. A ten-ear-old might
not know that. You still don't seem to be aware of it.
The graphite was thw WIRES smartass!!!
Like this,
#
stuff at the crossings
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by Jan Panteltje
Post by Bill Sloman
and quite a lot of perfectly correct ideas look wrong to them, as they do to you, for much
the same reasons.
The whole stuff of what they call big bang is sold the wrong way around.
It's not "sold". It's published as model that fits pretty much all the
observations we've collected.
Fits no such observations
That is why MOND (modified ... Newtonian gravity) popped up.
Dark matter, etc etc
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by Jan Panteltje
If indeed there was a big explosion the resulting fragments were black holes that then later started spewing out
material that formed galaxies or was - and became stars.
Explosion isn't quite the right concept. The universe is pictured as
starting off very small, very dense, and expanding rapidly, but it
created the space it expanded into as it expanded.
Only in the imagination of mamaticians who are starting as kids to try to do a divde by nothing (zero)
and then create infinities such as black's holes

Tip: there are no infinitoes in natire, somethng always wil give way
Same with Ohm's law, 1 V in zero Ohm gves infinte curent , no it does not.
Undestand electrons, without electrons Ohms law is sueless
Without a mechanism onestoines babble is uselss.
Withoput onestine's babbl;e things become fun.
Withoutg Ohm's law and with electroins things become fun.
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by Jan Panteltje
Albert's is as dumb as is electricity without electrons.
Neither CERN nor ITER is designed to go anywhere
Right. they are job creation programs for albert's parrots
Bill Sloman
2024-09-01 15:56:13 UTC
Permalink
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Sun, 1 Sep 2024 21:38:47 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Sun, 1 Sep 2024 17:45:46 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Fri, 30 Aug 2024 00:43:39 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
<snip>
Post by Jan Panteltje
Post by Bill Sloman
Explosion isn't quite the right concept. The universe is pictured as
starting off very small, very dense, and expanding rapidly, but it
created the space it expanded into as it expanded.
Only in the imagination of mathematicians who are starting as kids to try to do a divide by nothing (zero)
and then create infinities such as black's holes.
You've got that backwards. Black holes are entirely finite, because they
contain enough mass to close space back in on itself.
Post by Jan Panteltje
Tip: there are no infinities in nature, something always will give way.
With black holes it's the curvature of space-time.
Post by Jan Panteltje
Same with Ohm's law, 1 V in zero Ohm gves infinte curent , no it does not.
Understand electrons, without electrons Ohms law is useless.
Georg Ohm published his law in 1827, 70 years before J J Thompson
discovered the electron. It works just as well for other charge carriers.
Post by Jan Panteltje
Without a mechanism onestoines babble is useless
By which you mean that you can't understand it.
Post by Jan Panteltje
Without onestine's babble things become fun.
Without Ohm's law and with electrons things become fun.
Ask any ten year-old.
Post by Jan Panteltje
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by Jan Panteltje
Albert's is as dumb as is electricity without electrons.
Neither CERN nor ITER is designed to go anywhere
Right. they are job creation programs for Albert's parrots.
Neither CERN nor ITER have much to do within Einstein's interests.

CERN is about nuclear physics, which has moved on quite a way from
Einstein's insights, and ITER is about getting nuclear fusion to work,
which is even less dependent on Einstein's insights - it does depend on
E=MC^2, but once that had been used to explain the mass defect in
elements heavier than hydrogen, Einstein didn't have any real involvement.

The popular press made a lot of fuss about Einstein, but Bohr, Dirac,
Heisenberg, Schroedinger, Lorentz Planck and Pauli were all in much the
same class.
--
Bill Sloman, Sydney
Jan Panteltje
2024-09-02 02:34:59 UTC
Permalink
On a sunny day (Mon, 2 Sep 2024 01:56:13 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Sun, 1 Sep 2024 21:38:47 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Sun, 1 Sep 2024 17:45:46 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Fri, 30 Aug 2024 00:43:39 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
<snip>
Post by Jan Panteltje
Post by Bill Sloman
Explosion isn't quite the right concept. The universe is pictured as
starting off very small, very dense, and expanding rapidly, but it
created the space it expanded into as it expanded.
Only in the imagination of mathematicians who are starting as kids to try to do a divide by nothing (zero)
and then create infinities such as black's holes.
You've got that backwards. Black holes are entirely finite, because they
contain enough mass to close space back in on itself.
SOund like shit talk

In a Le Sage system there is a point where all LS particles ae intercepted.
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by Jan Panteltje
Tip: there are no infinities in nature, something always will give way.
With black holes it's the curvature of space-time.
Space and time are not curved, matter is less compressed near a big mass that intercepts some
LS particles, making the pendulum longer and clocks slowing down.
Same limits apply

It is simple.
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by Jan Panteltje
Same with Ohm's law, 1 V in zero Ohm gves infinte curent , no it does not.
Understand electrons, without electrons Ohms law is useless.
Georg Ohm published his law in 1827, 70 years before J J Thompson
discovered the electron. It works just as well for other charge carriers.
Post by Jan Panteltje
Without a mechanism onestoines babble is useless
By which you mean that you can't understand it.
equation parrots brainwash kids
No wonder nothing happened since onestone

Bill Sloman
2024-09-02 06:54:18 UTC
Permalink
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Mon, 2 Sep 2024 01:56:13 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Sun, 1 Sep 2024 21:38:47 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Sun, 1 Sep 2024 17:45:46 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Fri, 30 Aug 2024 00:43:39 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
<snip>
Post by Jan Panteltje
Post by Bill Sloman
Explosion isn't quite the right concept. The universe is pictured as
starting off very small, very dense, and expanding rapidly, but it
created the space it expanded into as it expanded.
Only in the imagination of mathematicians who are starting as kids to try to do a divide by nothing (zero)
and then create infinities such as black's holes.
You've got that backwards. Black holes are entirely finite, because they
contain enough mass to close space back in on itself.
Sound like shit talk.
Which is to say you don't understand it, and resent having your
ignorance highlighted
Post by Jan Panteltje
In a Le Sage system there is a point where all LS particles are intercepted.
Pity about all the other defects in the Le Sage model.
Post by Jan Panteltje
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by Jan Panteltje
Tip: there are no infinities in nature, something always will give way.
With black holes it's the curvature of space-time.
Space and time are not curved, matter is less compressed near a big mass that intercepts some
LS particles, making the pendulum longer and clocks slowing down.
That would be relevant is the Le Sage model could work. It can't.

Gravitational lensing demonstrates that space-tine is curved in the
vicinity of any mass - you need a lot of mass to get an observable
curvature,

The first big test of that prediction was made during the 1919 eclipse
of the sun.

https://earthsky.org/human-world/may-29-1919-solar-eclipse-einstein-relativity/

There have been plenty of others since then.
Post by Jan Panteltje
Same limits apply
It is simple.
If you ignore most of the data.

<snipped more ill-informed nonsense.>
--
Bill Sloman, Sydney
Jan Panteltje
2024-09-02 10:37:23 UTC
Permalink
On a sunny day (Mon, 2 Sep 2024 16:54:18 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Mon, 2 Sep 2024 01:56:13 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Sun, 1 Sep 2024 21:38:47 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Sun, 1 Sep 2024 17:45:46 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Fri, 30 Aug 2024 00:43:39 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
<snip>
Post by Jan Panteltje
Post by Bill Sloman
Explosion isn't quite the right concept. The universe is pictured as
starting off very small, very dense, and expanding rapidly, but it
created the space it expanded into as it expanded.
Only in the imagination of mathematicians who are starting as kids to try to do a divide by nothing (zero)
and then create infinities such as black's holes.
You've got that backwards. Black holes are entirely finite, because they
contain enough mass to close space back in on itself.
Sound like shit talk.
Which is to say you don't understand it, and resent having your
ignorance highlighted
Post by Jan Panteltje
In a Le Sage system there is a point where all LS particles are intercepted.
Pity about all the other defects in the Le Sage model.
Post by Jan Panteltje
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by Jan Panteltje
Tip: there are no infinities in nature, something always will give way.
With black holes it's the curvature of space-time.
Space and time are not curved, matter is less compressed near a big mass that intercepts some
LS particles, making the pendulum longer and clocks slowing down.
That would be relevant is the Le Sage model could work. It can't.
Gravitational lensing demonstrates that space-tine is curved in the
vicinity of any mass - you need a lot of mass to get an observable
curvature,
The first big test of that prediction was made during the 1919 eclipse
of the sun.
https://earthsky.org/human-world/may-29-1919-solar-eclipse-einstein-relativity/
There have been plenty of others since then.
Post by Jan Panteltje
Same limits apply
It is simple.
If you ignore most of the data.
<snipped more ill-informed nonsense.>
You need a brain-wash
Bill Sloman
2024-09-02 13:28:43 UTC
Permalink
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Mon, 2 Sep 2024 16:54:18 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Mon, 2 Sep 2024 01:56:13 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Sun, 1 Sep 2024 21:38:47 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Sun, 1 Sep 2024 17:45:46 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Fri, 30 Aug 2024 00:43:39 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
<snip>
Post by Jan Panteltje
Post by Bill Sloman
Explosion isn't quite the right concept. The universe is pictured as
starting off very small, very dense, and expanding rapidly, but it
created the space it expanded into as it expanded.
Only in the imagination of mathematicians who are starting as kids to try to do a divide by nothing (zero)
and then create infinities such as black's holes.
You've got that backwards. Black holes are entirely finite, because they
contain enough mass to close space back in on itself.
Sound like shit talk.
Which is to say you don't understand it, and resent having your
ignorance highlighted
Post by Jan Panteltje
In a Le Sage system there is a point where all LS particles are intercepted.
Pity about all the other defects in the Le Sage model.
Post by Jan Panteltje
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by Jan Panteltje
Tip: there are no infinities in nature, something always will give way.
With black holes it's the curvature of space-time.
Space and time are not curved, matter is less compressed near a big mass that intercepts some
LS particles, making the pendulum longer and clocks slowing down.
That would be relevant is the Le Sage model could work. It can't.
Gravitational lensing demonstrates that space-tine is curved in the
vicinity of any mass - you need a lot of mass to get an observable
curvature,
The first big test of that prediction was made during the 1919 eclipse
of the sun.
https://earthsky.org/human-world/may-29-1919-solar-eclipse-einstein-relativity/
There have been plenty of others since then.
Post by Jan Panteltje
Same limits apply
It is simple.
If you ignore most of the data.
<snipped more ill-informed nonsense.>
You need a brain-wash.
So I can end up as ill-informed as you are?

Somebody who believes what he reads in Russia Today has already been
brainwashed, and you are complaining that I haven't been suckered by the
mis-information that you have swallowed, hook, line and sinker.

Though not even they are silly enough to have gone for the Le Sage
theory of gravity.
--
Bill Sloman, Sydney
john larkin
2024-09-01 14:09:46 UTC
Permalink
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Fri, 30 Aug 2024 00:43:39 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
Post by Bill Sloman
It's lot easier and quicker to bread-board a circuit in LTSpice than it
is to wire up a test circuit, but what that means is that you need to
make fewer real circuits and they are a lot more likely to work when tested.
That, on it's own, is enough to explain why labs look different today
than they did in the dark ages.
All it explains is boeings falling apart and astronuts ending up stuck at the ISS
and no moonlanding from the US, not even a probe.
Slimulations are _not_ realty and never will be.
But they can capture useful parts of reality, if you know what you are
doing.
John Larkin's simulated inductors tend not to have any parallel capacitance.
The trick is to know when it matters. ESR and core loss are usually
more important.

I designed this surface-mount inductor for my Pockels Cell driver,
after several tries using commercial parts. They all smoked.

It's wound on a specially marked Sharpie pen that we have carefully
reserved.

https://www.highlandtechnology.com/Product/T850

The grey gap-pad gives it some extra cooling. The board has lots of
thermal vias down to the water-cooled baseplate.
Bill Sloman
2024-09-01 16:20:42 UTC
Permalink
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Fri, 30 Aug 2024 00:43:39 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
Post by Bill Sloman
It's lot easier and quicker to bread-board a circuit in LTSpice than it
is to wire up a test circuit, but what that means is that you need to
make fewer real circuits and they are a lot more likely to work when tested.
That, on it's own, is enough to explain why labs look different today
than they did in the dark ages.
All it explains is boeings falling apart and astronuts ending up stuck at the ISS
and no moonlanding from the US, not even a probe.
Slimulations are _not_ realty and never will be.
But they can capture useful parts of reality, if you know what you are
doing.
John Larkin's simulated inductors tend not to have any parallel capacitance.
The trick is to know when it matters. ESR and core loss are usually
more important.
And you don't simulate them either. Simulation is - in part - about
letting the math throw up unexpected effects that appear when you hook
up a bunch of components. Knowing when it matter relies on the
simulation inside your head.
Post by john larkin
I designed this surface-mount inductor for my Pockels Cell driver,
after several tries using commercial parts. They all smoked.
So you didn't read the data sheets carefully enough. It's not a part
that would usually be described as "surface mount". If you'd scraped the
enamel off the bottom of the coil and soldered each turn down onto an
isolated copper pad on the board, it probably would qualify as surface
mount, and would have had better thermal contact with the board.

You might have had to make it as sintered metal 3-D printed structure to
get this to work - the wound coil looks a bit irregular.

Lost wax casting could have worked too.
Post by john larkin
It's wound on a specially marked Sharpie pen that we have carefully
reserved.
That defines it diameter. Measuring that with a vernier caliper would
give you a number you could document.
Post by john larkin
https://www.highlandtechnology.com/Product/T850
The grey gap-pad gives it some extra cooling. The board has lots of
thermal vias down to the water-cooled baseplate.
If you'd wound it with copper tube you could have pumped water through
the tube, or made it a heat pipe.

A 3-D printed structure would have offered more options.
--
Bill Sloman, Sydney
john larkin
2024-09-01 20:32:59 UTC
Permalink
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Fri, 30 Aug 2024 00:43:39 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
Post by Bill Sloman
It's lot easier and quicker to bread-board a circuit in LTSpice than it
is to wire up a test circuit, but what that means is that you need to
make fewer real circuits and they are a lot more likely to work when tested.
That, on it's own, is enough to explain why labs look different today
than they did in the dark ages.
All it explains is boeings falling apart and astronuts ending up stuck at the ISS
and no moonlanding from the US, not even a probe.
Slimulations are _not_ realty and never will be.
But they can capture useful parts of reality, if you know what you are
doing.
John Larkin's simulated inductors tend not to have any parallel capacitance.
The trick is to know when it matters. ESR and core loss are usually
more important.
And you don't simulate them either.
Only when they matter.

Simulation is - in part - about
Post by Bill Sloman
letting the math throw up unexpected effects that appear when you hook
up a bunch of components. Knowing when it matter relies on the
simulation inside your head.
Post by john larkin
I designed this surface-mount inductor for my Pockels Cell driver,
after several tries using commercial parts. They all smoked.
So you didn't read the data sheets carefully enough.
Sure I did. They should have worked, based on the data sheets.


It's not a part
Post by Bill Sloman
that would usually be described as "surface mount". If you'd scraped the
enamel off the bottom of the coil and soldered each turn down onto an
isolated copper pad on the board, it probably would qualify as surface
mount, and would have had better thermal contact with the board.
I did that on the ends. I think the gap-pad works better thermally
than soldering every turn to the board.

Have you ever used a surface-mount coil that soldered every turn to
the board? Got a link?
Post by Bill Sloman
You might have had to make it as sintered metal 3-D printed structure to
get this to work - the wound coil looks a bit irregular.
Losses would be crazy.
Post by Bill Sloman
Lost wax casting could have worked too.
Post by john larkin
It's wound on a specially marked Sharpie pen that we have carefully
reserved.
That defines it diameter. Measuring that with a vernier caliper would
give you a number you could document.
Post by john larkin
https://www.highlandtechnology.com/Product/T850
The grey gap-pad gives it some extra cooling. The board has lots of
thermal vias down to the water-cooled baseplate.
If you'd wound it with copper tube you could have pumped water through
the tube, or made it a heat pipe.
And supply a water tank and a pump and water connectors?
Post by Bill Sloman
A 3-D printed structure would have offered more options.
Again, massive losses.

My inductor is cheap and simple and works.

If I get a gigantic order, I'll have a coil winding company make them
and retire the Sharpie.
Jan Panteltje
2024-09-02 02:48:45 UTC
Permalink
On a sunny day (Sun, 01 Sep 2024 13:32:59 -0700) it happened john larkin
Post by john larkin
My inductor is cheap and simple and works.
If I get a gigantic order, I'll have a coil winding company make them
and retire the Sharpie.
Some time ago I mentioned ceramic coil formers with grooves to you.
There were some in the mil transceivers.
It fixes the turns in position and diameter
https://www.surplussales.com/Inductors/Ind-SlugTu/Ind-SlugTu-4.html
ebay has some too I think

You could have some made if you sell thousands, any pottery;-)

I had some nice big ones with silvered wire in my 250 W linear in school days.
Jan Panteltje
2024-09-02 02:53:25 UTC
Permalink
On a sunny day (Mon, 02 Sep 2024 02:48:45 GMT) it happened Jan Panteltje
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Sun, 01 Sep 2024 13:32:59 -0700) it happened john larkin
Post by john larkin
My inductor is cheap and simple and works.
If I get a gigantic order, I'll have a coil winding company make them
and retire the Sharpie.
Some time ago I mentioned ceramic coil formers with grooves to you.
There were some in the mil transceivers.
It fixes the turns in position and diameter
https://www.surplussales.com/Inductors/Ind-SlugTu/Ind-SlugTu-4.html
ebay has some too I think
You could have some made if you sell thousands, any pottery;-)
I had some nice big ones with silvered wire in my 250 W linear in school days.
PS you do know about skin effect do you?
Bill Sloman
2024-09-02 07:13:59 UTC
Permalink
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Fri, 30 Aug 2024 00:43:39 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
Post by Bill Sloman
It's lot easier and quicker to bread-board a circuit in LTSpice than it
is to wire up a test circuit, but what that means is that you need to
make fewer real circuits and they are a lot more likely to work when tested.
That, on it's own, is enough to explain why labs look different today
than they did in the dark ages.
All it explains is boeings falling apart and astronuts ending up stuck at the ISS
and no moonlanding from the US, not even a probe.
Slimulations are _not_ realty and never will be.
But they can capture useful parts of reality, if you know what you are
doing.
John Larkin's simulated inductors tend not to have any parallel capacitance.
The trick is to know when it matters. ESR and core loss are usually
more important.
And you don't simulate them either.
Only when they matter.
Simulation is - in part - about
Post by Bill Sloman
letting the math throw up unexpected effects that appear when you hook
up a bunch of components. Knowing when it matter relies on the
simulation inside your head.
Post by john larkin
I designed this surface-mount inductor for my Pockels Cell driver,
after several tries using commercial parts. They all smoked.
So you didn't read the data sheets carefully enough.
Sure I did. They should have worked, based on the data sheets.
Based on your understanding of the data sheet, which was obviously
inadequate. It's revealing that you don't post links to the data sheets
or specify the number that you relied on when you assumed that they
ought to have worked.
Post by john larkin
It's not a part
Post by Bill Sloman
that would usually be described as "surface mount". If you'd scraped the
enamel off the bottom of the coil and soldered each turn down onto an
isolated copper pad on the board, it probably would qualify as surface
mount, and would have had better thermal contact with the board.
I did that on the ends. I think the gap-pad works better thermally
than soldering every turn to the board.
Solder is metal, and has a higher conductivity than your gap-pad
material. You can over-fill the joint, which would help.
Post by john larkin
Have you ever used a surface-mount coil that soldered every turn to
the board? Got a link?
No. It's merely an obvious possibility.
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
You might have had to make it as a sintered metal 3-D printed structure to
get this to work - the wound coil looks a bit irregular.
Losses would be crazy.
What makes you think that? The fact that the part is sintered doesn't
mean that you won't get close to solid metal electrical conductivity.
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
Lost wax casting could have worked too.
And even you must concede that that wouldn't have been lossy.
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by john larkin
It's wound on a specially marked Sharpie pen that we have carefully
reserved.
That defines it diameter. Measuring that with a vernier caliper would
give you a number you could document.
Post by john larkin
https://www.highlandtechnology.com/Product/T850
The grey gap-pad gives it some extra cooling. The board has lots of
thermal vias down to the water-cooled baseplate.
If you'd wound it with copper tube you could have pumped water through
the tube, or made it a heat pipe.
And supply a water tank and a pump and water connectors?
Heat pipes don't need that. A closed system doesn't need a water-tank,
and lots of top-end computer coolers do rely on circulating water.
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
A 3-D printed structure would have offered more options.
Again, massive losses.
Imagined massive losses.
Post by john larkin
My inductor is cheap and simple and works.
It's hand-wound, so it looks cheaper than it is.
Post by john larkin
If I get a gigantic order, I'll have a coil winding company make them
and retire the Sharpie.
Or come up with a more sensible solution?
--
Bill Sloman, Sydney
john larkin
2024-09-02 15:31:42 UTC
Permalink
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Fri, 30 Aug 2024 00:43:39 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
Post by Bill Sloman
It's lot easier and quicker to bread-board a circuit in LTSpice than it
is to wire up a test circuit, but what that means is that you need to
make fewer real circuits and they are a lot more likely to work when tested.
That, on it's own, is enough to explain why labs look different today
than they did in the dark ages.
All it explains is boeings falling apart and astronuts ending up stuck at the ISS
and no moonlanding from the US, not even a probe.
Slimulations are _not_ realty and never will be.
But they can capture useful parts of reality, if you know what you are
doing.
John Larkin's simulated inductors tend not to have any parallel capacitance.
The trick is to know when it matters. ESR and core loss are usually
more important.
And you don't simulate them either.
Only when they matter.
Simulation is - in part - about
Post by Bill Sloman
letting the math throw up unexpected effects that appear when you hook
up a bunch of components. Knowing when it matter relies on the
simulation inside your head.
Post by john larkin
I designed this surface-mount inductor for my Pockels Cell driver,
after several tries using commercial parts. They all smoked.
So you didn't read the data sheets carefully enough.
Sure I did. They should have worked, based on the data sheets.
Based on your understanding of the data sheet, which was obviously
inadequate. It's revealing that you don't post links to the data sheets
or specify the number that you relied on when you assumed that they
ought to have worked.
Post by john larkin
It's not a part
Post by Bill Sloman
that would usually be described as "surface mount". If you'd scraped the
enamel off the bottom of the coil and soldered each turn down onto an
isolated copper pad on the board, it probably would qualify as surface
mount, and would have had better thermal contact with the board.
I did that on the ends. I think the gap-pad works better thermally
than soldering every turn to the board.
Solder is metal, and has a higher conductivity than your gap-pad
material. You can over-fill the joint, which would help.
It wouldn't help much to conduct heat into a PCB pad. FR4 is a
terrible heat conductor.
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by john larkin
Have you ever used a surface-mount coil that soldered every turn to
the board? Got a link?
No. It's merely an obvious possibility.
Ha.
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
You might have had to make it as a sintered metal 3-D printed structure to
get this to work - the wound coil looks a bit irregular.
Losses would be crazy.
What makes you think that? The fact that the part is sintered doesn't
mean that you won't get close to solid metal electrical conductivity.
Skin depth is about 30 microns here, and we need a smooth, homogenous,
annealed surface. Ask a chemist.
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
Lost wax casting could have worked too.
And even you must concede that that wouldn't have been lossy.
Impractical, and cast copper is probably a worse conductor than
annealed.
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by john larkin
It's wound on a specially marked Sharpie pen that we have carefully
reserved.
That defines it diameter. Measuring that with a vernier caliper would
give you a number you could document.
Post by john larkin
https://www.highlandtechnology.com/Product/T850
The grey gap-pad gives it some extra cooling. The board has lots of
thermal vias down to the water-cooled baseplate.
If you'd wound it with copper tube you could have pumped water through
the tube, or made it a heat pipe.
And supply a water tank and a pump and water connectors?
Heat pipes don't need that. A closed system doesn't need a water-tank,
and lots of top-end computer coolers do rely on circulating water.
My gadget is cheap and easy and works.
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
A 3-D printed structure would have offered more options.
Again, massive losses.
Imagined massive losses.
Certainly imagined. Please make a 3D fabbed inductor and measure its Q
and report back to us.
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by john larkin
My inductor is cheap and simple and works.
It's hand-wound, so it looks cheaper than it is.
This Pockels Cell driver is maybe 1/20 the volume of competitors' and
uses a few per cent of the power. The inductor is a detail.

Most drivers dissipate

F * C * V^2

in the driver itself, but it should take zero energy to charge and
discharge a capacitor.
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by john larkin
If I get a gigantic order, I'll have a coil winding company make them
and retire the Sharpie.
Or come up with a more sensible solution?
More sensible than winding an inductor from magnet wire?
Bill Sloman
2024-09-03 05:11:40 UTC
Permalink
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by john larkin
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Fri, 30 Aug 2024 00:43:39 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
<snip>
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
And you don't simulate them either.
Only when they matter.
Simulation is - in part - about
Post by Bill Sloman
letting the math throw up unexpected effects that appear when you hook
up a bunch of components. Knowing when it matter relies on the
simulation inside your head.
Post by john larkin
I designed this surface-mount inductor for my Pockels Cell driver,
after several tries using commercial parts. They all smoked.
So you didn't read the data sheets carefully enough.
Sure I did. They should have worked, based on the data sheets.
Based on your understanding of the data sheet, which was obviously
inadequate. It's revealing that you don't post links to the data sheets
or specify the number that you relied on when you assumed that they
ought to have worked.
Post by john larkin
It's not a part
Post by Bill Sloman
that would usually be described as "surface mount". If you'd scraped the
enamel off the bottom of the coil and soldered each turn down onto an
isolated copper pad on the board, it probably would qualify as surface
mount, and would have had better thermal contact with the board.
I did that on the ends. I think the gap-pad works better thermally
than soldering every turn to the board.
Solder is metal, and has a higher conductivity than your gap-pad
material. You can over-fill the joint, which would help.
It wouldn't help much to conduct heat into a PCB pad. FR4 is a
terrible heat conductor.
That's where your gap-ad dumps the heat. It may be a terrible conductor
(if a lot better than air) but it was clearly good enough for you.
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by john larkin
Have you ever used a surface-mount coil that soldered every turn to
the board? Got a link?
No. It's merely an obvious possibility.
Ha.
So not obvious to you.
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
You might have had to make it as a sintered metal 3-D printed structure to
get this to work - the wound coil looks a bit irregular.
Losses would be crazy.
What makes you think that? The fact that the part is sintered doesn't
mean that you won't get close to solid metal electrical conductivity.
Skin depth is about 30 microns here, and we need a smooth, homogenous,
annealed surface. Ask a chemist.
Ask a guy with a pulsed laser, who can melt the top 30 microns of the
part for enough milliseconds for it flow into a smooth surface. I've
always been puzzled why people haven't resumed silver plating RF parts
when you can now fuse the surface electro-plated crystals into a
continuous film of silver
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
Lost wax casting could have worked too.
And even you must concede that that wouldn't have been lossy.
Impractical,
Why?

and cast copper is probably a worse conductor than annealed.

So anneal it.
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by john larkin
It's wound on a specially marked Sharpie pen that we have carefully
reserved.
That defines it diameter. Measuring that with a vernier caliper would
give you a number you could document.
Post by john larkin
https://www.highlandtechnology.com/Product/T850
The grey gap-pad gives it some extra cooling. The board has lots of
thermal vias down to the water-cooled baseplate.
If you'd wound it with copper tube you could have pumped water through
the tube, or made it a heat pipe.
And supply a water tank and a pump and water connectors?
Heat pipes don't need that. A closed system doesn't need a water-tank,
and lots of top-end computer coolers do rely on circulating water.
My gadget is cheap and easy and works.
But looks cheap. And a hand-wound coil is never easy.
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
A 3-D printed structure would have offered more options.
Again, massive losses.
Imagined massive losses.
Certainly imagined. Please make a 3D fabbed inductor and measure its Q
and report back to us.
If you'll pay for it, and the time I'd have to spend to dig out somebody
to do it. Back when I was working I had access to people who would know
somebody who would do it, but I moved back to Australia, and those
people are less accessible (and some of them have died).
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by john larkin
My inductor is cheap and simple and works.
It's hand-wound, so it looks cheaper than it is.
This Pockels Cell driver is maybe 1/20 the volume of competitors' and
uses a few per cent of the power. The inductor is a detail.
But a crucial one.
Post by john larkin
Most drivers dissipate
F * C * V^2
in the driver itself, but it should take zero energy to charge and
discharge a capacitor.
Sadly. capacitors can be lossy, and the current involved has flow
through conductors which are resistive - more so when the skin effect
kicks in.
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by john larkin
If I get a gigantic order, I'll have a coil winding company make them
and retire the Sharpie.
Or come up with a more sensible solution?
More sensible than winding an inductor from magnet wire?
Why do you think that the Coilcraft inductors were wound with flat wire?

The skin effect means that most of your magnet wire is unused.

With flat wire, you also have more surface area to couple the wire to
the air you are relying on to cool it.

From a practical point of view, changing the layout to accomodate
enough of the Coilcraft parts to dissipate the heat would give you a
much tidier-looking product, if marginally bulkier.

If what you've got has 5% of the volume of its competition, you've got
room to do that.
--
Bill Sloman, Sydney
Phil Hobbs
2024-09-01 17:55:58 UTC
Permalink
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Fri, 30 Aug 2024 00:43:39 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
Post by Bill Sloman
It's lot easier and quicker to bread-board a circuit in LTSpice than it
is to wire up a test circuit, but what that means is that you need to
make fewer real circuits and they are a lot more likely to work when tested.
That, on it's own, is enough to explain why labs look different today
than they did in the dark ages.
All it explains is boeings falling apart and astronuts ending up stuck at the ISS
and no moonlanding from the US, not even a probe.
Slimulations are _not_ realty and never will be.
But they can capture useful parts of reality, if you know what you are
doing.
John Larkin's simulated inductors tend not to have any parallel capacitance.
The trick is to know when it matters. ESR and core loss are usually
more important.
I designed this surface-mount inductor for my Pockels Cell driver,
after several tries using commercial parts. They all smoked.
It's wound on a specially marked Sharpie pen that we have carefully
reserved.
It better have a regular calibration schedule, or your semiconductor
customers may give you the raised eyebrow.

Cheers

Phil Hobbs
--
Dr Philip C D Hobbs Principal Consultant ElectroOptical Innovations LLC /
Hobbs ElectroOptics Optics, Electro-optics, Photonics, Analog Electronics
Joe Gwinn
2024-09-01 19:53:46 UTC
Permalink
On Sun, 1 Sep 2024 17:55:58 -0000 (UTC), Phil Hobbs
Post by Phil Hobbs
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Fri, 30 Aug 2024 00:43:39 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
Post by Bill Sloman
It's lot easier and quicker to bread-board a circuit in LTSpice than it
is to wire up a test circuit, but what that means is that you need to
make fewer real circuits and they are a lot more likely to work when tested.
That, on it's own, is enough to explain why labs look different today
than they did in the dark ages.
All it explains is boeings falling apart and astronuts ending up stuck at the ISS
and no moonlanding from the US, not even a probe.
Slimulations are _not_ realty and never will be.
But they can capture useful parts of reality, if you know what you are
doing.
John Larkin's simulated inductors tend not to have any parallel capacitance.
The trick is to know when it matters. ESR and core loss are usually
more important.
I designed this surface-mount inductor for my Pockels Cell driver,
after several tries using commercial parts. They all smoked.
It's wound on a specially marked Sharpie pen that we have carefully
reserved.
It better have a regular calibration schedule, or your semiconductor
customers may give you the raised eyebrow.
Hmm. To be overly serious: With traceability to NIST (US) or NPL
(UK) or the like.

The trend in standards is to eliminate standards tied tp a physical
object.

I have a Sharpie in hand. The barrel that is not covered by the cap
is a truncated cone, being 11.0 mm at the blunt end and 12.32 mm near
the cap, 73 mm away.

Actually, all that's needed is to specify an ideal geometric shape,
with tolerances, in the formal documentation.

Joe Gwinn
john larkin
2024-09-01 20:17:03 UTC
Permalink
Post by Joe Gwinn
On Sun, 1 Sep 2024 17:55:58 -0000 (UTC), Phil Hobbs
Post by Phil Hobbs
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Fri, 30 Aug 2024 00:43:39 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
Post by Bill Sloman
It's lot easier and quicker to bread-board a circuit in LTSpice than it
is to wire up a test circuit, but what that means is that you need to
make fewer real circuits and they are a lot more likely to work when tested.
That, on it's own, is enough to explain why labs look different today
than they did in the dark ages.
All it explains is boeings falling apart and astronuts ending up stuck at the ISS
and no moonlanding from the US, not even a probe.
Slimulations are _not_ realty and never will be.
But they can capture useful parts of reality, if you know what you are
doing.
John Larkin's simulated inductors tend not to have any parallel capacitance.
The trick is to know when it matters. ESR and core loss are usually
more important.
I designed this surface-mount inductor for my Pockels Cell driver,
after several tries using commercial parts. They all smoked.
It's wound on a specially marked Sharpie pen that we have carefully
reserved.
It better have a regular calibration schedule, or your semiconductor
customers may give you the raised eyebrow.
Hmm. To be overly serious: With traceability to NIST (US) or NPL
(UK) or the like.
The trend in standards is to eliminate standards tied tp a physical
object.
I have a Sharpie in hand. The barrel that is not covered by the cap
is a truncated cone, being 11.0 mm at the blunt end and 12.32 mm near
the cap, 73 mm away.
Mine is pretty cylindrical for the length of the coil. I expect that
the operator's (ie, my) applied tension affects the radius too.

That inductor sees 25 amps p-p, roughly a sawtooth, at 4 MHz. The
Coilcraft parts that I tried all smoked, I guess from skin effect and
proximity effect.
Post by Joe Gwinn
Actually, all that's needed is to specify an ideal geometric shape,
with tolerances, in the formal documentation.
Joe Gwinn
I'll have someone start on a SolidWorks model.
Joe Gwinn
2024-09-01 21:43:32 UTC
Permalink
On Sun, 01 Sep 2024 13:17:03 -0700, john larkin
Post by john larkin
Post by Joe Gwinn
On Sun, 1 Sep 2024 17:55:58 -0000 (UTC), Phil Hobbs
Post by Phil Hobbs
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Fri, 30 Aug 2024 00:43:39 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
Post by Bill Sloman
It's lot easier and quicker to bread-board a circuit in LTSpice than it
is to wire up a test circuit, but what that means is that you need to
make fewer real circuits and they are a lot more likely to work when tested.
That, on it's own, is enough to explain why labs look different today
than they did in the dark ages.
All it explains is boeings falling apart and astronuts ending up stuck at the ISS
and no moonlanding from the US, not even a probe.
Slimulations are _not_ realty and never will be.
But they can capture useful parts of reality, if you know what you are
doing.
John Larkin's simulated inductors tend not to have any parallel capacitance.
The trick is to know when it matters. ESR and core loss are usually
more important.
I designed this surface-mount inductor for my Pockels Cell driver,
after several tries using commercial parts. They all smoked.
It's wound on a specially marked Sharpie pen that we have carefully
reserved.
It better have a regular calibration schedule, or your semiconductor
customers may give you the raised eyebrow.
Hmm. To be overly serious: With traceability to NIST (US) or NPL
(UK) or the like.
The trend in standards is to eliminate standards tied to a physical
object.
I have a Sharpie in hand. The barrel that is not covered by the cap
is a truncated cone, being 11.0 mm at the blunt end and 12.32 mm near
the cap, 73 mm away.
Mine is pretty cylindrical for the length of the coil. I expect that
the operator's (ie, my) applied tension affects the radius too.
Most likely.
Post by john larkin
That inductor sees 25 amps p-p, roughly a sawtooth, at 4 MHz. The
Coilcraft parts that I tried all smoked, I guess from skin effect and
proximity effect.
Post by Joe Gwinn
Actually, all that's needed is to specify an ideal geometric shape,
with tolerances, in the formal documentation.
Joe Gwinn
I'll have someone start on a SolidWorks model.
I bet you need the standoff, so the lossy FR4 material isn't too
close. That should be in the requirements as well.

I'd specify the coil dimensions, not the mandrel dimensions, which may
be provided as a helpful suggestion only.

Joe Gwinn
john larkin
2024-09-02 02:49:39 UTC
Permalink
Post by Joe Gwinn
On Sun, 01 Sep 2024 13:17:03 -0700, john larkin
Post by john larkin
Post by Joe Gwinn
On Sun, 1 Sep 2024 17:55:58 -0000 (UTC), Phil Hobbs
Post by Phil Hobbs
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Fri, 30 Aug 2024 00:43:39 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
Post by Bill Sloman
It's lot easier and quicker to bread-board a circuit in LTSpice than it
is to wire up a test circuit, but what that means is that you need to
make fewer real circuits and they are a lot more likely to work when tested.
That, on it's own, is enough to explain why labs look different today
than they did in the dark ages.
All it explains is boeings falling apart and astronuts ending up stuck at the ISS
and no moonlanding from the US, not even a probe.
Slimulations are _not_ realty and never will be.
But they can capture useful parts of reality, if you know what you are
doing.
John Larkin's simulated inductors tend not to have any parallel capacitance.
The trick is to know when it matters. ESR and core loss are usually
more important.
I designed this surface-mount inductor for my Pockels Cell driver,
after several tries using commercial parts. They all smoked.
It's wound on a specially marked Sharpie pen that we have carefully
reserved.
It better have a regular calibration schedule, or your semiconductor
customers may give you the raised eyebrow.
Hmm. To be overly serious: With traceability to NIST (US) or NPL
(UK) or the like.
The trend in standards is to eliminate standards tied to a physical
object.
I have a Sharpie in hand. The barrel that is not covered by the cap
is a truncated cone, being 11.0 mm at the blunt end and 12.32 mm near
the cap, 73 mm away.
Mine is pretty cylindrical for the length of the coil. I expect that
the operator's (ie, my) applied tension affects the radius too.
Most likely.
Post by john larkin
That inductor sees 25 amps p-p, roughly a sawtooth, at 4 MHz. The
Coilcraft parts that I tried all smoked, I guess from skin effect and
proximity effect.
Post by Joe Gwinn
Actually, all that's needed is to specify an ideal geometric shape,
with tolerances, in the formal documentation.
Joe Gwinn
I'll have someone start on a SolidWorks model.
I bet you need the standoff, so the lossy FR4 material isn't too
close. That should be in the requirements as well.
The turns squish down into the gap-pad gunk, which is an OK heat
conductor. The PCB under the pad is a big copper pour, top and bottom,
with a zillion thermal vias. There's more gap-pad on the underside of
the board to dump heat into the baseplate.

At 4 MHz, skin depth is 32 microns, so most of the copper is wasted.
That's why it gets so hot.

I tried three of the Coilcraft 1010VS parts in series, but they
smoked, probably skin+proximity effect. Maybe parallel would have
been better.
Post by Joe Gwinn
I'd specify the coil dimensions, not the mandrel dimensions, which may
be provided as a helpful suggestion only.
Joe Gwinn
I could have a mandrel machined or 3D printed, to more accurately wind
the inductor. The improvement would be mostly cosmetic.

Inductors are a pain.
Jan Panteltje
2024-09-02 02:56:51 UTC
Permalink
On a sunny day (Sun, 01 Sep 2024 19:49:39 -0700) it happened john larkin
Post by john larkin
Inductors are a pain.
Na... inductors are fun!
Bill Sloman
2024-09-02 07:52:09 UTC
Permalink
Post by john larkin
Post by Joe Gwinn
On Sun, 01 Sep 2024 13:17:03 -0700, john larkin
Post by john larkin
Post by Joe Gwinn
On Sun, 1 Sep 2024 17:55:58 -0000 (UTC), Phil Hobbs
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Fri, 30 Aug 2024 00:43:39 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
<snip>
Post by john larkin
Post by Joe Gwinn
Post by john larkin
I'll have someone start on a SolidWorks model.
I bet you need the standoff, so the lossy FR4 material isn't too
close. That should be in the requirements as well.
If the FR4 losses matter, the printed circuit board under the coil would
darken, which the customers wouldn't like. The Cambridge Instruments
0.5nsec beam blanker did that so we swapped to a different substrate
that didn't discolour.
Post by john larkin
The turns squish down into the gap-pad gunk, which is an OK heat
conductor. The PCB under the pad is a big copper pour, top and bottom,
with a zillion thermal vias. There's more gap-pad on the underside of
the board to dump heat into the baseplate.
At 4 MHz, skin depth is 32 microns, so most of the copper is wasted.
That's why it gets so hot.
It's a sawtooth so it has quite a lot of higher harmonic components with
even thinner skin depths. Baxandall's preference for sine waves has
incidental advantages.

The turns are wide and flat, which reduces the effect of skin dept.
Post by john larkin
I tried three of the Coilcraft 1010VS parts in series, but they
smoked, probably skin+proximity effect. Maybe parallel would have
been better.
https://www.coilcraft.com/getmedia/55a4b40a-2e02-4bf5-b0af-2ea5db75b6cf/1010vs.pdf

There are five 1010VS parts, all rated at about 25A rms. You haven't
specified which one you used three of.

That 25A rms isn't going to include any allowance for skin effect.

They don't look as if there would be much cross-talk from one to the
next. Making space for more parts might have been a better approach.

With +/-20% tolerance on inductance, putting them in parallel wouldn't
have been a good idea.
Post by john larkin
Post by Joe Gwinn
I'd specify the coil dimensions, not the mandrel dimensions, which may
be provided as a helpful suggestion only.
I could have a mandrel machined or 3D printed, to more accurately wind
the inductor. The improvement would be mostly cosmetic.
Inductors are a pain.
Particularly when you don't think about what you doing.
--
Bill Sloman, Sydney
john larkin
2024-09-02 15:45:10 UTC
Permalink
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by john larkin
Post by Joe Gwinn
On Sun, 01 Sep 2024 13:17:03 -0700, john larkin
Post by john larkin
Post by Joe Gwinn
On Sun, 1 Sep 2024 17:55:58 -0000 (UTC), Phil Hobbs
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Fri, 30 Aug 2024 00:43:39 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
<snip>
Post by john larkin
Post by Joe Gwinn
Post by john larkin
I'll have someone start on a SolidWorks model.
I bet you need the standoff, so the lossy FR4 material isn't too
close. That should be in the requirements as well.
If the FR4 losses matter, the printed circuit board under the coil would
darken, which the customers wouldn't like. The Cambridge Instruments
0.5nsec beam blanker did that so we swapped to a different substrate
that didn't discolour.
Post by john larkin
The turns squish down into the gap-pad gunk, which is an OK heat
conductor. The PCB under the pad is a big copper pour, top and bottom,
with a zillion thermal vias. There's more gap-pad on the underside of
the board to dump heat into the baseplate.
At 4 MHz, skin depth is 32 microns, so most of the copper is wasted.
That's why it gets so hot.
It's a sawtooth so it has quite a lot of higher harmonic components with
even thinner skin depths. Baxandall's preference for sine waves has
incidental advantages.
The turns are wide and flat, which reduces the effect of skin dept.
Post by john larkin
I tried three of the Coilcraft 1010VS parts in series, but they
smoked, probably skin+proximity effect. Maybe parallel would have
been better.
https://www.coilcraft.com/getmedia/55a4b40a-2e02-4bf5-b0af-2ea5db75b6cf/1010vs.pdf
There are five 1010VS parts, all rated at about 25A rms. You haven't
specified which one you used three of.
That 25A rms isn't going to include any allowance for skin effect.
They don't look as if there would be much cross-talk from one to the
next. Making space for more parts might have been a better approach.
With +/-20% tolerance on inductance, putting them in parallel wouldn't
have been a good idea.
Don't they have the same tolerance in series?

In parallel, each would get 1/3 the current. But each would need to be
9x the inductance. I suspect that's a wash, something fundamental
going on.

My coil opens itself up for a lot of air cooling, and bare copper can
run pretty hot.
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by john larkin
Post by Joe Gwinn
I'd specify the coil dimensions, not the mandrel dimensions, which may
be provided as a helpful suggestion only.
I could have a mandrel machined or 3D printed, to more accurately wind
the inductor. The improvement would be mostly cosmetic.
Inductors are a pain.
Particularly when you don't think about what you doing.
But it works. A big laser company buys them.

Why don't you design a 1200 volt, 4 MHz pulse generator and we can
discuss it here.
Bill Sloman
2024-09-03 05:20:47 UTC
Permalink
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by john larkin
Post by Joe Gwinn
On Sun, 01 Sep 2024 13:17:03 -0700, john larkin
Post by john larkin
Post by Joe Gwinn
On Sun, 1 Sep 2024 17:55:58 -0000 (UTC), Phil Hobbs
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Fri, 30 Aug 2024 00:43:39 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
<snip>
Post by john larkin
Post by Joe Gwinn
Post by john larkin
I'll have someone start on a SolidWorks model.
I bet you need the standoff, so the lossy FR4 material isn't too
close. That should be in the requirements as well.
If the FR4 losses matter, the printed circuit board under the coil would
darken, which the customers wouldn't like. The Cambridge Instruments
0.5nsec beam blanker did that so we swapped to a different substrate
that didn't discolour.
Post by john larkin
The turns squish down into the gap-pad gunk, which is an OK heat
conductor. The PCB under the pad is a big copper pour, top and bottom,
with a zillion thermal vias. There's more gap-pad on the underside of
the board to dump heat into the baseplate.
At 4 MHz, skin depth is 32 microns, so most of the copper is wasted.
That's why it gets so hot.
It's a sawtooth so it has quite a lot of higher harmonic components with
even thinner skin depths. Baxandall's preference for sine waves has
incidental advantages.
The turns are wide and flat, which reduces the effect of skin dept.
Post by john larkin
I tried three of the Coilcraft 1010VS parts in series, but they
smoked, probably skin+proximity effect. Maybe parallel would have
been better.
https://www.coilcraft.com/getmedia/55a4b40a-2e02-4bf5-b0af-2ea5db75b6cf/1010vs.pdf
There are five 1010VS parts, all rated at about 25A rms. You haven't
specified which one you used three of.
That 25A rms isn't going to include any allowance for skin effect.
They don't look as if there would be much cross-talk from one to the
next. Making space for more parts might have been a better approach.
With +/-20% tolerance on inductance, putting them in parallel wouldn't
have been a good idea.
Don't they have the same tolerance in series?
When they are in series, the same current passes through each one.

When they are in parallel the lower inductance parts would carry up to
40% more current and have to dissipate up to twice as much heat.
Post by john larkin
In parallel, each would get 1/3 the current. But each would need to be
9x the inductance. I suspect that's a wash, something fundamental
going on.
My coil opens itself up for a lot of air cooling, and bare copper can
run pretty hot.
And melt the solder holding it in place?
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by john larkin
Post by Joe Gwinn
I'd specify the coil dimensions, not the mandrel dimensions, which may
be provided as a helpful suggestion only.
I could have a mandrel machined or 3D printed, to more accurately wind
the inductor. The improvement would be mostly cosmetic.
Inductors are a pain.
Particularly when you don't think about what you doing.
But it works. A big laser company buys them.
Why don't you design a 1200 volt, 4 MHz pulse generator and we can
discuss it here.
Why would I bother? I wouldn't get paid for it. More to the point, I'd
need a lot more information than 1200V, 4 MHz and 25A peak to peak, and
your customer wouldn't be happy if you broadcast that much detail.
--
Bill Sloman, Sydney
Joe Gwinn
2024-09-02 14:02:34 UTC
Permalink
On Sun, 01 Sep 2024 19:49:39 -0700, john larkin
Post by john larkin
Post by Joe Gwinn
On Sun, 01 Sep 2024 13:17:03 -0700, john larkin
Post by john larkin
Post by Joe Gwinn
On Sun, 1 Sep 2024 17:55:58 -0000 (UTC), Phil Hobbs
Post by Phil Hobbs
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Fri, 30 Aug 2024 00:43:39 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
Post by Bill Sloman
It's lot easier and quicker to bread-board a circuit in LTSpice than it
is to wire up a test circuit, but what that means is that you need to
make fewer real circuits and they are a lot more likely to work when tested.
That, on it's own, is enough to explain why labs look different today
than they did in the dark ages.
All it explains is boeings falling apart and astronuts ending up stuck at the ISS
and no moonlanding from the US, not even a probe.
Slimulations are _not_ realty and never will be.
But they can capture useful parts of reality, if you know what you are
doing.
John Larkin's simulated inductors tend not to have any parallel capacitance.
The trick is to know when it matters. ESR and core loss are usually
more important.
I designed this surface-mount inductor for my Pockels Cell driver,
after several tries using commercial parts. They all smoked.
It's wound on a specially marked Sharpie pen that we have carefully
reserved.
It better have a regular calibration schedule, or your semiconductor
customers may give you the raised eyebrow.
Hmm. To be overly serious: With traceability to NIST (US) or NPL
(UK) or the like.
The trend in standards is to eliminate standards tied to a physical
object.
I have a Sharpie in hand. The barrel that is not covered by the cap
is a truncated cone, being 11.0 mm at the blunt end and 12.32 mm near
the cap, 73 mm away.
Mine is pretty cylindrical for the length of the coil. I expect that
the operator's (ie, my) applied tension affects the radius too.
Most likely.
Post by john larkin
That inductor sees 25 amps p-p, roughly a sawtooth, at 4 MHz. The
Coilcraft parts that I tried all smoked, I guess from skin effect and
proximity effect.
Post by Joe Gwinn
Actually, all that's needed is to specify an ideal geometric shape,
with tolerances, in the formal documentation.
Joe Gwinn
I'll have someone start on a SolidWorks model.
I bet you need the standoff, so the lossy FR4 material isn't too
close. That should be in the requirements as well.
The turns squish down into the gap-pad gunk, which is an OK heat
conductor. The PCB under the pad is a big copper pour, top and bottom,
with a zillion thermal vias. There's more gap-pad on the underside of
the board to dump heat into the baseplate.
At 4 MHz, skin depth is 32 microns, so most of the copper is wasted.
That's why it gets so hot.
I tried three of the Coilcraft 1010VS parts in series, but they
smoked, probably skin+proximity effect. Maybe parallel would have
been better.
Post by Joe Gwinn
I'd specify the coil dimensions, not the mandrel dimensions, which may
be provided as a helpful suggestion only.
Joe Gwinn
I could have a mandrel machined or 3D printed, to more accurately wind
the inductor. The improvement would be mostly cosmetic.
Or choose a 12mm OD mandrel, and adjust elsewhere. The advantage of
12mm is that it's a common size. so just buy the rod and use it.

.<https://www.mcmaster.com/products/shafts/shafts-2~/rotary-shafts-5/diameter~12-mm/>

Actually, the requirement is a certain inductance while handling a
4-MHz sawtooth at 25 Amps (p-p), so the frequency band is roughly 4 to
20 MHz, to cover the first five harmonics Which harmonic causes the
most heating?

The dimensions et al are the construction details needed for Highland
to be able to replicate the part without your help.
Post by john larkin
Inductors are a pain.
But useful. Or essential in some cases.

Joe Gwinn
Phil Hobbs
2024-09-02 15:25:59 UTC
Permalink
Post by Joe Gwinn
On Sun, 01 Sep 2024 19:49:39 -0700, john larkin
Post by john larkin
Post by Joe Gwinn
On Sun, 01 Sep 2024 13:17:03 -0700, john larkin
Post by john larkin
Post by Joe Gwinn
On Sun, 1 Sep 2024 17:55:58 -0000 (UTC), Phil Hobbs
Post by Phil Hobbs
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Fri, 30 Aug 2024 00:43:39 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
Post by Bill Sloman
It's lot easier and quicker to bread-board a circuit in LTSpice than it
is to wire up a test circuit, but what that means is that you need to
make fewer real circuits and they are a lot more likely to work when tested.
That, on it's own, is enough to explain why labs look different today
than they did in the dark ages.
All it explains is boeings falling apart and astronuts ending up stuck at the ISS
and no moonlanding from the US, not even a probe.
Slimulations are _not_ realty and never will be.
But they can capture useful parts of reality, if you know what you are
doing.
John Larkin's simulated inductors tend not to have any parallel capacitance.
The trick is to know when it matters. ESR and core loss are usually
more important.
I designed this surface-mount inductor for my Pockels Cell driver,
after several tries using commercial parts. They all smoked.
It's wound on a specially marked Sharpie pen that we have carefully
reserved.
It better have a regular calibration schedule, or your semiconductor
customers may give you the raised eyebrow.
Hmm. To be overly serious: With traceability to NIST (US) or NPL
(UK) or the like.
The trend in standards is to eliminate standards tied to a physical
object.
I have a Sharpie in hand. The barrel that is not covered by the cap
is a truncated cone, being 11.0 mm at the blunt end and 12.32 mm near
the cap, 73 mm away.
Mine is pretty cylindrical for the length of the coil. I expect that
the operator's (ie, my) applied tension affects the radius too.
Most likely.
Post by john larkin
That inductor sees 25 amps p-p, roughly a sawtooth, at 4 MHz. The
Coilcraft parts that I tried all smoked, I guess from skin effect and
proximity effect.
Post by Joe Gwinn
Actually, all that's needed is to specify an ideal geometric shape,
with tolerances, in the formal documentation.
Joe Gwinn
I'll have someone start on a SolidWorks model.
I bet you need the standoff, so the lossy FR4 material isn't too
close. That should be in the requirements as well.
The turns squish down into the gap-pad gunk, which is an OK heat
conductor. The PCB under the pad is a big copper pour, top and bottom,
with a zillion thermal vias. There's more gap-pad on the underside of
the board to dump heat into the baseplate.
At 4 MHz, skin depth is 32 microns, so most of the copper is wasted.
That's why it gets so hot.
I tried three of the Coilcraft 1010VS parts in series, but they
smoked, probably skin+proximity effect. Maybe parallel would have
been better.
Post by Joe Gwinn
I'd specify the coil dimensions, not the mandrel dimensions, which may
be provided as a helpful suggestion only.
Joe Gwinn
I could have a mandrel machined or 3D printed, to more accurately wind
the inductor. The improvement would be mostly cosmetic.
Or choose a 12mm OD mandrel, and adjust elsewhere. The advantage of
12mm is that it's a common size. so just buy the rod and use it.
.<https://www.mcmaster.com/products/shafts/shafts-2~/rotary-shafts-5/diameter~12-mm/>
Actually, the requirement is a certain inductance while handling a
4-MHz sawtooth at 25 Amps (p-p), so the frequency band is roughly 4 to
20 MHz, to cover the first five harmonics Which harmonic causes the
most heating?
The dimensions et al are the construction details needed for Highland
to be able to replicate the part without your help.
Lo these forty year gone, I had this RF gig that involved making a lot of
VHF LC oscillatior and filter protos.

We had a hand-cranked coil winder that had a good selection of cylindrical
steel mandrels with helical grooves to guide the wire, plus three or four
sheets with tables of measured values for single-layer coils of various
lengths. With a couple of training runs, one learned how hard to pull on
the wire so that it would just spring free from the mandrel.

That made it easy to make nice looking, high-Q coils for the inductance
range of interest. Good Medicine.

Cheers

Phil Hobbs
--
Dr Philip C D Hobbs Principal Consultant ElectroOptical Innovations LLC /
Hobbs ElectroOptics Optics, Electro-optics, Photonics, Analog Electronics
john larkin
2024-09-02 21:57:39 UTC
Permalink
On Mon, 2 Sep 2024 15:25:59 -0000 (UTC), Phil Hobbs
Post by Phil Hobbs
Post by Joe Gwinn
On Sun, 01 Sep 2024 19:49:39 -0700, john larkin
Post by john larkin
Post by Joe Gwinn
On Sun, 01 Sep 2024 13:17:03 -0700, john larkin
Post by john larkin
Post by Joe Gwinn
On Sun, 1 Sep 2024 17:55:58 -0000 (UTC), Phil Hobbs
Post by Phil Hobbs
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Fri, 30 Aug 2024 00:43:39 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
Post by Bill Sloman
It's lot easier and quicker to bread-board a circuit in LTSpice than it
is to wire up a test circuit, but what that means is that you need to
make fewer real circuits and they are a lot more likely to work when tested.
That, on it's own, is enough to explain why labs look different today
than they did in the dark ages.
All it explains is boeings falling apart and astronuts ending up stuck at the ISS
and no moonlanding from the US, not even a probe.
Slimulations are _not_ realty and never will be.
But they can capture useful parts of reality, if you know what you are
doing.
John Larkin's simulated inductors tend not to have any parallel capacitance.
The trick is to know when it matters. ESR and core loss are usually
more important.
I designed this surface-mount inductor for my Pockels Cell driver,
after several tries using commercial parts. They all smoked.
It's wound on a specially marked Sharpie pen that we have carefully
reserved.
It better have a regular calibration schedule, or your semiconductor
customers may give you the raised eyebrow.
Hmm. To be overly serious: With traceability to NIST (US) or NPL
(UK) or the like.
The trend in standards is to eliminate standards tied to a physical
object.
I have a Sharpie in hand. The barrel that is not covered by the cap
is a truncated cone, being 11.0 mm at the blunt end and 12.32 mm near
the cap, 73 mm away.
Mine is pretty cylindrical for the length of the coil. I expect that
the operator's (ie, my) applied tension affects the radius too.
Most likely.
Post by john larkin
That inductor sees 25 amps p-p, roughly a sawtooth, at 4 MHz. The
Coilcraft parts that I tried all smoked, I guess from skin effect and
proximity effect.
Post by Joe Gwinn
Actually, all that's needed is to specify an ideal geometric shape,
with tolerances, in the formal documentation.
Joe Gwinn
I'll have someone start on a SolidWorks model.
I bet you need the standoff, so the lossy FR4 material isn't too
close. That should be in the requirements as well.
The turns squish down into the gap-pad gunk, which is an OK heat
conductor. The PCB under the pad is a big copper pour, top and bottom,
with a zillion thermal vias. There's more gap-pad on the underside of
the board to dump heat into the baseplate.
At 4 MHz, skin depth is 32 microns, so most of the copper is wasted.
That's why it gets so hot.
I tried three of the Coilcraft 1010VS parts in series, but they
smoked, probably skin+proximity effect. Maybe parallel would have
been better.
Post by Joe Gwinn
I'd specify the coil dimensions, not the mandrel dimensions, which may
be provided as a helpful suggestion only.
Joe Gwinn
I could have a mandrel machined or 3D printed, to more accurately wind
the inductor. The improvement would be mostly cosmetic.
Or choose a 12mm OD mandrel, and adjust elsewhere. The advantage of
12mm is that it's a common size. so just buy the rod and use it.
.<https://www.mcmaster.com/products/shafts/shafts-2~/rotary-shafts-5/diameter~12-mm/>
Actually, the requirement is a certain inductance while handling a
4-MHz sawtooth at 25 Amps (p-p), so the frequency band is roughly 4 to
20 MHz, to cover the first five harmonics Which harmonic causes the
most heating?
The dimensions et al are the construction details needed for Highland
to be able to replicate the part without your help.
Lo these forty year gone, I had this RF gig that involved making a lot of
VHF LC oscillatior and filter protos.
I still design LC oscillators!
Post by Phil Hobbs
We had a hand-cranked coil winder that had a good selection of cylindrical
steel mandrels with helical grooves to guide the wire, plus three or four
sheets with tables of measured values for single-layer coils of various
lengths. With a couple of training runs, one learned how hard to pull on
the wire so that it would just spring free from the mandrel.
That made it easy to make nice looking, high-Q coils for the inductance
range of interest. Good Medicine.
Cheers
Phil Hobbs
Coilcraft makes a bunch of bare-naked RF inductors.

We like this encapsulated part:

https://www.coilcraft.com/en-us/products/rf/air-core-inductors/midi-spring/1812sms/?skuId=26054|26274

What's surprising is that the "natural" tempco of a copper solenoid
inductor runs around +120 ppm/degC, but this one is around +40. The
plastic must compensate for the copper somehow.
Bill Sloman
2024-09-03 05:30:13 UTC
Permalink
Post by john larkin
On Mon, 2 Sep 2024 15:25:59 -0000 (UTC), Phil Hobbs
Post by Phil Hobbs
Post by Joe Gwinn
On Sun, 01 Sep 2024 19:49:39 -0700, john larkin
Post by john larkin
Post by Joe Gwinn
On Sun, 01 Sep 2024 13:17:03 -0700, john larkin
Post by john larkin
Post by Joe Gwinn
On Sun, 1 Sep 2024 17:55:58 -0000 (UTC), Phil Hobbs
Post by Phil Hobbs
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Fri, 30 Aug 2024 00:43:39 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
Post by Bill Sloman
It's lot easier and quicker to bread-board a circuit in LTSpice than it
is to wire up a test circuit, but what that means is that you need to
make fewer real circuits and they are a lot more likely to work when tested.
That, on it's own, is enough to explain why labs look different today
than they did in the dark ages.
All it explains is boeings falling apart and astronuts ending up stuck at the ISS
and no moonlanding from the US, not even a probe.
Slimulations are _not_ realty and never will be.
But they can capture useful parts of reality, if you know what you are
doing.
John Larkin's simulated inductors tend not to have any parallel capacitance.
The trick is to know when it matters. ESR and core loss are usually
more important.
I designed this surface-mount inductor for my Pockels Cell driver,
after several tries using commercial parts. They all smoked.
It's wound on a specially marked Sharpie pen that we have carefully
reserved.
It better have a regular calibration schedule, or your semiconductor
customers may give you the raised eyebrow.
Hmm. To be overly serious: With traceability to NIST (US) or NPL
(UK) or the like.
The trend in standards is to eliminate standards tied to a physical
object.
I have a Sharpie in hand. The barrel that is not covered by the cap
is a truncated cone, being 11.0 mm at the blunt end and 12.32 mm near
the cap, 73 mm away.
Mine is pretty cylindrical for the length of the coil. I expect that
the operator's (ie, my) applied tension affects the radius too.
Most likely.
Post by john larkin
That inductor sees 25 amps p-p, roughly a sawtooth, at 4 MHz. The
Coilcraft parts that I tried all smoked, I guess from skin effect and
proximity effect.
Post by Joe Gwinn
Actually, all that's needed is to specify an ideal geometric shape,
with tolerances, in the formal documentation.
Joe Gwinn
I'll have someone start on a SolidWorks model.
I bet you need the standoff, so the lossy FR4 material isn't too
close. That should be in the requirements as well.
The turns squish down into the gap-pad gunk, which is an OK heat
conductor. The PCB under the pad is a big copper pour, top and bottom,
with a zillion thermal vias. There's more gap-pad on the underside of
the board to dump heat into the baseplate.
At 4 MHz, skin depth is 32 microns, so most of the copper is wasted.
That's why it gets so hot.
I tried three of the Coilcraft 1010VS parts in series, but they
smoked, probably skin+proximity effect. Maybe parallel would have
been better.
Post by Joe Gwinn
I'd specify the coil dimensions, not the mandrel dimensions, which may
be provided as a helpful suggestion only.
Joe Gwinn
I could have a mandrel machined or 3D printed, to more accurately wind
the inductor. The improvement would be mostly cosmetic.
Or choose a 12mm OD mandrel, and adjust elsewhere. The advantage of
12mm is that it's a common size. so just buy the rod and use it.
.<https://www.mcmaster.com/products/shafts/shafts-2~/rotary-shafts-5/diameter~12-mm/>
Actually, the requirement is a certain inductance while handling a
4-MHz sawtooth at 25 Amps (p-p), so the frequency band is roughly 4 to
20 MHz, to cover the first five harmonics Which harmonic causes the
most heating?
The dimensions et al are the construction details needed for Highland
to be able to replicate the part without your help.
Lo these forty year gone, I had this RF gig that involved making a lot of
VHF LC oscillatior and filter protos.
I still design LC oscillators!
You may put them together, but it sounds as if you evolve them rather
than design them. And you'd have your own coil-winding gear if you did
much of it. As Phil did.
Post by john larkin
Post by Phil Hobbs
We had a hand-cranked coil winder that had a good selection of cylindrical
steel mandrels with helical grooves to guide the wire, plus three or four
sheets with tables of measured values for single-layer coils of various
lengths. With a couple of training runs, one learned how hard to pull on
the wire so that it would just spring free from the mandrel.
That made it easy to make nice looking, high-Q coils for the inductance
range of interest. Good Medicine.
At George Kent in Luton (1973-76) I got to wind my own small-signal
transformers. At Cambridge Instruments (1982-1991) I had to ask the
coil-winders on the shop floor to do it for me.
--
Bill Sloman, Sydney
john larkin
2024-09-04 14:50:11 UTC
Permalink
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by john larkin
On Mon, 2 Sep 2024 15:25:59 -0000 (UTC), Phil Hobbs
Post by Phil Hobbs
Post by Joe Gwinn
On Sun, 01 Sep 2024 19:49:39 -0700, john larkin
Post by john larkin
Post by Joe Gwinn
On Sun, 01 Sep 2024 13:17:03 -0700, john larkin
Post by john larkin
Post by Joe Gwinn
On Sun, 1 Sep 2024 17:55:58 -0000 (UTC), Phil Hobbs
Post by Phil Hobbs
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Fri, 30 Aug 2024 00:43:39 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
Post by Bill Sloman
It's lot easier and quicker to bread-board a circuit in LTSpice than it
is to wire up a test circuit, but what that means is that you need to
make fewer real circuits and they are a lot more likely to work when tested.
That, on it's own, is enough to explain why labs look different today
than they did in the dark ages.
All it explains is boeings falling apart and astronuts ending up stuck at the ISS
and no moonlanding from the US, not even a probe.
Slimulations are _not_ realty and never will be.
But they can capture useful parts of reality, if you know what you are
doing.
John Larkin's simulated inductors tend not to have any parallel capacitance.
The trick is to know when it matters. ESR and core loss are usually
more important.
I designed this surface-mount inductor for my Pockels Cell driver,
after several tries using commercial parts. They all smoked.
It's wound on a specially marked Sharpie pen that we have carefully
reserved.
It better have a regular calibration schedule, or your semiconductor
customers may give you the raised eyebrow.
Hmm. To be overly serious: With traceability to NIST (US) or NPL
(UK) or the like.
The trend in standards is to eliminate standards tied to a physical
object.
I have a Sharpie in hand. The barrel that is not covered by the cap
is a truncated cone, being 11.0 mm at the blunt end and 12.32 mm near
the cap, 73 mm away.
Mine is pretty cylindrical for the length of the coil. I expect that
the operator's (ie, my) applied tension affects the radius too.
Most likely.
Post by john larkin
That inductor sees 25 amps p-p, roughly a sawtooth, at 4 MHz. The
Coilcraft parts that I tried all smoked, I guess from skin effect and
proximity effect.
Post by Joe Gwinn
Actually, all that's needed is to specify an ideal geometric shape,
with tolerances, in the formal documentation.
Joe Gwinn
I'll have someone start on a SolidWorks model.
I bet you need the standoff, so the lossy FR4 material isn't too
close. That should be in the requirements as well.
The turns squish down into the gap-pad gunk, which is an OK heat
conductor. The PCB under the pad is a big copper pour, top and bottom,
with a zillion thermal vias. There's more gap-pad on the underside of
the board to dump heat into the baseplate.
At 4 MHz, skin depth is 32 microns, so most of the copper is wasted.
That's why it gets so hot.
I tried three of the Coilcraft 1010VS parts in series, but they
smoked, probably skin+proximity effect. Maybe parallel would have
been better.
Post by Joe Gwinn
I'd specify the coil dimensions, not the mandrel dimensions, which may
be provided as a helpful suggestion only.
Joe Gwinn
I could have a mandrel machined or 3D printed, to more accurately wind
the inductor. The improvement would be mostly cosmetic.
Or choose a 12mm OD mandrel, and adjust elsewhere. The advantage of
12mm is that it's a common size. so just buy the rod and use it.
.<https://www.mcmaster.com/products/shafts/shafts-2~/rotary-shafts-5/diameter~12-mm/>
Actually, the requirement is a certain inductance while handling a
4-MHz sawtooth at 25 Amps (p-p), so the frequency band is roughly 4 to
20 MHz, to cover the first five harmonics Which harmonic causes the
most heating?
The dimensions et al are the construction details needed for Highland
to be able to replicate the part without your help.
Lo these forty year gone, I had this RF gig that involved making a lot of
VHF LC oscillatior and filter protos.
I still design LC oscillators!
You may put them together, but it sounds as if you evolve them rather
than design them. And you'd have your own coil-winding gear if you did
much of it. As Phil did.
Design, simulate, build, test, evolve. That's how engineering usually
works. At the bleeding edge of performance, unpredictable higher-order
effects happen. Sometimes whacking the competition depends on
understanding and taming those effects. That's more fun to me than
pushing a bunch of equations around.
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by john larkin
Post by Phil Hobbs
We had a hand-cranked coil winder that had a good selection of cylindrical
steel mandrels with helical grooves to guide the wire, plus three or four
sheets with tables of measured values for single-layer coils of various
lengths. With a couple of training runs, one learned how hard to pull on
the wire so that it would just spring free from the mandrel.
My Sharpie is a nice red marker when it's not winding coils.
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by john larkin
Post by Phil Hobbs
That made it easy to make nice looking, high-Q coils for the inductance
range of interest. Good Medicine.
At George Kent in Luton (1973-76) I got to wind my own small-signal
transformers. At Cambridge Instruments (1982-1991) I had to ask the
coil-winders on the shop floor to do it for me.
I used to have toroid winding machine. That's not actually a rational
thing to do.
Bill Sloman
2024-09-05 06:54:47 UTC
Permalink
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by john larkin
On Mon, 2 Sep 2024 15:25:59 -0000 (UTC), Phil Hobbs
Post by Phil Hobbs
Post by Joe Gwinn
On Sun, 01 Sep 2024 19:49:39 -0700, john larkin
Post by john larkin
Post by Joe Gwinn
On Sun, 01 Sep 2024 13:17:03 -0700, john larkin
Post by john larkin
Post by Joe Gwinn
On Sun, 1 Sep 2024 17:55:58 -0000 (UTC), Phil Hobbs
Post by Phil Hobbs
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Fri, 30 Aug 2024 00:43:39 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
Post by Bill Sloman
It's lot easier and quicker to bread-board a circuit in LTSpice than it
is to wire up a test circuit, but what that means is that you need to
make fewer real circuits and they are a lot more likely to work when tested.
That, on it's own, is enough to explain why labs look different today
than they did in the dark ages.
All it explains is boeings falling apart and astronuts ending up stuck at the ISS
and no moonlanding from the US, not even a probe.
Slimulations are _not_ realty and never will be.
But they can capture useful parts of reality, if you know what you are
doing.
John Larkin's simulated inductors tend not to have any parallel capacitance.
The trick is to know when it matters. ESR and core loss are usually
more important.
I designed this surface-mount inductor for my Pockels Cell driver,
after several tries using commercial parts. They all smoked.
It's wound on a specially marked Sharpie pen that we have carefully
reserved.
It better have a regular calibration schedule, or your semiconductor
customers may give you the raised eyebrow.
Hmm. To be overly serious: With traceability to NIST (US) or NPL
(UK) or the like.
The trend in standards is to eliminate standards tied to a physical
object.
I have a Sharpie in hand. The barrel that is not covered by the cap
is a truncated cone, being 11.0 mm at the blunt end and 12.32 mm near
the cap, 73 mm away.
Mine is pretty cylindrical for the length of the coil. I expect that
the operator's (ie, my) applied tension affects the radius too.
Most likely.
Post by john larkin
That inductor sees 25 amps p-p, roughly a sawtooth, at 4 MHz. The
Coilcraft parts that I tried all smoked, I guess from skin effect and
proximity effect.
Post by Joe Gwinn
Actually, all that's needed is to specify an ideal geometric shape,
with tolerances, in the formal documentation.
Joe Gwinn
I'll have someone start on a SolidWorks model.
I bet you need the standoff, so the lossy FR4 material isn't too
close. That should be in the requirements as well.
The turns squish down into the gap-pad gunk, which is an OK heat
conductor. The PCB under the pad is a big copper pour, top and bottom,
with a zillion thermal vias. There's more gap-pad on the underside of
the board to dump heat into the baseplate.
At 4 MHz, skin depth is 32 microns, so most of the copper is wasted.
That's why it gets so hot.
I tried three of the Coilcraft 1010VS parts in series, but they
smoked, probably skin+proximity effect. Maybe parallel would have
been better.
Post by Joe Gwinn
I'd specify the coil dimensions, not the mandrel dimensions, which may
be provided as a helpful suggestion only.
Joe Gwinn
I could have a mandrel machined or 3D printed, to more accurately wind
the inductor. The improvement would be mostly cosmetic.
Or choose a 12mm OD mandrel, and adjust elsewhere. The advantage of
12mm is that it's a common size. so just buy the rod and use it.
.<https://www.mcmaster.com/products/shafts/shafts-2~/rotary-shafts-5/diameter~12-mm/>
Actually, the requirement is a certain inductance while handling a
4-MHz sawtooth at 25 Amps (p-p), so the frequency band is roughly 4 to
20 MHz, to cover the first five harmonics Which harmonic causes the
most heating?
The dimensions et al are the construction details needed for Highland
to be able to replicate the part without your help.
Lo these forty year gone, I had this RF gig that involved making a lot of
VHF LC oscillatior and filter protos.
I still design LC oscillators!
You may put them together, but it sounds as if you evolve them rather
than design them. And you'd have your own coil-winding gear if you did
much of it. As Phil did.
Design, simulate, build, test, evolve. That's how engineering usually
works.
Serious engineering goes more like design, simulate, redesign,simulate
again, build, test, modify-evolve, retest, design, simulate, build,
test, ship.
Post by john larkin
At the bleeding edge of performance, unpredictable higher-order
effects happen.
As if you were ever there.
Post by john larkin
Sometimes whacking the competition depends on
understanding and taming those effects. That's more fun to me than
pushing a bunch of equations around.
But if you don't push the equations around you don't get to understand
the effects properly, no matter how proud you are of your "intuition".
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by john larkin
Post by Phil Hobbs
We had a hand-cranked coil winder that had a good selection of cylindrical
steel mandrels with helical grooves to guide the wire, plus three or four
sheets with tables of measured values for single-layer coils of various
lengths. With a couple of training runs, one learned how hard to pull on
the wire so that it would just spring free from the mandrel.
My Sharpie is a nice red marker when it's not winding coils.
But it is still a ppor excuse for a coilwinder.
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by john larkin
Post by Phil Hobbs
That made it easy to make nice looking, high-Q coils for the inductance
range of interest. Good Medicine.
At George Kent in Luton (1973-76) I got to wind my own small-signal
transformers. At Cambridge Instruments (1982-1991) I had to ask the
coil-winders on the shop floor to do it for me.
I used to have toroid winding machine. That's not actually a rational
thing to do.
It's entirely rational if you need special purpose toroids - perhaps
non-progressively wound (so they really do have zero external field).

It's a mechanically complicated device - not that I've ever seen one -
and presumably a pest to keep working.
--
Bill Sloman, Sydney
Phil Hobbs
2024-09-02 22:32:15 UTC
Permalink
Post by john larkin
On Mon, 2 Sep 2024 15:25:59 -0000 (UTC), Phil Hobbs
Post by Phil Hobbs
Post by Joe Gwinn
On Sun, 01 Sep 2024 19:49:39 -0700, john larkin
Post by john larkin
Post by Joe Gwinn
On Sun, 01 Sep 2024 13:17:03 -0700, john larkin
Post by john larkin
Post by Joe Gwinn
On Sun, 1 Sep 2024 17:55:58 -0000 (UTC), Phil Hobbs
Post by Phil Hobbs
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Fri, 30 Aug 2024 00:43:39 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
Post by Bill Sloman
It's lot easier and quicker to bread-board a circuit in LTSpice than it
is to wire up a test circuit, but what that means is that you need to
make fewer real circuits and they are a lot more likely to work when tested.
That, on it's own, is enough to explain why labs look different today
than they did in the dark ages.
All it explains is boeings falling apart and astronuts ending up stuck at the ISS
and no moonlanding from the US, not even a probe.
Slimulations are _not_ realty and never will be.
But they can capture useful parts of reality, if you know what you are
doing.
John Larkin's simulated inductors tend not to have any parallel capacitance.
The trick is to know when it matters. ESR and core loss are usually
more important.
I designed this surface-mount inductor for my Pockels Cell driver,
after several tries using commercial parts. They all smoked.
It's wound on a specially marked Sharpie pen that we have carefully
reserved.
It better have a regular calibration schedule, or your semiconductor
customers may give you the raised eyebrow.
Hmm. To be overly serious: With traceability to NIST (US) or NPL
(UK) or the like.
The trend in standards is to eliminate standards tied to a physical
object.
I have a Sharpie in hand. The barrel that is not covered by the cap
is a truncated cone, being 11.0 mm at the blunt end and 12.32 mm near
the cap, 73 mm away.
Mine is pretty cylindrical for the length of the coil. I expect that
the operator's (ie, my) applied tension affects the radius too.
Most likely.
Post by john larkin
That inductor sees 25 amps p-p, roughly a sawtooth, at 4 MHz. The
Coilcraft parts that I tried all smoked, I guess from skin effect and
proximity effect.
Post by Joe Gwinn
Actually, all that's needed is to specify an ideal geometric shape,
with tolerances, in the formal documentation.
Joe Gwinn
I'll have someone start on a SolidWorks model.
I bet you need the standoff, so the lossy FR4 material isn't too
close. That should be in the requirements as well.
The turns squish down into the gap-pad gunk, which is an OK heat
conductor. The PCB under the pad is a big copper pour, top and bottom,
with a zillion thermal vias. There's more gap-pad on the underside of
the board to dump heat into the baseplate.
At 4 MHz, skin depth is 32 microns, so most of the copper is wasted.
That's why it gets so hot.
I tried three of the Coilcraft 1010VS parts in series, but they
smoked, probably skin+proximity effect. Maybe parallel would have
been better.
Post by Joe Gwinn
I'd specify the coil dimensions, not the mandrel dimensions, which may
be provided as a helpful suggestion only.
Joe Gwinn
I could have a mandrel machined or 3D printed, to more accurately wind
the inductor. The improvement would be mostly cosmetic.
Or choose a 12mm OD mandrel, and adjust elsewhere. The advantage of
12mm is that it's a common size. so just buy the rod and use it.
.<https://www.mcmaster.com/products/shafts/shafts-2~/rotary-shafts-5/diameter~12-mm/>
Actually, the requirement is a certain inductance while handling a
4-MHz sawtooth at 25 Amps (p-p), so the frequency band is roughly 4 to
20 MHz, to cover the first five harmonics Which harmonic causes the
most heating?
The dimensions et al are the construction details needed for Highland
to be able to replicate the part without your help.
Lo these forty year gone, I had this RF gig that involved making a lot of
VHF LC oscillatior and filter protos.
I still design LC oscillators!
Post by Phil Hobbs
We had a hand-cranked coil winder that had a good selection of cylindrical
steel mandrels with helical grooves to guide the wire, plus three or four
sheets with tables of measured values for single-layer coils of various
lengths. With a couple of training runs, one learned how hard to pull on
the wire so that it would just spring free from the mandrel.
That made it easy to make nice looking, high-Q coils for the inductance
range of interest. Good Medicine.
Cheers
Phil Hobbs
Coilcraft makes a bunch of bare-naked RF inductors.
https://www.coilcraft.com/en-us/products/rf/air-core-inductors/midi-spring/1812sms/?skuId=26054|26274
What's surprising is that the "natural" tempco of a copper solenoid
inductor runs around +120 ppm/degC, but this one is around +40. The
plastic must compensate for the copper somehow.
Sounds awfully high.

To about 1% accuracy (over most useful aspect ratios), the inductance of a
single-layer coil is

L(uH) = a**2 n**2 /(9a + 10b),

Where a is the mean radius and b is the overall length, both in inches.

If the thermal expansion is unconstrained, a and b vary together, so the TC
of inductance of such a coil is the same as the CTE of copper, about 17
ppm/K.

A solid plastic form is strong enough to stretch the copper and increase
the TCL to the CTE of the plastic.

If the length only is constant, the TCL is increased, and for a short fat
coil it’s nearly doubled.

In the case of something like B&W Miniductor, which has fairly fine-pitched
turns held by a few small axial stringers, the plastic stretches the length
of the coil but leaves the radial expansion free.

Because both a and b enter in the denominator, it’s possible to choose
dimensions that make the TCL of a Miniductor or similar coil very nearly
zero.

A normal single layer coil has a TCL around +30 ppm. I’ve never measured
one as bad as +120.

Cheers

Phil Hobbs
--
Dr Philip C D Hobbs Principal Consultant ElectroOptical Innovations LLC /
Hobbs ElectroOptics Optics, Electro-optics, Photonics, Analog Electronics
john larkin
2024-09-04 14:41:38 UTC
Permalink
On Mon, 2 Sep 2024 22:32:15 -0000 (UTC), Phil Hobbs
Post by Phil Hobbs
Post by john larkin
On Mon, 2 Sep 2024 15:25:59 -0000 (UTC), Phil Hobbs
Post by Phil Hobbs
Post by Joe Gwinn
On Sun, 01 Sep 2024 19:49:39 -0700, john larkin
Post by john larkin
Post by Joe Gwinn
On Sun, 01 Sep 2024 13:17:03 -0700, john larkin
Post by john larkin
Post by Joe Gwinn
On Sun, 1 Sep 2024 17:55:58 -0000 (UTC), Phil Hobbs
Post by Phil Hobbs
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Fri, 30 Aug 2024 00:43:39 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
Post by Bill Sloman
It's lot easier and quicker to bread-board a circuit in LTSpice than it
is to wire up a test circuit, but what that means is that you need to
make fewer real circuits and they are a lot more likely to work when tested.
That, on it's own, is enough to explain why labs look different today
than they did in the dark ages.
All it explains is boeings falling apart and astronuts ending up stuck at the ISS
and no moonlanding from the US, not even a probe.
Slimulations are _not_ realty and never will be.
But they can capture useful parts of reality, if you know what you are
doing.
John Larkin's simulated inductors tend not to have any parallel capacitance.
The trick is to know when it matters. ESR and core loss are usually
more important.
I designed this surface-mount inductor for my Pockels Cell driver,
after several tries using commercial parts. They all smoked.
It's wound on a specially marked Sharpie pen that we have carefully
reserved.
It better have a regular calibration schedule, or your semiconductor
customers may give you the raised eyebrow.
Hmm. To be overly serious: With traceability to NIST (US) or NPL
(UK) or the like.
The trend in standards is to eliminate standards tied to a physical
object.
I have a Sharpie in hand. The barrel that is not covered by the cap
is a truncated cone, being 11.0 mm at the blunt end and 12.32 mm near
the cap, 73 mm away.
Mine is pretty cylindrical for the length of the coil. I expect that
the operator's (ie, my) applied tension affects the radius too.
Most likely.
Post by john larkin
That inductor sees 25 amps p-p, roughly a sawtooth, at 4 MHz. The
Coilcraft parts that I tried all smoked, I guess from skin effect and
proximity effect.
Post by Joe Gwinn
Actually, all that's needed is to specify an ideal geometric shape,
with tolerances, in the formal documentation.
Joe Gwinn
I'll have someone start on a SolidWorks model.
I bet you need the standoff, so the lossy FR4 material isn't too
close. That should be in the requirements as well.
The turns squish down into the gap-pad gunk, which is an OK heat
conductor. The PCB under the pad is a big copper pour, top and bottom,
with a zillion thermal vias. There's more gap-pad on the underside of
the board to dump heat into the baseplate.
At 4 MHz, skin depth is 32 microns, so most of the copper is wasted.
That's why it gets so hot.
I tried three of the Coilcraft 1010VS parts in series, but they
smoked, probably skin+proximity effect. Maybe parallel would have
been better.
Post by Joe Gwinn
I'd specify the coil dimensions, not the mandrel dimensions, which may
be provided as a helpful suggestion only.
Joe Gwinn
I could have a mandrel machined or 3D printed, to more accurately wind
the inductor. The improvement would be mostly cosmetic.
Or choose a 12mm OD mandrel, and adjust elsewhere. The advantage of
12mm is that it's a common size. so just buy the rod and use it.
.<https://www.mcmaster.com/products/shafts/shafts-2~/rotary-shafts-5/diameter~12-mm/>
Actually, the requirement is a certain inductance while handling a
4-MHz sawtooth at 25 Amps (p-p), so the frequency band is roughly 4 to
20 MHz, to cover the first five harmonics Which harmonic causes the
most heating?
The dimensions et al are the construction details needed for Highland
to be able to replicate the part without your help.
Lo these forty year gone, I had this RF gig that involved making a lot of
VHF LC oscillatior and filter protos.
I still design LC oscillators!
Post by Phil Hobbs
We had a hand-cranked coil winder that had a good selection of cylindrical
steel mandrels with helical grooves to guide the wire, plus three or four
sheets with tables of measured values for single-layer coils of various
lengths. With a couple of training runs, one learned how hard to pull on
the wire so that it would just spring free from the mandrel.
That made it easy to make nice looking, high-Q coils for the inductance
range of interest. Good Medicine.
Cheers
Phil Hobbs
Coilcraft makes a bunch of bare-naked RF inductors.
https://www.coilcraft.com/en-us/products/rf/air-core-inductors/midi-spring/1812sms/?skuId=26054|26274
What's surprising is that the "natural" tempco of a copper solenoid
inductor runs around +120 ppm/degC, but this one is around +40. The
plastic must compensate for the copper somehow.
Sounds awfully high.
To about 1% accuracy (over most useful aspect ratios), the inductance of a
single-layer coil is
L(uH) = a**2 n**2 /(9a + 10b),
Where a is the mean radius and b is the overall length, both in inches.
If the thermal expansion is unconstrained, a and b vary together, so the TC
of inductance of such a coil is the same as the CTE of copper, about 17
ppm/K.
A solid plastic form is strong enough to stretch the copper and increase
the TCL to the CTE of the plastic.
If the length only is constant, the TCL is increased, and for a short fat
coil it’s nearly doubled.
In the case of something like B&W Miniductor, which has fairly fine-pitched
turns held by a few small axial stringers, the plastic stretches the length
of the coil but leaves the radial expansion free.
Because both a and b enter in the denominator, it’s possible to choose
dimensions that make the TCL of a Miniductor or similar coil very nearly
zero.
A normal single layer coil has a TCL around +30 ppm. I’ve never measured
one as bad as +120.
Cheers
Phil Hobbs
I posted a followup to my tc comment, but sometimes usenet posts
disappear.

Right, the L of a loop goes about as d-squared, so the +17 PPM TCE of
copper should make L increase at maybe 35 PPM.

We have measured much higher tempcos of small inductors used in our
triggered LC oscillators. That may be a secondary effect of
encapsulation or something. I was pleased that the Coilcraft Midi
parts were about +40 and apparently very stable.

We have used some surface-mount coils that not only had awful tc's,
but their L would creep over months as the potting stuff apparently
flowed. Annealing helped.

Inductors are a pain.
john larkin
2024-09-03 18:39:41 UTC
Permalink
On Mon, 02 Sep 2024 14:57:39 -0700, john larkin
Post by john larkin
On Mon, 2 Sep 2024 15:25:59 -0000 (UTC), Phil Hobbs
Post by Phil Hobbs
Post by Joe Gwinn
On Sun, 01 Sep 2024 19:49:39 -0700, john larkin
Post by john larkin
Post by Joe Gwinn
On Sun, 01 Sep 2024 13:17:03 -0700, john larkin
Post by john larkin
Post by Joe Gwinn
On Sun, 1 Sep 2024 17:55:58 -0000 (UTC), Phil Hobbs
Post by Phil Hobbs
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Fri, 30 Aug 2024 00:43:39 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
Post by Bill Sloman
It's lot easier and quicker to bread-board a circuit in LTSpice than it
is to wire up a test circuit, but what that means is that you need to
make fewer real circuits and they are a lot more likely to work when tested.
That, on it's own, is enough to explain why labs look different today
than they did in the dark ages.
All it explains is boeings falling apart and astronuts ending up stuck at the ISS
and no moonlanding from the US, not even a probe.
Slimulations are _not_ realty and never will be.
But they can capture useful parts of reality, if you know what you are
doing.
John Larkin's simulated inductors tend not to have any parallel capacitance.
The trick is to know when it matters. ESR and core loss are usually
more important.
I designed this surface-mount inductor for my Pockels Cell driver,
after several tries using commercial parts. They all smoked.
It's wound on a specially marked Sharpie pen that we have carefully
reserved.
It better have a regular calibration schedule, or your semiconductor
customers may give you the raised eyebrow.
Hmm. To be overly serious: With traceability to NIST (US) or NPL
(UK) or the like.
The trend in standards is to eliminate standards tied to a physical
object.
I have a Sharpie in hand. The barrel that is not covered by the cap
is a truncated cone, being 11.0 mm at the blunt end and 12.32 mm near
the cap, 73 mm away.
Mine is pretty cylindrical for the length of the coil. I expect that
the operator's (ie, my) applied tension affects the radius too.
Most likely.
Post by john larkin
That inductor sees 25 amps p-p, roughly a sawtooth, at 4 MHz. The
Coilcraft parts that I tried all smoked, I guess from skin effect and
proximity effect.
Post by Joe Gwinn
Actually, all that's needed is to specify an ideal geometric shape,
with tolerances, in the formal documentation.
Joe Gwinn
I'll have someone start on a SolidWorks model.
I bet you need the standoff, so the lossy FR4 material isn't too
close. That should be in the requirements as well.
The turns squish down into the gap-pad gunk, which is an OK heat
conductor. The PCB under the pad is a big copper pour, top and bottom,
with a zillion thermal vias. There's more gap-pad on the underside of
the board to dump heat into the baseplate.
At 4 MHz, skin depth is 32 microns, so most of the copper is wasted.
That's why it gets so hot.
I tried three of the Coilcraft 1010VS parts in series, but they
smoked, probably skin+proximity effect. Maybe parallel would have
been better.
Post by Joe Gwinn
I'd specify the coil dimensions, not the mandrel dimensions, which may
be provided as a helpful suggestion only.
Joe Gwinn
I could have a mandrel machined or 3D printed, to more accurately wind
the inductor. The improvement would be mostly cosmetic.
Or choose a 12mm OD mandrel, and adjust elsewhere. The advantage of
12mm is that it's a common size. so just buy the rod and use it.
.<https://www.mcmaster.com/products/shafts/shafts-2~/rotary-shafts-5/diameter~12-mm/>
Actually, the requirement is a certain inductance while handling a
4-MHz sawtooth at 25 Amps (p-p), so the frequency band is roughly 4 to
20 MHz, to cover the first five harmonics Which harmonic causes the
most heating?
The dimensions et al are the construction details needed for Highland
to be able to replicate the part without your help.
Lo these forty year gone, I had this RF gig that involved making a lot of
VHF LC oscillatior and filter protos.
I still design LC oscillators!
Post by Phil Hobbs
We had a hand-cranked coil winder that had a good selection of cylindrical
steel mandrels with helical grooves to guide the wire, plus three or four
sheets with tables of measured values for single-layer coils of various
lengths. With a couple of training runs, one learned how hard to pull on
the wire so that it would just spring free from the mandrel.
That made it easy to make nice looking, high-Q coils for the inductance
range of interest. Good Medicine.
Cheers
Phil Hobbs
Coilcraft makes a bunch of bare-naked RF inductors.
https://www.coilcraft.com/en-us/products/rf/air-core-inductors/midi-spring/1812sms/?skuId=26054|26274
What's surprising is that the "natural" tempco of a copper solenoid
inductor runs around +120 ppm/degC, but this one is around +40. The
plastic must compensate for the copper somehow.
Actually, the tce of copper is only about 17 PPM, so a loop should
increase L by about 35 PPM/deg C. I don't know why we've seen lots of
inductors in the +100 range.
john larkin
2024-09-02 15:51:45 UTC
Permalink
Post by Joe Gwinn
On Sun, 01 Sep 2024 19:49:39 -0700, john larkin
Post by john larkin
Post by Joe Gwinn
On Sun, 01 Sep 2024 13:17:03 -0700, john larkin
Post by john larkin
Post by Joe Gwinn
On Sun, 1 Sep 2024 17:55:58 -0000 (UTC), Phil Hobbs
Post by Phil Hobbs
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Fri, 30 Aug 2024 00:43:39 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
Post by Bill Sloman
It's lot easier and quicker to bread-board a circuit in LTSpice than it
is to wire up a test circuit, but what that means is that you need to
make fewer real circuits and they are a lot more likely to work when tested.
That, on it's own, is enough to explain why labs look different today
than they did in the dark ages.
All it explains is boeings falling apart and astronuts ending up stuck at the ISS
and no moonlanding from the US, not even a probe.
Slimulations are _not_ realty and never will be.
But they can capture useful parts of reality, if you know what you are
doing.
John Larkin's simulated inductors tend not to have any parallel capacitance.
The trick is to know when it matters. ESR and core loss are usually
more important.
I designed this surface-mount inductor for my Pockels Cell driver,
after several tries using commercial parts. They all smoked.
It's wound on a specially marked Sharpie pen that we have carefully
reserved.
It better have a regular calibration schedule, or your semiconductor
customers may give you the raised eyebrow.
Hmm. To be overly serious: With traceability to NIST (US) or NPL
(UK) or the like.
The trend in standards is to eliminate standards tied to a physical
object.
I have a Sharpie in hand. The barrel that is not covered by the cap
is a truncated cone, being 11.0 mm at the blunt end and 12.32 mm near
the cap, 73 mm away.
Mine is pretty cylindrical for the length of the coil. I expect that
the operator's (ie, my) applied tension affects the radius too.
Most likely.
Post by john larkin
That inductor sees 25 amps p-p, roughly a sawtooth, at 4 MHz. The
Coilcraft parts that I tried all smoked, I guess from skin effect and
proximity effect.
Post by Joe Gwinn
Actually, all that's needed is to specify an ideal geometric shape,
with tolerances, in the formal documentation.
Joe Gwinn
I'll have someone start on a SolidWorks model.
I bet you need the standoff, so the lossy FR4 material isn't too
close. That should be in the requirements as well.
The turns squish down into the gap-pad gunk, which is an OK heat
conductor. The PCB under the pad is a big copper pour, top and bottom,
with a zillion thermal vias. There's more gap-pad on the underside of
the board to dump heat into the baseplate.
At 4 MHz, skin depth is 32 microns, so most of the copper is wasted.
That's why it gets so hot.
I tried three of the Coilcraft 1010VS parts in series, but they
smoked, probably skin+proximity effect. Maybe parallel would have
been better.
Post by Joe Gwinn
I'd specify the coil dimensions, not the mandrel dimensions, which may
be provided as a helpful suggestion only.
Joe Gwinn
I could have a mandrel machined or 3D printed, to more accurately wind
the inductor. The improvement would be mostly cosmetic.
Or choose a 12mm OD mandrel, and adjust elsewhere. The advantage of
12mm is that it's a common size. so just buy the rod and use it.
.<https://www.mcmaster.com/products/shafts/shafts-2~/rotary-shafts-5/diameter~12-mm/>
Actually, the requirement is a certain inductance while handling a
4-MHz sawtooth at 25 Amps (p-p), so the frequency band is roughly 4 to
20 MHz, to cover the first five harmonics Which harmonic causes the
most heating?
That's past my pay grade. I wound coils until it worked. The cooling
issues complicate things.

How about Litz wire wound on a spiral-grooved aluminum nitride tube,
with air blown inside maybe?
Post by Joe Gwinn
The dimensions et al are the construction details needed for Highland
to be able to replicate the part without your help.
Post by john larkin
Inductors are a pain.
But useful. Or essential in some cases.
Joe Gwinn
We are lucky to have resistors and capacitors and inductors, linear
and derivative and integral. There is no thermal equivalent of an
inductor, which is why thermal systems are dynamically sloppy.
Joe Gwinn
2024-09-02 16:47:24 UTC
Permalink
On Mon, 02 Sep 2024 08:51:45 -0700, john larkin
Post by john larkin
Post by Joe Gwinn
On Sun, 01 Sep 2024 19:49:39 -0700, john larkin
Post by john larkin
Post by Joe Gwinn
On Sun, 01 Sep 2024 13:17:03 -0700, john larkin
Post by john larkin
Post by Joe Gwinn
On Sun, 1 Sep 2024 17:55:58 -0000 (UTC), Phil Hobbs
Post by Phil Hobbs
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Fri, 30 Aug 2024 00:43:39 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
Post by Bill Sloman
It's lot easier and quicker to bread-board a circuit in LTSpice than it
is to wire up a test circuit, but what that means is that you need to
make fewer real circuits and they are a lot more likely to work when tested.
That, on it's own, is enough to explain why labs look different today
than they did in the dark ages.
All it explains is boeings falling apart and astronuts ending up stuck at the ISS
and no moonlanding from the US, not even a probe.
Slimulations are _not_ realty and never will be.
But they can capture useful parts of reality, if you know what you are
doing.
John Larkin's simulated inductors tend not to have any parallel capacitance.
The trick is to know when it matters. ESR and core loss are usually
more important.
I designed this surface-mount inductor for my Pockels Cell driver,
after several tries using commercial parts. They all smoked.
It's wound on a specially marked Sharpie pen that we have carefully
reserved.
It better have a regular calibration schedule, or your semiconductor
customers may give you the raised eyebrow.
Hmm. To be overly serious: With traceability to NIST (US) or NPL
(UK) or the like.
The trend in standards is to eliminate standards tied to a physical
object.
I have a Sharpie in hand. The barrel that is not covered by the cap
is a truncated cone, being 11.0 mm at the blunt end and 12.32 mm near
the cap, 73 mm away.
Mine is pretty cylindrical for the length of the coil. I expect that
the operator's (ie, my) applied tension affects the radius too.
Most likely.
Post by john larkin
That inductor sees 25 amps p-p, roughly a sawtooth, at 4 MHz. The
Coilcraft parts that I tried all smoked, I guess from skin effect and
proximity effect.
Post by Joe Gwinn
Actually, all that's needed is to specify an ideal geometric shape,
with tolerances, in the formal documentation.
Joe Gwinn
I'll have someone start on a SolidWorks model.
I bet you need the standoff, so the lossy FR4 material isn't too
close. That should be in the requirements as well.
The turns squish down into the gap-pad gunk, which is an OK heat
conductor. The PCB under the pad is a big copper pour, top and bottom,
with a zillion thermal vias. There's more gap-pad on the underside of
the board to dump heat into the baseplate.
At 4 MHz, skin depth is 32 microns, so most of the copper is wasted.
That's why it gets so hot.
I tried three of the Coilcraft 1010VS parts in series, but they
smoked, probably skin+proximity effect. Maybe parallel would have
been better.
Post by Joe Gwinn
I'd specify the coil dimensions, not the mandrel dimensions, which may
be provided as a helpful suggestion only.
Joe Gwinn
I could have a mandrel machined or 3D printed, to more accurately wind
the inductor. The improvement would be mostly cosmetic.
Or choose a 12mm OD mandrel, and adjust elsewhere. The advantage of
12mm is that it's a common size. so just buy the rod and use it.
.<https://www.mcmaster.com/products/shafts/shafts-2~/rotary-shafts-5/diameter~12-mm/>
Actually, the requirement is a certain inductance while handling a
4-MHz sawtooth at 25 Amps (p-p), so the frequency band is roughly 4 to
20 MHz, to cover the first five harmonics Which harmonic causes the
most heating?
That's past my pay grade. I wound coils until it worked. The cooling
issues complicate things.
I'd compute it. The fundamental may not be the whole story.
Post by john larkin
How about Litz wire wound on a spiral-grooved aluminum nitride tube,
with air blown inside maybe?
That could certainly work, but would be far more expensive that the
plain coil currently used. I would conformal coat the assembly for
thermal contact between wire and AlN tube. Best thermal story would
be silicon-rubber conformal coating.
Post by john larkin
Post by Joe Gwinn
The dimensions et al are the construction details needed for Highland
to be able to replicate the part without your help.
Post by john larkin
Inductors are a pain.
But useful. Or essential in some cases.
For one use case, using a toroid with both supply leads (ort and back)
threaded through the aperture allows one to measure the common current
and the differential current (reverse one wire) with essentially
infinite CMRR (needs shields), over a very wide dynamic range.
Post by john larkin
Post by Joe Gwinn
Joe Gwinn
We are lucky to have resistors and capacitors and inductors, linear
and derivative and integral. There is no thermal equivalent of an
inductor, which is why thermal systems are dynamically sloppy.
Yes.

Joe Gwinn
john larkin
2024-09-02 15:36:53 UTC
Permalink
Post by Joe Gwinn
On Sun, 01 Sep 2024 13:17:03 -0700, john larkin
Post by john larkin
Post by Joe Gwinn
On Sun, 1 Sep 2024 17:55:58 -0000 (UTC), Phil Hobbs
Post by Phil Hobbs
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Fri, 30 Aug 2024 00:43:39 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
Post by Bill Sloman
It's lot easier and quicker to bread-board a circuit in LTSpice than it
is to wire up a test circuit, but what that means is that you need to
make fewer real circuits and they are a lot more likely to work when tested.
That, on it's own, is enough to explain why labs look different today
than they did in the dark ages.
All it explains is boeings falling apart and astronuts ending up stuck at the ISS
and no moonlanding from the US, not even a probe.
Slimulations are _not_ realty and never will be.
But they can capture useful parts of reality, if you know what you are
doing.
John Larkin's simulated inductors tend not to have any parallel capacitance.
The trick is to know when it matters. ESR and core loss are usually
more important.
I designed this surface-mount inductor for my Pockels Cell driver,
after several tries using commercial parts. They all smoked.
It's wound on a specially marked Sharpie pen that we have carefully
reserved.
It better have a regular calibration schedule, or your semiconductor
customers may give you the raised eyebrow.
Hmm. To be overly serious: With traceability to NIST (US) or NPL
(UK) or the like.
The trend in standards is to eliminate standards tied to a physical
object.
I have a Sharpie in hand. The barrel that is not covered by the cap
is a truncated cone, being 11.0 mm at the blunt end and 12.32 mm near
the cap, 73 mm away.
Mine is pretty cylindrical for the length of the coil. I expect that
the operator's (ie, my) applied tension affects the radius too.
Most likely.
Post by john larkin
That inductor sees 25 amps p-p, roughly a sawtooth, at 4 MHz. The
Coilcraft parts that I tried all smoked, I guess from skin effect and
proximity effect.
Post by Joe Gwinn
Actually, all that's needed is to specify an ideal geometric shape,
with tolerances, in the formal documentation.
Joe Gwinn
I'll have someone start on a SolidWorks model.
I bet you need the standoff, so the lossy FR4 material isn't too
close. That should be in the requirements as well.
That's another function of the gap-pad material. And the flattish part
of the circular solenoid windings make a big contact area into the
pads, for more heat transfer.
Post by Joe Gwinn
I'd specify the coil dimensions, not the mandrel dimensions, which may
be provided as a helpful suggestion only.
It would be cool is the bottom of the windings were actually flat, a
square or elliptical winding, for more heat transfer area.
Post by Joe Gwinn
Joe Gwinn
Joe Gwinn
2024-09-02 16:39:19 UTC
Permalink
On Mon, 02 Sep 2024 08:36:53 -0700, john larkin
Post by john larkin
Post by Joe Gwinn
On Sun, 01 Sep 2024 13:17:03 -0700, john larkin
Post by john larkin
Post by Joe Gwinn
On Sun, 1 Sep 2024 17:55:58 -0000 (UTC), Phil Hobbs
Post by Phil Hobbs
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Fri, 30 Aug 2024 00:43:39 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
Post by Bill Sloman
It's lot easier and quicker to bread-board a circuit in LTSpice than it
is to wire up a test circuit, but what that means is that you need to
make fewer real circuits and they are a lot more likely to work when tested.
That, on it's own, is enough to explain why labs look different today
than they did in the dark ages.
All it explains is boeings falling apart and astronuts ending up stuck at the ISS
and no moonlanding from the US, not even a probe.
Slimulations are _not_ realty and never will be.
But they can capture useful parts of reality, if you know what you are
doing.
John Larkin's simulated inductors tend not to have any parallel capacitance.
The trick is to know when it matters. ESR and core loss are usually
more important.
I designed this surface-mount inductor for my Pockels Cell driver,
after several tries using commercial parts. They all smoked.
It's wound on a specially marked Sharpie pen that we have carefully
reserved.
It better have a regular calibration schedule, or your semiconductor
customers may give you the raised eyebrow.
Hmm. To be overly serious: With traceability to NIST (US) or NPL
(UK) or the like.
The trend in standards is to eliminate standards tied to a physical
object.
I have a Sharpie in hand. The barrel that is not covered by the cap
is a truncated cone, being 11.0 mm at the blunt end and 12.32 mm near
the cap, 73 mm away.
Mine is pretty cylindrical for the length of the coil. I expect that
the operator's (ie, my) applied tension affects the radius too.
Most likely.
Post by john larkin
That inductor sees 25 amps p-p, roughly a sawtooth, at 4 MHz. The
Coilcraft parts that I tried all smoked, I guess from skin effect and
proximity effect.
Post by Joe Gwinn
Actually, all that's needed is to specify an ideal geometric shape,
with tolerances, in the formal documentation.
Joe Gwinn
I'll have someone start on a SolidWorks model.
I bet you need the standoff, so the lossy FR4 material isn't too
close. That should be in the requirements as well.
That's another function of the gap-pad material. And the flattish part
of the circular solenoid windings make a big contact area into the
pads, for more heat transfer.
All good. Needs to be in the drawing.
Post by john larkin
Post by Joe Gwinn
I'd specify the coil dimensions, not the mandrel dimensions, which may
be provided as a helpful suggestion only.
It would be cool is the bottom of the windings were actually flat, a
square or elliptical winding, for more heat transfer area.
.<https://www.mcmaster.com/products/~/d-profile-rotary-shafts-5/?s=shafts%2Fshafts-2%7E%2Frotary-shafts-5%2Fdiameter%7E12-mm>

This is what's easily available. If you make your own mandrels, they
can be any shape. Make sure that at least one end has a index slot or
radial hole, to make winding easier by allowing the clock angle of the
mandrel easily fixed.

Joe Gwinn
piglet
2024-09-09 18:51:52 UTC
Permalink
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Fri, 30 Aug 2024 00:43:39 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
Post by Bill Sloman
It's lot easier and quicker to bread-board a circuit in LTSpice than it
is to wire up a test circuit, but what that means is that you need to
make fewer real circuits and they are a lot more likely to work when tested.
That, on it's own, is enough to explain why labs look different today
than they did in the dark ages.
All it explains is boeings falling apart and astronuts ending up stuck at the ISS
and no moonlanding from the US, not even a probe.
Slimulations are _not_ realty and never will be.
But they can capture useful parts of reality, if you know what you are
doing.
John Larkin's simulated inductors tend not to have any parallel capacitance.
The trick is to know when it matters. ESR and core loss are usually
more important.
I designed this surface-mount inductor for my Pockels Cell driver,
after several tries using commercial parts. They all smoked.
It's wound on a specially marked Sharpie pen that we have carefully
reserved.
https://www.highlandtechnology.com/Product/T850
The grey gap-pad gives it some extra cooling. The board has lots of
thermal vias down to the water-cooled baseplate.
That sharpie formed coil looks like the turn-to-turn air-spacing is done
by eyeball? Can you find a bolt or screw with right pitch and diameter
to make winding easier?

piglet
Jeroen Belleman
2024-09-09 20:24:23 UTC
Permalink
Post by piglet
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Fri, 30 Aug 2024 00:43:39 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
Post by Bill Sloman
It's lot easier and quicker to bread-board a circuit in LTSpice than it
is to wire up a test circuit, but what that means is that you need to
make fewer real circuits and they are a lot more likely to work when tested.
That, on it's own, is enough to explain why labs look different today
than they did in the dark ages.
All it explains is boeings falling apart and astronuts ending up stuck at the ISS
and no moonlanding from the US, not even a probe.
Slimulations are _not_ realty and never will be.
But they can capture useful parts of reality, if you know what you are
doing.
John Larkin's simulated inductors tend not to have any parallel capacitance.
The trick is to know when it matters. ESR and core loss are usually
more important.
I designed this surface-mount inductor for my Pockels Cell driver,
after several tries using commercial parts. They all smoked.
It's wound on a specially marked Sharpie pen that we have carefully
reserved.
https://www.highlandtechnology.com/Product/T850
The grey gap-pad gives it some extra cooling. The board has lots of
thermal vias down to the water-cooled baseplate.
That sharpie formed coil looks like the turn-to-turn air-spacing is done
by eyeball? Can you find a bolt or screw with right pitch and diameter
to make winding easier?
piglet
It /does/ look a bit messy.

To get nice even spacing in hand-wound coils, I would pull on
the wire until it gave just a bit, then wind it tightly spaced
on a mandrel of appropriate size and finally, stick a toothpick,
or something like that, transversely through the turns, 'screwing'
it from one end to the other. My coils ended up looking perfectly
neat.

Jeroen Belleman
Liz Tuddenham
2024-09-09 21:15:50 UTC
Permalink
Jeroen Belleman <***@nospam.please> wrote:

[...]
Post by Jeroen Belleman
To get nice even spacing in hand-wound coils, I would pull on
the wire until it gave just a bit, then wind it tightly spaced
on a mandrel of appropriate size and finally, stick a toothpick,
or something like that, transversely through the turns, 'screwing'
it from one end to the other. My coils ended up looking perfectly
neat.
Another method is to wind two wires tightly side-by-side to get the
correct spacing, then unwind one of them.
--
~ Liz Tuddenham ~
(Remove the ".invalid"s and add ".co.uk" to reply)
www.poppyrecords.co.uk
john larkin
2024-09-09 21:27:38 UTC
Permalink
Post by piglet
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Fri, 30 Aug 2024 00:43:39 +1000) it happened Bill Sloman
Post by Bill Sloman
It's lot easier and quicker to bread-board a circuit in LTSpice than it
is to wire up a test circuit, but what that means is that you need to
make fewer real circuits and they are a lot more likely to work when tested.
That, on it's own, is enough to explain why labs look different today
than they did in the dark ages.
All it explains is boeings falling apart and astronuts ending up stuck at the ISS
and no moonlanding from the US, not even a probe.
Slimulations are _not_ realty and never will be.
But they can capture useful parts of reality, if you know what you are
doing.
John Larkin's simulated inductors tend not to have any parallel capacitance.
The trick is to know when it matters. ESR and core loss are usually
more important.
I designed this surface-mount inductor for my Pockels Cell driver,
after several tries using commercial parts. They all smoked.
It's wound on a specially marked Sharpie pen that we have carefully
reserved.
https://www.highlandtechnology.com/Product/T850
The grey gap-pad gives it some extra cooling. The board has lots of
thermal vias down to the water-cooled baseplate.
That sharpie formed coil looks like the turn-to-turn air-spacing is done
by eyeball? Can you find a bolt or screw with right pitch and diameter
to make winding easier?
piglet
I recursively used another Sharpie to make some tic marks, to space
the turns.

Jan Panteltje
2024-08-29 16:15:59 UTC
Permalink
On a sunny day (Thu, 29 Aug 2024 07:16:58 -0700) it happened john larkin
Post by john larkin
On Thu, 29 Aug 2024 06:55:15 -0700, john larkin
Post by john larkin
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Wed, 28 Aug 2024 09:32:58 -0700) it happened john larkin
Post by john larkin
On Wed, 28 Aug 2024 15:21:00 -0000 (UTC), Sergey Kubushyn
Post by Sergey Kubushyn
Post by john larkin
On Wed, 28 Aug 2024 04:28:02 -0000 (UTC), Sergey Kubushyn
Post by Sergey Kubushyn
Post by john larkin
On Tue, 27 Aug 2024 14:55:32 -0400 (EDT), Martin Rid
Post by Martin Rid
john larkin <jlarkin_highland_tech> Wrote in message:r
Post by john larkin
?>>Any
good?>>$350 at tequipment>>CheersI haven't tried that one. We like the Rigols.I recently acquired a
Siglenthttps://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B06XZML6RD/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1and gave it to one
of my engineers. I'll ask him how he
likes it.It has an up-front DEFAULT button, which a digital scope needs to getyou out of nightmare states.
Other than the lack of software features, the 200mhz bw for 350
dollars is intriguing.
Cheers
It sounds pretty good to me.
https://siglentna.com/wp-content/uploads/dlm_uploads/2020/02/SDS1000X-E_DataSheet_DS0101E-E04C.pdf
What's missing?
I like the 500 uV/div.
If you want to save the last penny, maybe. But you can get way better scope
for slightly more -- Rigol DHO800/DHO900. It is 12-bit, same 550uV/div, has
all standard serial protocols decoding, very light and compact, can work
from a battery with USB-C power connector, way better than that Siglent that
feels like relic next to those DHOs.
We use almost all Rigols at work. My slow bench scope is a 500 MHz
DS4034 (upgraded from 350 MHz)
https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fo/ns08x686afbayjsw8c2ab/h?rlkey=iu4h89057t755pueg4ijnldbo&dl=0
and my fast scope is a Tek 11802 sampler.
I also have one, 11801C. Couple of SD-24s, SD-20, and SD-22 heads :)
At the original purchase price, adjusted for inflation, I must have
half a million dollars worth of sampling heads.
The color grading and jitter measurement is great on the 11801C, but
the old B+W screens photograph better.
I'll miss my 11802 when it eventually dies.
The TDR is great. I'm going to give my new kids a lecture on
transmission lines, and I'll show them some TDR.
It is apparently possible these days to get an EE degree and be
completely ignorant of transmission lines. Or even electricity.
oops!
Then what DO they know?
How to type c++
One issue here is that it's cheaper and easier to teach coding, than
it is to teach electronics.
I walked through the Cornell EE school. I saw about 25 computer
screens and one oscilloscope.
In the school where I was we had plenty of scopes and stuff.
Some teachers were very old, from before the transistor age...
The concensus was that 'only true hobbyists make it'
I think we started with 2 classes of 30, we had 6 at the final exams that had passed at the party
I did 2 exams at the same time, one from te gov and one from the school.
I remember one question 'draw a PCB for this transistor circuit'
does that still happen?
I thought it was fun:-)
Computers? There were none..
Calculators yes.
john larkin
2024-08-29 18:50:33 UTC
Permalink
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Thu, 29 Aug 2024 07:16:58 -0700) it happened john larkin
Post by john larkin
On Thu, 29 Aug 2024 06:55:15 -0700, john larkin
Post by john larkin
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Wed, 28 Aug 2024 09:32:58 -0700) it happened john larkin
Post by john larkin
On Wed, 28 Aug 2024 15:21:00 -0000 (UTC), Sergey Kubushyn
Post by Sergey Kubushyn
Post by john larkin
On Wed, 28 Aug 2024 04:28:02 -0000 (UTC), Sergey Kubushyn
Post by Sergey Kubushyn
Post by john larkin
On Tue, 27 Aug 2024 14:55:32 -0400 (EDT), Martin Rid
Post by Martin Rid
john larkin <jlarkin_highland_tech> Wrote in message:r
Post by john larkin
?>>Any
good?>>$350 at tequipment>>CheersI haven't tried that one. We like the Rigols.I recently acquired a
Siglenthttps://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B06XZML6RD/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1and gave it to one
of my engineers. I'll ask him how he
likes it.It has an up-front DEFAULT button, which a digital scope needs to getyou out of nightmare states.
Other than the lack of software features, the 200mhz bw for 350
dollars is intriguing.
Cheers
It sounds pretty good to me.
https://siglentna.com/wp-content/uploads/dlm_uploads/2020/02/SDS1000X-E_DataSheet_DS0101E-E04C.pdf
What's missing?
I like the 500 uV/div.
If you want to save the last penny, maybe. But you can get way better scope
for slightly more -- Rigol DHO800/DHO900. It is 12-bit, same 550uV/div, has
all standard serial protocols decoding, very light and compact, can work
from a battery with USB-C power connector, way better than that Siglent that
feels like relic next to those DHOs.
We use almost all Rigols at work. My slow bench scope is a 500 MHz
DS4034 (upgraded from 350 MHz)
https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fo/ns08x686afbayjsw8c2ab/h?rlkey=iu4h89057t755pueg4ijnldbo&dl=0
and my fast scope is a Tek 11802 sampler.
I also have one, 11801C. Couple of SD-24s, SD-20, and SD-22 heads :)
At the original purchase price, adjusted for inflation, I must have
half a million dollars worth of sampling heads.
The color grading and jitter measurement is great on the 11801C, but
the old B+W screens photograph better.
I'll miss my 11802 when it eventually dies.
The TDR is great. I'm going to give my new kids a lecture on
transmission lines, and I'll show them some TDR.
It is apparently possible these days to get an EE degree and be
completely ignorant of transmission lines. Or even electricity.
oops!
Then what DO they know?
How to type c++
One issue here is that it's cheaper and easier to teach coding, than
it is to teach electronics.
I walked through the Cornell EE school. I saw about 25 computer
screens and one oscilloscope.
In the school where I was we had plenty of scopes and stuff.
Some teachers were very old, from before the transistor age...
The concensus was that 'only true hobbyists make it'
I think we started with 2 classes of 30, we had 6 at the final exams that had passed at the party
I did 2 exams at the same time, one from te gov and one from the school.
I remember one question 'draw a PCB for this transistor circuit'
does that still happen?
I thought it was fun:-)
Computers? There were none..
Calculators yes.
We weren't alowed to use a calculator on exams because it would give
an unfair advantage to the students that could afford one.

My HP35 cost $400, a bit more than my Honda S90 motorcycle.
Liz Tuddenham
2024-08-29 20:50:19 UTC
Permalink
Post by john larkin
[...]
Post by Jan Panteltje
Calculators yes.
We weren't alowed to use a calculator on exams because it would give
an unfair advantage to the students that could afford one.
We were allowed mechanical calculators (Facits etc.) but there were only
enough for half the candidates. Half of us were locked in a room with a
spare envigilator acting as a guard while the other half sat the exam
then we swapped places and the ones who had taken the exam were locked
in while the second group sat the exam.

Electronic calculators did not exist, but we did learn to program an
analogue computer where 100v = 1 Machine Unit.
--
~ Liz Tuddenham ~
(Remove the ".invalid"s and add ".co.uk" to reply)
www.poppyrecords.co.uk
john larkin
2024-08-31 14:24:33 UTC
Permalink
Post by Liz Tuddenham
Post by john larkin
[...]
Post by Jan Panteltje
Calculators yes.
We weren't alowed to use a calculator on exams because it would give
an unfair advantage to the students that could afford one.
We were allowed mechanical calculators (Facits etc.) but there were only
enough for half the candidates. Half of us were locked in a room with a
spare envigilator acting as a guard while the other half sat the exam
then we swapped places and the ones who had taken the exam were locked
in while the second group sat the exam.
Electronic calculators did not exist, but we did learn to program an
analogue computer where 100v = 1 Machine Unit.
A lot of current engineering practise is left over from the days when
computing was expensive or non-existant. Things like s-parameters and
Smith charts.
Phil Hobbs
2024-08-31 17:59:04 UTC
Permalink
Post by john larkin
Post by Liz Tuddenham
Post by john larkin
[...]
Post by Jan Panteltje
Calculators yes.
We weren't alowed to use a calculator on exams because it would give
an unfair advantage to the students that could afford one.
We were allowed mechanical calculators (Facits etc.) but there were only
enough for half the candidates. Half of us were locked in a room with a
spare envigilator acting as a guard while the other half sat the exam
then we swapped places and the ones who had taken the exam were locked
in while the second group sat the exam.
Electronic calculators did not exist, but we did learn to program an
analogue computer where 100v = 1 Machine Unit.
A lot of current engineering practise is left over from the days when
computing was expensive or non-existant. Things like s-parameters and
Smith charts.
I’ve done a lot of lowish-power RF stuff, and mostly agree with you about
the practicality of using S parameters in hand calculations.

However, I cordially disagree with your sentiments regarding Smith charts.

For one thing, they’re super useful for designing optical coatings, but
that’s a minority interest on SED.

In RF work one runs into a lot of matching jobs involving modulated sine
waves.

One typical example from my work is coupling sine modulation into a diode
laser, for modulation-generated carrier interferometry. (*)

A Smith chart makes it super easy to try out different schemes, such as
series/shunt stubs, lumped elements, or any combination thereof.

Useless for bandwidths of an octave or more, and so apt to be undervalued
by crass time-domain types. ;)

Cheers

Phil Hobbs

(*)MGC is dear to my heart—it’s about the only thing I’ve ever invented
that was published by someone else first. (There are an amazing number of
things to work on.)

You put sinusoidal FM on the laser, and adjust the amplitude to the first
carrier null (M=2.405 radians) at the interferometer output. At that point
the first (Q phase) and second (I phase) signals are the same size, and
account for about 85% of the total signal power.

That lets you measure the complex signal just by looking at the amplitudes
of the first two harmonics. Great for fiber sensors and other situations
where there’s a lot of low frequency instability.
--
Dr Philip C D Hobbs Principal Consultant ElectroOptical Innovations LLC /
Hobbs ElectroOptics Optics, Electro-optics, Photonics, Analog Electronics
john larkin
2024-08-31 18:44:20 UTC
Permalink
On Sat, 31 Aug 2024 17:59:04 -0000 (UTC), Phil Hobbs
Post by john larkin
Post by Liz Tuddenham
Post by john larkin
[...]
Post by Jan Panteltje
Calculators yes.
We weren't alowed to use a calculator on exams because it would give
an unfair advantage to the students that could afford one.
We were allowed mechanical calculators (Facits etc.) but there were only
enough for half the candidates. Half of us were locked in a room with a
spare envigilator acting as a guard while the other half sat the exam
then we swapped places and the ones who had taken the exam were locked
in while the second group sat the exam.
Electronic calculators did not exist, but we did learn to program an
analogue computer where 100v = 1 Machine Unit.
A lot of current engineering practise is left over from the days when
computing was expensive or non-existant. Things like s-parameters and
Smith charts.
I’ve done a lot of lowish-power RF stuff, and mostly agree with you about
the practicality of using S parameters in hand calculations.
However, I cordially disagree with your sentiments regarding Smith charts.
For one thing, they’re super useful for designing optical coatings, but
that’s a minority interest on SED.
In RF work one runs into a lot of matching jobs involving modulated sine
waves.
One typical example from my work is coupling sine modulation into a diode
laser, for modulation-generated carrier interferometry. (*)
A Smith chart makes it super easy to try out different schemes, such as
series/shunt stubs, lumped elements, or any combination thereof.
Useless for bandwidths of an octave or more, and so apt to be undervalued
by crass time-domain types. ;)
The interesting parts of the world are wideband and nonlinear. So are
we.

Sine waves are BORING.
Phil Hobbs
2024-08-31 20:14:35 UTC
Permalink
Post by john larkin
On Sat, 31 Aug 2024 17:59:04 -0000 (UTC), Phil Hobbs
Post by john larkin
Post by Liz Tuddenham
Post by john larkin
[...]
Post by Jan Panteltje
Calculators yes.
We weren't alowed to use a calculator on exams because it would give
an unfair advantage to the students that could afford one.
We were allowed mechanical calculators (Facits etc.) but there were only
enough for half the candidates. Half of us were locked in a room with a
spare envigilator acting as a guard while the other half sat the exam
then we swapped places and the ones who had taken the exam were locked
in while the second group sat the exam.
Electronic calculators did not exist, but we did learn to program an
analogue computer where 100v = 1 Machine Unit.
A lot of current engineering practise is left over from the days when
computing was expensive or non-existant. Things like s-parameters and
Smith charts.
I’ve done a lot of lowish-power RF stuff, and mostly agree with you about
the practicality of using S parameters in hand calculations.
However, I cordially disagree with your sentiments regarding Smith charts.
For one thing, they’re super useful for designing optical coatings, but
that’s a minority interest on SED.
In RF work one runs into a lot of matching jobs involving modulated sine
waves.
One typical example from my work is coupling sine modulation into a diode
laser, for modulation-generated carrier interferometry. (*)
A Smith chart makes it super easy to try out different schemes, such as
series/shunt stubs, lumped elements, or any combination thereof.
Useless for bandwidths of an octave or more, and so apt to be undervalued
by crass time-domain types. ;)
The interesting parts of the world are wideband and nonlinear. So are
we.
I noticed. ;)
Post by john larkin
Sine waves are BORING.
You’ve been hanging out with the wrong crowd, obviously. Tsk tsk.

Cheers

Phil Hobbs
--
Dr Philip C D Hobbs Principal Consultant ElectroOptical Innovations LLC /
Hobbs ElectroOptics Optics, Electro-optics, Photonics, Analog Electronics
ehsjr
2024-08-31 21:43:55 UTC
Permalink
snip
Post by Phil Hobbs
Post by john larkin
Sine waves are BORING.
You’ve been hanging out with the wrong crowd, obviously. Tsk tsk.
:-)
Post by Phil Hobbs
Cheers
Phil Hobbs
john larkin
2024-08-31 23:40:45 UTC
Permalink
On Sat, 31 Aug 2024 20:14:35 -0000 (UTC), Phil Hobbs
Post by Phil Hobbs
Post by john larkin
On Sat, 31 Aug 2024 17:59:04 -0000 (UTC), Phil Hobbs
Post by john larkin
Post by Liz Tuddenham
Post by john larkin
[...]
Post by Jan Panteltje
Calculators yes.
We weren't alowed to use a calculator on exams because it would give
an unfair advantage to the students that could afford one.
We were allowed mechanical calculators (Facits etc.) but there were only
enough for half the candidates. Half of us were locked in a room with a
spare envigilator acting as a guard while the other half sat the exam
then we swapped places and the ones who had taken the exam were locked
in while the second group sat the exam.
Electronic calculators did not exist, but we did learn to program an
analogue computer where 100v = 1 Machine Unit.
A lot of current engineering practise is left over from the days when
computing was expensive or non-existant. Things like s-parameters and
Smith charts.
I?ve done a lot of lowish-power RF stuff, and mostly agree with you about
the practicality of using S parameters in hand calculations.
However, I cordially disagree with your sentiments regarding Smith charts.
For one thing, they?re super useful for designing optical coatings, but
that?s a minority interest on SED.
In RF work one runs into a lot of matching jobs involving modulated sine
waves.
One typical example from my work is coupling sine modulation into a diode
laser, for modulation-generated carrier interferometry. (*)
A Smith chart makes it super easy to try out different schemes, such as
series/shunt stubs, lumped elements, or any combination thereof.
Useless for bandwidths of an octave or more, and so apt to be undervalued
by crass time-domain types. ;)
The interesting parts of the world are wideband and nonlinear. So are
we.
I noticed. ;)
Post by john larkin
Sine waves are BORING.
You’ve been hanging out with the wrong crowd, obviously. Tsk tsk.
Cheers
Phil Hobbs
There is a story about Feynman. Somebody bumped into him in a hallway
and suggested using multilayer mirrors. He came back two days later
with the complete theory of multilayer optical filters.

ASML uses zillion-layer mirrors in their EUV systems, at 13 nm.
Jan Panteltje
2024-08-29 16:06:11 UTC
Permalink
On a sunny day (Thu, 29 Aug 2024 06:55:15 -0700) it happened john larkin
Post by john larkin
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Wed, 28 Aug 2024 09:32:58 -0700) it happened john larkin
Post by john larkin
On Wed, 28 Aug 2024 15:21:00 -0000 (UTC), Sergey Kubushyn
Post by Sergey Kubushyn
Post by john larkin
On Wed, 28 Aug 2024 04:28:02 -0000 (UTC), Sergey Kubushyn
Post by Sergey Kubushyn
Post by john larkin
On Tue, 27 Aug 2024 14:55:32 -0400 (EDT), Martin Rid
Post by Martin Rid
john larkin <jlarkin_highland_tech> Wrote in message:r
good?>>$350 at tequipment>>CheersI haven't tried that one. We like the Rigols.I recently acquired a
Siglenthttps://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B06XZML6RD/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1and gave it to one
of my engineers. I'll ask him how he
likes it.It has an up-front DEFAULT button, which a digital scope needs to getyou out of nightmare states.
Other than the lack of software features, the 200mhz bw for 350
dollars is intriguing.
Cheers
It sounds pretty good to me.
https://siglentna.com/wp-content/uploads/dlm_uploads/2020/02/SDS1000X-E_DataSheet_DS0101E-E04C.pdf
What's missing?
I like the 500 uV/div.
If you want to save the last penny, maybe. But you can get way better scope
for slightly more -- Rigol DHO800/DHO900. It is 12-bit, same 550uV/div, has
all standard serial protocols decoding, very light and compact, can work
from a battery with USB-C power connector, way better than that Siglent that
feels like relic next to those DHOs.
We use almost all Rigols at work. My slow bench scope is a 500 MHz
DS4034 (upgraded from 350 MHz)
https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fo/ns08x686afbayjsw8c2ab/h?rlkey=iu4h89057t755pueg4ijnldbo&dl=0
and my fast scope is a Tek 11802 sampler.
I also have one, 11801C. Couple of SD-24s, SD-20, and SD-22 heads :)
At the original purchase price, adjusted for inflation, I must have
half a million dollars worth of sampling heads.
The color grading and jitter measurement is great on the 11801C, but
the old B+W screens photograph better.
I'll miss my 11802 when it eventually dies.
The TDR is great. I'm going to give my new kids a lecture on
transmission lines, and I'll show them some TDR.
It is apparently possible these days to get an EE degree and be
completely ignorant of transmission lines. Or even electricity.
oops!
Then what DO they know?
How to type c++
C plush plush is a crime against humanity in my opinion
C with linked list is all you need.

But bit of asm is also a must, close to the hardware,
to be able to use the on chip facilities the micros have.

As to electrickety, I remember a lunch conversation between us technical people
and one was talking about electrickety flowing from + towards -
I aksked him how he though a radio tube worked...
That guy was later sent far away to look after a small studio...
He would not have coped in the media center were we were..
john larkin
2024-08-29 18:52:11 UTC
Permalink
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Thu, 29 Aug 2024 06:55:15 -0700) it happened john larkin
Post by john larkin
Post by Jan Panteltje
On a sunny day (Wed, 28 Aug 2024 09:32:58 -0700) it happened john larkin
Post by john larkin
On Wed, 28 Aug 2024 15:21:00 -0000 (UTC), Sergey Kubushyn
Post by Sergey Kubushyn
Post by john larkin
On Wed, 28 Aug 2024 04:28:02 -0000 (UTC), Sergey Kubushyn
Post by Sergey Kubushyn
Post by john larkin
On Tue, 27 Aug 2024 14:55:32 -0400 (EDT), Martin Rid
Post by Martin Rid
john larkin <jlarkin_highland_tech> Wrote in message:r
good?>>$350 at tequipment>>CheersI haven't tried that one. We like the Rigols.I recently acquired a
Siglenthttps://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B06XZML6RD/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1and gave it to one
of my engineers. I'll ask him how he
likes it.It has an up-front DEFAULT button, which a digital scope needs to getyou out of nightmare states.
Other than the lack of software features, the 200mhz bw for 350
dollars is intriguing.
Cheers
It sounds pretty good to me.
https://siglentna.com/wp-content/uploads/dlm_uploads/2020/02/SDS1000X-E_DataSheet_DS0101E-E04C.pdf
What's missing?
I like the 500 uV/div.
If you want to save the last penny, maybe. But you can get way better scope
for slightly more -- Rigol DHO800/DHO900. It is 12-bit, same 550uV/div, has
all standard serial protocols decoding, very light and compact, can work
from a battery with USB-C power connector, way better than that Siglent that
feels like relic next to those DHOs.
We use almost all Rigols at work. My slow bench scope is a 500 MHz
DS4034 (upgraded from 350 MHz)
https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fo/ns08x686afbayjsw8c2ab/h?rlkey=iu4h89057t755pueg4ijnldbo&dl=0
and my fast scope is a Tek 11802 sampler.
I also have one, 11801C. Couple of SD-24s, SD-20, and SD-22 heads :)
At the original purchase price, adjusted for inflation, I must have
half a million dollars worth of sampling heads.
The color grading and jitter measurement is great on the 11801C, but
the old B+W screens photograph better.
I'll miss my 11802 when it eventually dies.
The TDR is great. I'm going to give my new kids a lecture on
transmission lines, and I'll show them some TDR.
It is apparently possible these days to get an EE degree and be
completely ignorant of transmission lines. Or even electricity.
oops!
Then what DO they know?
How to type c++
C plush plush is a crime against humanity in my opinion
C with linked list is all you need.
But bit of asm is also a must, close to the hardware,
to be able to use the on chip facilities the micros have.
As to electrickety, I remember a lunch conversation between us technical people
and one was talking about electrickety flowing from + towards -
I aksked him how he though a radio tube worked...
That guy was later sent far away to look after a small studio...
He would not have coped in the media center were we were..
Electricity does flow from + to -.

People who are taught otherwise are damaged for life.
Bill Sloman
2024-08-29 10:23:19 UTC
Permalink
Post by john larkin
On Wed, 28 Aug 2024 15:21:00 -0000 (UTC), Sergey Kubushyn
Post by Sergey Kubushyn
Post by john larkin
On Wed, 28 Aug 2024 04:28:02 -0000 (UTC), Sergey Kubushyn
Post by Sergey Kubushyn
Post by john larkin
On Tue, 27 Aug 2024 14:55:32 -0400 (EDT), Martin Rid
Post by Martin Rid
john larkin <jlarkin_highland_tech> Wrote in message:r
Other than the lack of software features, the 200mhz bw for 350
dollars is intriguing.
Cheers
It sounds pretty good to me.
https://siglentna.com/wp-content/uploads/dlm_uploads/2020/02/SDS1000X-E_DataSheet_DS0101E-E04C.pdf
What's missing?
I like the 500 uV/div.
If you want to save the last penny, maybe. But you can get way better scope
for slightly more -- Rigol DHO800/DHO900. It is 12-bit, same 550uV/div, has
all standard serial protocols decoding, very light and compact, can work
from a battery with USB-C power connector, way better than that Siglent that
feels like relic next to those DHOs.
We use almost all Rigols at work. My slow bench scope is a 500 MHz
DS4034 (upgraded from 350 MHz)
https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fo/ns08x686afbayjsw8c2ab/h?rlkey=iu4h89057t755pueg4ijnldbo&dl=0
and my fast scope is a Tek 11802 sampler.
I also have one, 11801C. Couple of SD-24s, SD-20, and SD-22 heads :)
At the original purchase price, adjusted for inflation, I must have
half a million dollars worth of sampling heads.
The color grading and jitter measurement is great on the 11801C, but
the old B+W screens photograph better.
I'll miss my 11802 when it eventually dies.
The TDR is great. I'm going to give my new kids a lecture on
transmission lines, and I'll show them some TDR.
It is apparently possible these days to get an EE degree and be
completely ignorant of transmission lines. Or even electricity.
Or a least to be able to react to John Larkin's insultingly trivial
questions in a way that leaves him thinking that.

Maybe he didn't understand the answers.
--
Bill Sloman, Sydney
john larkin
2024-08-29 18:59:55 UTC
Permalink
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by john larkin
On Wed, 28 Aug 2024 15:21:00 -0000 (UTC), Sergey Kubushyn
Post by Sergey Kubushyn
Post by john larkin
On Wed, 28 Aug 2024 04:28:02 -0000 (UTC), Sergey Kubushyn
Post by Sergey Kubushyn
Post by john larkin
On Tue, 27 Aug 2024 14:55:32 -0400 (EDT), Martin Rid
Post by Martin Rid
john larkin <jlarkin_highland_tech> Wrote in message:r
Other than the lack of software features, the 200mhz bw for 350
dollars is intriguing.
Cheers
It sounds pretty good to me.
https://siglentna.com/wp-content/uploads/dlm_uploads/2020/02/SDS1000X-E_DataSheet_DS0101E-E04C.pdf
What's missing?
I like the 500 uV/div.
If you want to save the last penny, maybe. But you can get way better scope
for slightly more -- Rigol DHO800/DHO900. It is 12-bit, same 550uV/div, has
all standard serial protocols decoding, very light and compact, can work
from a battery with USB-C power connector, way better than that Siglent that
feels like relic next to those DHOs.
We use almost all Rigols at work. My slow bench scope is a 500 MHz
DS4034 (upgraded from 350 MHz)
https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fo/ns08x686afbayjsw8c2ab/h?rlkey=iu4h89057t755pueg4ijnldbo&dl=0
and my fast scope is a Tek 11802 sampler.
I also have one, 11801C. Couple of SD-24s, SD-20, and SD-22 heads :)
At the original purchase price, adjusted for inflation, I must have
half a million dollars worth of sampling heads.
The color grading and jitter measurement is great on the 11801C, but
the old B+W screens photograph better.
I'll miss my 11802 when it eventually dies.
The TDR is great. I'm going to give my new kids a lecture on
transmission lines, and I'll show them some TDR.
It is apparently possible these days to get an EE degree and be
completely ignorant of transmission lines. Or even electricity.
Or a least to be able to react to John Larkin's insultingly trivial
questions in a way that leaves him thinking that.
Maybe he didn't understand the answers.
You're impossible to talk too. Your only motivation is to insult.
Bill Sloman
2024-08-30 04:17:14 UTC
Permalink
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by john larkin
On Wed, 28 Aug 2024 15:21:00 -0000 (UTC), Sergey Kubushyn
Post by Sergey Kubushyn
Post by john larkin
On Wed, 28 Aug 2024 04:28:02 -0000 (UTC), Sergey Kubushyn
Post by Sergey Kubushyn
Post by john larkin
On Tue, 27 Aug 2024 14:55:32 -0400 (EDT), Martin Rid
Post by Martin Rid
john larkin <jlarkin_highland_tech> Wrote in message:r
Other than the lack of software features, the 200mhz bw for 350
dollars is intriguing.
Cheers
It sounds pretty good to me.
https://siglentna.com/wp-content/uploads/dlm_uploads/2020/02/SDS1000X-E_DataSheet_DS0101E-E04C.pdf
What's missing?
I like the 500 uV/div.
If you want to save the last penny, maybe. But you can get way better scope
for slightly more -- Rigol DHO800/DHO900. It is 12-bit, same 550uV/div, has
all standard serial protocols decoding, very light and compact, can work
from a battery with USB-C power connector, way better than that Siglent that
feels like relic next to those DHOs.
We use almost all Rigols at work. My slow bench scope is a 500 MHz
DS4034 (upgraded from 350 MHz)
https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fo/ns08x686afbayjsw8c2ab/h?rlkey=iu4h89057t755pueg4ijnldbo&dl=0
and my fast scope is a Tek 11802 sampler.
I also have one, 11801C. Couple of SD-24s, SD-20, and SD-22 heads :)
At the original purchase price, adjusted for inflation, I must have
half a million dollars worth of sampling heads.
The color grading and jitter measurement is great on the 11801C, but
the old B+W screens photograph better.
I'll miss my 11802 when it eventually dies.
The TDR is great. I'm going to give my new kids a lecture on
transmission lines, and I'll show them some TDR.
It is apparently possible these days to get an EE degree and be
completely ignorant of transmission lines. Or even electricity.
Or a least to be able to react to John Larkin's insultingly trivial
questions in a way that leaves him thinking that.
Maybe he didn't understand the answers.
You're impossible to talk too. Your only motivation is to insult.
If your idea of a conversation is one where you get flattered nonstop,
I'm not the ideal conversational partner.

Most people have lower expectations when it comes to uncritical
flattery, and some of them can even earn just approbation.
--
Bill Sloman, Sydney
john larkin
2024-08-30 17:14:46 UTC
Permalink
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by john larkin
On Wed, 28 Aug 2024 15:21:00 -0000 (UTC), Sergey Kubushyn
Post by Sergey Kubushyn
Post by john larkin
On Wed, 28 Aug 2024 04:28:02 -0000 (UTC), Sergey Kubushyn
Post by Sergey Kubushyn
Post by john larkin
On Tue, 27 Aug 2024 14:55:32 -0400 (EDT), Martin Rid
Post by Martin Rid
john larkin <jlarkin_highland_tech> Wrote in message:r
Other than the lack of software features, the 200mhz bw for 350
dollars is intriguing.
Cheers
It sounds pretty good to me.
https://siglentna.com/wp-content/uploads/dlm_uploads/2020/02/SDS1000X-E_DataSheet_DS0101E-E04C.pdf
What's missing?
I like the 500 uV/div.
If you want to save the last penny, maybe. But you can get way better scope
for slightly more -- Rigol DHO800/DHO900. It is 12-bit, same 550uV/div, has
all standard serial protocols decoding, very light and compact, can work
from a battery with USB-C power connector, way better than that Siglent that
feels like relic next to those DHOs.
We use almost all Rigols at work. My slow bench scope is a 500 MHz
DS4034 (upgraded from 350 MHz)
https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fo/ns08x686afbayjsw8c2ab/h?rlkey=iu4h89057t755pueg4ijnldbo&dl=0
and my fast scope is a Tek 11802 sampler.
I also have one, 11801C. Couple of SD-24s, SD-20, and SD-22 heads :)
At the original purchase price, adjusted for inflation, I must have
half a million dollars worth of sampling heads.
The color grading and jitter measurement is great on the 11801C, but
the old B+W screens photograph better.
I'll miss my 11802 when it eventually dies.
The TDR is great. I'm going to give my new kids a lecture on
transmission lines, and I'll show them some TDR.
It is apparently possible these days to get an EE degree and be
completely ignorant of transmission lines. Or even electricity.
Or a least to be able to react to John Larkin's insultingly trivial
questions in a way that leaves him thinking that.
Maybe he didn't understand the answers.
You're impossible to talk too. Your only motivation is to insult.
If your idea of a conversation is one where you get flattered nonstop,
I'm not the ideal conversational partner.
My idea of good conversation is a group of people playing with ideas
and inventing stuff together. "Egoless" is the word, as in "egoless
programming."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Egoless_programming

I don't think you can do that. Some people are too fragile.
Bill Sloman
2024-08-31 06:03:39 UTC
Permalink
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by john larkin
On Wed, 28 Aug 2024 15:21:00 -0000 (UTC), Sergey Kubushyn
Post by Sergey Kubushyn
Post by john larkin
On Wed, 28 Aug 2024 04:28:02 -0000 (UTC), Sergey Kubushyn
Post by Sergey Kubushyn
Post by john larkin
On Tue, 27 Aug 2024 14:55:32 -0400 (EDT), Martin Rid
Post by Martin Rid
john larkin <jlarkin_highland_tech> Wrote in message:r
Other than the lack of software features, the 200mhz bw for 350
dollars is intriguing.
Cheers
It sounds pretty good to me.
https://siglentna.com/wp-content/uploads/dlm_uploads/2020/02/SDS1000X-E_DataSheet_DS0101E-E04C.pdf
What's missing?
I like the 500 uV/div.
If you want to save the last penny, maybe. But you can get way better scope
for slightly more -- Rigol DHO800/DHO900. It is 12-bit, same 550uV/div, has
all standard serial protocols decoding, very light and compact, can work
from a battery with USB-C power connector, way better than that Siglent that
feels like relic next to those DHOs.
We use almost all Rigols at work. My slow bench scope is a 500 MHz
DS4034 (upgraded from 350 MHz)
https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fo/ns08x686afbayjsw8c2ab/h?rlkey=iu4h89057t755pueg4ijnldbo&dl=0
and my fast scope is a Tek 11802 sampler.
I also have one, 11801C. Couple of SD-24s, SD-20, and SD-22 heads :)
At the original purchase price, adjusted for inflation, I must have
half a million dollars worth of sampling heads.
The color grading and jitter measurement is great on the 11801C, but
the old B+W screens photograph better.
I'll miss my 11802 when it eventually dies.
The TDR is great. I'm going to give my new kids a lecture on
transmission lines, and I'll show them some TDR.
It is apparently possible these days to get an EE degree and be
completely ignorant of transmission lines. Or even electricity.
Or a least to be able to react to John Larkin's insultingly trivial
questions in a way that leaves him thinking that.
Maybe he didn't understand the answers.
You're impossible to talk too. Your only motivation is to insult.
If your idea of a conversation is one where you get flattered nonstop,
I'm not the ideal conversational partner.
My idea of good conversation is a group of people playing with ideas
and inventing stuff together. "Egoless" is the word, as in "egoless
programming."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Egoless_programming
I don't think you can do that. Some people are too fragile.
Your opinion is noted. I doubt if the people with whom I have
collaborated would agree.

Sloman A.W., Buggs P., Molloy J., and Stewart D. “A
microcontroller-based driver to stabilise the temperature of an optical
stage to 1mK in the range 4C to 38C, using a Peltier heat pump and a
thermistor sensor” Measurement Science and Technology, 7 1653-64 (1996)

Jim Molloy has died, but Paul Buggs and Doug Stewart are still around.
You could ask them.

http://sophia-elektronica.com/At_Cambridge.html

presents three years of my weekly reports when I was acting as a senior
electronic engineer in the advanced electron beam tester project - they
eventually went to everybody working on the team, though they were
directed to the project manager. This was a bit odd, but my ego didn't
have anything to do with it.

I knew some ego-driven engineers who tried to patent every bright idea
that they though that they had had. I've only got three patents and one
of them had struck me as obvious, so I hadn't thought to patent it until
I'd had to explain it to enough people to let me realise that it wasn't
all that obvious.
--
Bill Sloman, Sydney
john larkin
2024-08-31 14:03:51 UTC
Permalink
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by john larkin
On Wed, 28 Aug 2024 15:21:00 -0000 (UTC), Sergey Kubushyn
Post by Sergey Kubushyn
Post by john larkin
On Wed, 28 Aug 2024 04:28:02 -0000 (UTC), Sergey Kubushyn
Post by Sergey Kubushyn
Post by john larkin
On Tue, 27 Aug 2024 14:55:32 -0400 (EDT), Martin Rid
Post by Martin Rid
john larkin <jlarkin_highland_tech> Wrote in message:r
Other than the lack of software features, the 200mhz bw for 350
dollars is intriguing.
Cheers
It sounds pretty good to me.
https://siglentna.com/wp-content/uploads/dlm_uploads/2020/02/SDS1000X-E_DataSheet_DS0101E-E04C.pdf
What's missing?
I like the 500 uV/div.
If you want to save the last penny, maybe. But you can get way better scope
for slightly more -- Rigol DHO800/DHO900. It is 12-bit, same 550uV/div, has
all standard serial protocols decoding, very light and compact, can work
from a battery with USB-C power connector, way better than that Siglent that
feels like relic next to those DHOs.
We use almost all Rigols at work. My slow bench scope is a 500 MHz
DS4034 (upgraded from 350 MHz)
https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fo/ns08x686afbayjsw8c2ab/h?rlkey=iu4h89057t755pueg4ijnldbo&dl=0
and my fast scope is a Tek 11802 sampler.
I also have one, 11801C. Couple of SD-24s, SD-20, and SD-22 heads :)
At the original purchase price, adjusted for inflation, I must have
half a million dollars worth of sampling heads.
The color grading and jitter measurement is great on the 11801C, but
the old B+W screens photograph better.
I'll miss my 11802 when it eventually dies.
The TDR is great. I'm going to give my new kids a lecture on
transmission lines, and I'll show them some TDR.
It is apparently possible these days to get an EE degree and be
completely ignorant of transmission lines. Or even electricity.
Or a least to be able to react to John Larkin's insultingly trivial
questions in a way that leaves him thinking that.
Maybe he didn't understand the answers.
You're impossible to talk too. Your only motivation is to insult.
If your idea of a conversation is one where you get flattered nonstop,
I'm not the ideal conversational partner.
My idea of good conversation is a group of people playing with ideas
and inventing stuff together. "Egoless" is the word, as in "egoless
programming."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Egoless_programming
I don't think you can do that. Some people are too fragile.
Your opinion is noted. I doubt if the people with whom I have
collaborated would agree.
Sloman A.W., Buggs P., Molloy J., and Stewart D. “A
microcontroller-based driver to stabilise the temperature of an optical
stage to 1mK in the range 4C to 38C, using a Peltier heat pump and a
thermistor sensor” Measurement Science and Technology, 7 1653-64 (1996)
You did one academic, unremarkable temperature controller, published
in a journal, and have cited it here maybe 50 times now. Do something
new.

Here's my millikelven temperature controller.

Loading Image...

That's a dual-stage Mach-Zender e/o modulartor whose extinction is
much better if the temperature is stable to milllikelvins. The big
hogged-aluminum box is heated by six mosfets on the bottom, and there
are four thermistors for feedback. It runs at 30C.

This is part of the modulation system for a big laser.

I really over-did it on the enclosure. It's a lot heavier than it
really needed to be.
Bill Sloman
2024-08-31 15:43:32 UTC
Permalink
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by john larkin
On Wed, 28 Aug 2024 15:21:00 -0000 (UTC), Sergey Kubushyn
Post by Sergey Kubushyn
Post by john larkin
On Wed, 28 Aug 2024 04:28:02 -0000 (UTC), Sergey Kubushyn
Post by Sergey Kubushyn
Post by john larkin
On Tue, 27 Aug 2024 14:55:32 -0400 (EDT), Martin Rid
Post by Martin Rid
john larkin <jlarkin_highland_tech> Wrote in message:r
Other than the lack of software features, the 200mhz bw for 350
dollars is intriguing.
Cheers
It sounds pretty good to me.
https://siglentna.com/wp-content/uploads/dlm_uploads/2020/02/SDS1000X-E_DataSheet_DS0101E-E04C.pdf
What's missing?
I like the 500 uV/div.
If you want to save the last penny, maybe. But you can get way better scope
for slightly more -- Rigol DHO800/DHO900. It is 12-bit, same 550uV/div, has
all standard serial protocols decoding, very light and compact, can work
from a battery with USB-C power connector, way better than that Siglent that
feels like relic next to those DHOs.
We use almost all Rigols at work. My slow bench scope is a 500 MHz
DS4034 (upgraded from 350 MHz)
https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fo/ns08x686afbayjsw8c2ab/h?rlkey=iu4h89057t755pueg4ijnldbo&dl=0
and my fast scope is a Tek 11802 sampler.
I also have one, 11801C. Couple of SD-24s, SD-20, and SD-22 heads :)
At the original purchase price, adjusted for inflation, I must have
half a million dollars worth of sampling heads.
The color grading and jitter measurement is great on the 11801C, but
the old B+W screens photograph better.
I'll miss my 11802 when it eventually dies.
The TDR is great. I'm going to give my new kids a lecture on
transmission lines, and I'll show them some TDR.
It is apparently possible these days to get an EE degree and be
completely ignorant of transmission lines. Or even electricity.
Or a least to be able to react to John Larkin's insultingly trivial
questions in a way that leaves him thinking that.
Maybe he didn't understand the answers.
You're impossible to talk too. Your only motivation is to insult.
If your idea of a conversation is one where you get flattered nonstop,
I'm not the ideal conversational partner.
My idea of good conversation is a group of people playing with ideas
and inventing stuff together. "Egoless" is the word, as in "egoless
programming."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Egoless_programming
I don't think you can do that. Some people are too fragile.
Your opinion is noted. I doubt if the people with whom I have
collaborated would agree.
Sloman A.W., Buggs P., Molloy J., and Stewart D. “A
microcontroller-based driver to stabilise the temperature of an optical
stage to 1mK in the range 4C to 38C, using a Peltier heat pump and a
thermistor sensor” Measurement Science and Technology, 7 1653-64 (1996)
You did one academic, unremarkable temperature controller, published
in a journal, and have cited it here maybe 50 times now. Do something
new.
I did quite a lot of stuff. That one wasn't in the least academic, and
it got published because I didn't have anything better to do with my
time immediately after I moved to the Netherlands
Post by john larkin
Here's my millikelven temperature controller.
https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/emxfaurnyj35t0y84tvwl/Oven_Cables_pub.jpg?rlkey=jpcnmnt1pcooz9nj7d0j4rah0&raw=1
That's a dual-stage Mach-Zender e/o modulator whose extinction is
much better if the temperature is stable to milllikelvins. The big
hogged-aluminum box is heated by six mosfets on the bottom, and there
are four thermistors for feedback. It runs at 30C.
Why four thermistors? The only temperature that matters is that of the
modulator itself. People who need to minimise temperature gradients do
need more than one temperature sensor, but it isn't clear why you would
have. I used a second thermistor to monitor the temperature of the
exhaust side of my Peltier cooler (which does matter) but you seem to
have used mosfets as resistive heaters which is rather easier.
Post by john larkin
This is part of the modulation system for a big laser.
So what?
Post by john larkin
I really over-did it on the enclosure. It's a lot heavier than it
really needed to be.
For short production runs it is cheaper to over-design that it is to
design twice.

As usual, you missed the point I was making, which was that I did do
cooperative design, which does depend on being nice to your
collaborators, and acknowledging their contributions to the final
result, as I did there.

The electron-beam tester story, which you've snipped, ran for longer and
involved a considerably bigger team, and a lot more politics.
--
Bill Sloman, Sydney
john larkin
2024-08-31 18:57:03 UTC
Permalink
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by john larkin
On Wed, 28 Aug 2024 15:21:00 -0000 (UTC), Sergey Kubushyn
Post by Sergey Kubushyn
Post by john larkin
On Wed, 28 Aug 2024 04:28:02 -0000 (UTC), Sergey Kubushyn
Post by Sergey Kubushyn
Post by john larkin
On Tue, 27 Aug 2024 14:55:32 -0400 (EDT), Martin Rid
Post by Martin Rid
john larkin <jlarkin_highland_tech> Wrote in message:r
Other than the lack of software features, the 200mhz bw for 350
dollars is intriguing.
Cheers
It sounds pretty good to me.
https://siglentna.com/wp-content/uploads/dlm_uploads/2020/02/SDS1000X-E_DataSheet_DS0101E-E04C.pdf
What's missing?
I like the 500 uV/div.
If you want to save the last penny, maybe. But you can get way better scope
for slightly more -- Rigol DHO800/DHO900. It is 12-bit, same 550uV/div, has
all standard serial protocols decoding, very light and compact, can work
from a battery with USB-C power connector, way better than that Siglent that
feels like relic next to those DHOs.
We use almost all Rigols at work. My slow bench scope is a 500 MHz
DS4034 (upgraded from 350 MHz)
https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fo/ns08x686afbayjsw8c2ab/h?rlkey=iu4h89057t755pueg4ijnldbo&dl=0
and my fast scope is a Tek 11802 sampler.
I also have one, 11801C. Couple of SD-24s, SD-20, and SD-22 heads :)
At the original purchase price, adjusted for inflation, I must have
half a million dollars worth of sampling heads.
The color grading and jitter measurement is great on the 11801C, but
the old B+W screens photograph better.
I'll miss my 11802 when it eventually dies.
The TDR is great. I'm going to give my new kids a lecture on
transmission lines, and I'll show them some TDR.
It is apparently possible these days to get an EE degree and be
completely ignorant of transmission lines. Or even electricity.
Or a least to be able to react to John Larkin's insultingly trivial
questions in a way that leaves him thinking that.
Maybe he didn't understand the answers.
You're impossible to talk too. Your only motivation is to insult.
If your idea of a conversation is one where you get flattered nonstop,
I'm not the ideal conversational partner.
My idea of good conversation is a group of people playing with ideas
and inventing stuff together. "Egoless" is the word, as in "egoless
programming."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Egoless_programming
I don't think you can do that. Some people are too fragile.
Your opinion is noted. I doubt if the people with whom I have
collaborated would agree.
Sloman A.W., Buggs P., Molloy J., and Stewart D. “A
microcontroller-based driver to stabilise the temperature of an optical
stage to 1mK in the range 4C to 38C, using a Peltier heat pump and a
thermistor sensor” Measurement Science and Technology, 7 1653-64 (1996)
You did one academic, unremarkable temperature controller, published
in a journal, and have cited it here maybe 50 times now. Do something
new.
I did quite a lot of stuff. That one wasn't in the least academic, and
it got published because I didn't have anything better to do with my
time immediately after I moved to the Netherlands
Post by john larkin
Here's my millikelven temperature controller.
https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/emxfaurnyj35t0y84tvwl/Oven_Cables_pub.jpg?rlkey=jpcnmnt1pcooz9nj7d0j4rah0&raw=1
That's a dual-stage Mach-Zender e/o modulator whose extinction is
much better if the temperature is stable to milllikelvins. The big
hogged-aluminum box is heated by six mosfets on the bottom, and there
are four thermistors for feedback. It runs at 30C.
Why four thermistors? The only temperature that matters is that of the
modulator itself. People who need to minimise temperature gradients do
need more than one temperature sensor, but it isn't clear why you would
have. I used a second thermistor to monitor the temperature of the
exhaust side of my Peltier cooler (which does matter) but you seem to
have used mosfets as resistive heaters which is rather easier.
One thermistor is on the heater board, on the bottom of the big block.
Three are on the platform that mounts the e/o modulator. We really
don't need three up there, but we wanted to error check and snoop for
gradients and optionally do some averaging if we had noise.

The EOM platform is spaced off the bottom of the big block, which
makes us a 2nd order thermal system. The main block has a 75 minute
time constant, and the platform inside is 17 minutes. Our control
algorithm uses the difference as, essentially, a derivative term.

Coolers have lots of problems, including condensation. Heating to 30C
worked fine. This is in maybe the world's biggest single clean room
and the local air is always 20C.
Bill Sloman
2024-09-01 05:15:39 UTC
Permalink
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by john larkin
On Wed, 28 Aug 2024 15:21:00 -0000 (UTC), Sergey Kubushyn
Post by Sergey Kubushyn
Post by john larkin
On Wed, 28 Aug 2024 04:28:02 -0000 (UTC), Sergey Kubushyn
Post by Sergey Kubushyn
Post by john larkin
On Tue, 27 Aug 2024 14:55:32 -0400 (EDT), Martin Rid
Post by Martin Rid
john larkin <jlarkin_highland_tech> Wrote in message:r
Other than the lack of software features, the 200mhz bw for 350
dollars is intriguing.
Cheers
It sounds pretty good to me.
https://siglentna.com/wp-content/uploads/dlm_uploads/2020/02/SDS1000X-E_DataSheet_DS0101E-E04C.pdf
What's missing?
I like the 500 uV/div.
If you want to save the last penny, maybe. But you can get way better scope
for slightly more -- Rigol DHO800/DHO900. It is 12-bit, same 550uV/div, has
all standard serial protocols decoding, very light and compact, can work
from a battery with USB-C power connector, way better than that Siglent that
feels like relic next to those DHOs.
We use almost all Rigols at work. My slow bench scope is a 500 MHz
DS4034 (upgraded from 350 MHz)
https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fo/ns08x686afbayjsw8c2ab/h?rlkey=iu4h89057t755pueg4ijnldbo&dl=0
and my fast scope is a Tek 11802 sampler.
I also have one, 11801C. Couple of SD-24s, SD-20, and SD-22 heads :)
At the original purchase price, adjusted for inflation, I must have
half a million dollars worth of sampling heads.
The color grading and jitter measurement is great on the 11801C, but
the old B+W screens photograph better.
I'll miss my 11802 when it eventually dies.
The TDR is great. I'm going to give my new kids a lecture on
transmission lines, and I'll show them some TDR.
It is apparently possible these days to get an EE degree and be
completely ignorant of transmission lines. Or even electricity.
Or a least to be able to react to John Larkin's insultingly trivial
questions in a way that leaves him thinking that.
Maybe he didn't understand the answers.
You're impossible to talk too. Your only motivation is to insult.
If your idea of a conversation is one where you get flattered nonstop,
I'm not the ideal conversational partner.
My idea of good conversation is a group of people playing with ideas
and inventing stuff together. "Egoless" is the word, as in "egoless
programming."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Egoless_programming
I don't think you can do that. Some people are too fragile.
Your opinion is noted. I doubt if the people with whom I have
collaborated would agree.
Sloman A.W., Buggs P., Molloy J., and Stewart D. “A
microcontroller-based driver to stabilise the temperature of an optical
stage to 1mK in the range 4C to 38C, using a Peltier heat pump and a
thermistor sensor” Measurement Science and Technology, 7 1653-64 (1996)
You did one academic, unremarkable temperature controller, published
in a journal, and have cited it here maybe 50 times now. Do something
new.
I did quite a lot of stuff. That one wasn't in the least academic, and
it got published because I didn't have anything better to do with my
time immediately after I moved to the Netherlands
Post by john larkin
Here's my millikelven temperature controller.
https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/emxfaurnyj35t0y84tvwl/Oven_Cables_pub.jpg?rlkey=jpcnmnt1pcooz9nj7d0j4rah0&raw=1
That's a dual-stage Mach-Zender e/o modulator whose extinction is
much better if the temperature is stable to milllikelvins. The big
hogged-aluminum box is heated by six mosfets on the bottom, and there
are four thermistors for feedback. It runs at 30C.
Why four thermistors? The only temperature that matters is that of the
modulator itself. People who need to minimise temperature gradients do
need more than one temperature sensor, but it isn't clear why you would
have. I used a second thermistor to monitor the temperature of the
exhaust side of my Peltier cooler (which does matter) but you seem to
have used mosfets as resistive heaters which is rather easier.
One thermistor is on the heater board, on the bottom of the big block.
Three are on the platform that mounts the e/o modulator. We really
don't need three up there, but we wanted to error check and snoop for
gradients and optionally do some averaging if we had noise.
The EOM platform is spaced off the bottom of the big block, which
makes us a 2nd order thermal system. The main block has a 75 minute
time constant, and the platform inside is 17 minutes. Our control
algorithm uses the difference as, essentially, a derivative term.
We did characterise the thermal time constants of our system pretty
carefully, as is spelled out in the paper, which does speculate on
whether a better control algorithm would have let us achieve finer
temperature control.
Post by john larkin
Coolers have lots of problems, including condensation. Heating to 30C
worked fine. This is in maybe the world's biggest single clean room
and the local air is always 20C.
Our machine was designed to work on biological specimens, and had to
stabilise the specimen temperatures at industry-defined arbitrary
levels, most of them a little above normal room temperature. The
customers were warned that they'd have to purge the optical path with
dry air (usually dry nitrogen) if they set the target temperature below
the local dew point.

The Peltier junction was unavoidable.
--
Bill Sloman, Sydney
Jan Panteltje
2024-09-01 07:36:34 UTC
Permalink
On a sunny day (Sat, 31 Aug 2024 11:57:03 -0700) it happened john larkin
Post by john larkin
Post by Bill Sloman
Post by john larkin
Here's my millikelven temperature controller.
https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/emxfaurnyj35t0y84tvwl/Oven_Cables_pub.jpg?rlkey=jpcnmnt1pcooz9nj7d0j4rah0&raw=1
That's a dual-stage Mach-Zender e/o modulator whose extinction is
much better if the temperature is stable to milllikelvins. The big
hogged-aluminum box is heated by six mosfets on the bottom, and there
are four thermistors for feedback. It runs at 30C.
Why four thermistors? The only temperature that matters is that of the
modulator itself. People who need to minimise temperature gradients do
need more than one temperature sensor, but it isn't clear why you would
have. I used a second thermistor to monitor the temperature of the
exhaust side of my Peltier cooler (which does matter) but you seem to
have used mosfets as resistive heaters which is rather easier.
One thermistor is on the heater board, on the bottom of the big block.
Three are on the platform that mounts the e/o modulator. We really
don't need three up there, but we wanted to error check and snoop for
gradients and optionally do some averaging if we had noise.
The EOM platform is spaced off the bottom of the big block, which
makes us a 2nd order thermal system. The main block has a 75 minute
time constant, and the platform inside is 17 minutes. Our control
algorithm uses the difference as, essentially, a derivative term.
Coolers have lots of problems, including condensation. Heating to 30C
worked fine. This is in maybe the world's biggest single clean room
and the local air is always 20C.
Decent temperature stability over several years:
https://panteltje.nl/panteltje/tri_pic/
Loading Image...
Loading Image...


Much better time constant, much cheaper, took an hour to code, maybe 2 to build
Uses less power, can run on batteries if main fails,
:-)
Phil Hobbs
2024-08-28 17:41:33 UTC
Permalink
Post by Sergey Kubushyn
Post by john larkin
On Wed, 28 Aug 2024 04:28:02 -0000 (UTC), Sergey Kubushyn
Post by Sergey Kubushyn
Post by john larkin
On Tue, 27 Aug 2024 14:55:32 -0400 (EDT), Martin Rid
Post by Martin Rid
john larkin <jlarkin_highland_tech> Wrote in message:r
Post by john larkin
On Tue, 27 Aug 2024 10:40:15 -0400 (EDT), Martin
?>>Any good?>>$350 at tequipment>>CheersI haven't tried that one. We
like the Rigols.I recently acquired a
Siglenthttps://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B06XZML6RD/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1and
gave it to one of my engineers. I'll ask him how he likes it.It has
an up-front DEFAULT button, which a digital scope needs to getyou
out of nightmare states.
Other than the lack of software features, the 200mhz bw for 350
dollars is intriguing.
Cheers
It sounds pretty good to me.
https://siglentna.com/wp-content/uploads/dlm_uploads/2020/02/SDS1000X-E_DataSheet_DS0101E-E04C.pdf
What's missing?
I like the 500 uV/div.
If you want to save the last penny, maybe. But you can get way better scope
for slightly more -- Rigol DHO800/DHO900. It is 12-bit, same 550uV/div, has
all standard serial protocols decoding, very light and compact, can work
from a battery with USB-C power connector, way better than that Siglent that
feels like relic next to those DHOs.
We use almost all Rigols at work. My slow bench scope is a 500 MHz
DS4034 (upgraded from 350 MHz)
https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fo/ns08x686afbayjsw8c2ab/h?rlkey=iu4h89057t755pueg4ijnldbo&dl=0
and my fast scope is a Tek 11802 sampler.
I also have one, 11801C. Couple of SD-24s, SD-20, and SD-22 heads :)
Post by john larkin
Post by Sergey Kubushyn
I don't have any relation to Rigol, just have DHO924S as a go-to scope on my
bench and DHO814 for use as an advanced multimeter wherever I need a
portable one. I like them and I can run them in a web browser if needed.
I bought the Siglent as a gift, and I was curious about it.
Post by Sergey Kubushyn
I do have an advanced LeCroy WR640Zi with all options for serious jobs -- it
is 40GS/s 4GHz bandwidth instrument with all features imaginable -- but I
rarely power it up. It makes a noise like a jet at takeoff (Rigol DHO is
very quite) and it is 8-bit so what you get on the screen looks ugly
comparing with 12-bit DHO. DHO924 covers 99% of real world debugging so
LeCroy is mostly gathering dust...
So is ours! It cost $50K. It doesn't make much sense and there is
basically no support. It doesn't make sense to them either.
Yep, all those features are nice but very rarely needed in the real life.
Next to my bench, I have a couple of TDS 784As, a TDS 694C, an 11801C, and
an 11802 that JL kindly donated when I went out on my own, lo these fifteen
years ago. Also several SD-14s and SD-24s, plus at least one of all the
other heads except the SD-32.

I use them all regularly.

My favorite is the 694C—3GHz, 10GSa/s simultaneously on all four channels.
It’s 50 ohms only, but I also have the matching 4GHz FET probes.

A 12-bit scope might be useful if the ENOB is anything like that, but I
have doubts, especially in a 250 MHz bandwidth.

Cheers

Phil Hobbs

Cheers

Phil Hobbs
--
Dr Philip C D Hobbs Principal Consultant ElectroOptical Innovations LLC /
Hobbs ElectroOptics Optics, Electro-optics, Photonics, Analog Electronics
john larkin
2024-08-28 20:05:35 UTC
Permalink
On Wed, 28 Aug 2024 17:41:33 -0000 (UTC), Phil Hobbs
Post by Phil Hobbs
Post by Sergey Kubushyn
Post by john larkin
On Wed, 28 Aug 2024 04:28:02 -0000 (UTC), Sergey Kubushyn
Post by Sergey Kubushyn
Post by john larkin
On Tue, 27 Aug 2024 14:55:32 -0400 (EDT), Martin Rid
Post by Martin Rid
john larkin <jlarkin_highland_tech> Wrote in message:r
Post by john larkin
On Tue, 27 Aug 2024 10:40:15 -0400 (EDT), Martin
?>>Any good?>>$350 at tequipment>>CheersI haven't tried that one. We
like the Rigols.I recently acquired a
Siglenthttps://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B06XZML6RD/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1and
gave it to one of my engineers. I'll ask him how he likes it.It has
an up-front DEFAULT button, which a digital scope needs to getyou
out of nightmare states.
Other than the lack of software features, the 200mhz bw for 350
dollars is intriguing.
Cheers
It sounds pretty good to me.
https://siglentna.com/wp-content/uploads/dlm_uploads/2020/02/SDS1000X-E_DataSheet_DS0101E-E04C.pdf
What's missing?
I like the 500 uV/div.
If you want to save the last penny, maybe. But you can get way better scope
for slightly more -- Rigol DHO800/DHO900. It is 12-bit, same 550uV/div, has
all standard serial protocols decoding, very light and compact, can work
from a battery with USB-C power connector, way better than that Siglent that
feels like relic next to those DHOs.
We use almost all Rigols at work. My slow bench scope is a 500 MHz
DS4034 (upgraded from 350 MHz)
https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fo/ns08x686afbayjsw8c2ab/h?rlkey=iu4h89057t755pueg4ijnldbo&dl=0
and my fast scope is a Tek 11802 sampler.
I also have one, 11801C. Couple of SD-24s, SD-20, and SD-22 heads :)
Post by john larkin
Post by Sergey Kubushyn
I don't have any relation to Rigol, just have DHO924S as a go-to scope on my
bench and DHO814 for use as an advanced multimeter wherever I need a
portable one. I like them and I can run them in a web browser if needed.
I bought the Siglent as a gift, and I was curious about it.
Post by Sergey Kubushyn
I do have an advanced LeCroy WR640Zi with all options for serious jobs -- it
is 40GS/s 4GHz bandwidth instrument with all features imaginable -- but I
rarely power it up. It makes a noise like a jet at takeoff (Rigol DHO is
very quite) and it is 8-bit so what you get on the screen looks ugly
comparing with 12-bit DHO. DHO924 covers 99% of real world debugging so
LeCroy is mostly gathering dust...
So is ours! It cost $50K. It doesn't make much sense and there is
basically no support. It doesn't make sense to them either.
Yep, all those features are nice but very rarely needed in the real life.
Next to my bench, I have a couple of TDS 784As, a TDS 694C, an 11801C, and
an 11802 that JL kindly donated when I went out on my own, lo these fifteen
years ago. Also several SD-14s and SD-24s, plus at least one of all the
other heads except the SD-32.
I use them all regularly.
My favorite is the 694C—3GHz, 10GSa/s simultaneously on all four channels.
It’s 50 ohms only, but I also have the matching 4GHz FET probes.
A 12-bit scope might be useful if the ENOB is anything like that, but I
have doubts, especially in a 250 MHz bandwidth.
Cheers
Phil Hobbs
Cheers
Phil Hobbs
The 3 GHz probe sampler, the SD14, is incredible. Its loading is close
to zero and in most cases it doesn't even need a ground clip on the
probe.

I have a couple of the SD32 (50 GHz) heads, if you need to do
something fast.

And one each of the SD42 and SD43 optical-input heads.
Phil Hobbs
2024-08-29 23:15:29 UTC
Permalink
Post by john larkin
On Wed, 28 Aug 2024 17:41:33 -0000 (UTC), Phil Hobbs
Post by Phil Hobbs
Post by Sergey Kubushyn
Post by john larkin
On Wed, 28 Aug 2024 04:28:02 -0000 (UTC), Sergey Kubushyn
Post by Sergey Kubushyn
Post by john larkin
On Tue, 27 Aug 2024 14:55:32 -0400 (EDT), Martin Rid
Post by Martin Rid
john larkin <jlarkin_highland_tech> Wrote in message:r
Post by john larkin
On Tue, 27 Aug 2024 10:40:15 -0400 (EDT), Martin
?>>Any good?>>$350 at tequipment>>CheersI haven't tried that one. We
like the Rigols.I recently acquired a
Siglenthttps://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B06XZML6RD/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1and
gave it to one of my engineers. I'll ask him how he likes it.It has
an up-front DEFAULT button, which a digital scope needs to getyou
out of nightmare states.
Other than the lack of software features, the 200mhz bw for 350
dollars is intriguing.
Cheers
It sounds pretty good to me.
https://siglentna.com/wp-content/uploads/dlm_uploads/2020/02/SDS1000X-E_DataSheet_DS0101E-E04C.pdf
What's missing?
I like the 500 uV/div.
If you want to save the last penny, maybe. But you can get way better scope
for slightly more -- Rigol DHO800/DHO900. It is 12-bit, same 550uV/div, has
all standard serial protocols decoding, very light and compact, can work
from a battery with USB-C power connector, way better than that Siglent that
feels like relic next to those DHOs.
We use almost all Rigols at work. My slow bench scope is a 500 MHz
DS4034 (upgraded from 350 MHz)
https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fo/ns08x686afbayjsw8c2ab/h?rlkey=iu4h89057t755pueg4ijnldbo&dl=0
and my fast scope is a Tek 11802 sampler.
I also have one, 11801C. Couple of SD-24s, SD-20, and SD-22 heads :)
Post by john larkin
Post by Sergey Kubushyn
I don't have any relation to Rigol, just have DHO924S as a go-to scope on my
bench and DHO814 for use as an advanced multimeter wherever I need a
portable one. I like them and I can run them in a web browser if needed.
I bought the Siglent as a gift, and I was curious about it.
Post by Sergey Kubushyn
I do have an advanced LeCroy WR640Zi with all options for serious jobs -- it
is 40GS/s 4GHz bandwidth instrument with all features imaginable -- but I
rarely power it up. It makes a noise like a jet at takeoff (Rigol DHO is
very quite) and it is 8-bit so what you get on the screen looks ugly
comparing with 12-bit DHO. DHO924 covers 99% of real world debugging so
LeCroy is mostly gathering dust...
So is ours! It cost $50K. It doesn't make much sense and there is
basically no support. It doesn't make sense to them either.
Yep, all those features are nice but very rarely needed in the real life.
Next to my bench, I have a couple of TDS 784As, a TDS 694C, an 11801C, and
an 11802 that JL kindly donated when I went out on my own, lo these fifteen
years ago. Also several SD-14s and SD-24s, plus at least one of all the
other heads except the SD-32.
I use them all regularly.
My favorite is the 694C—3GHz, 10GSa/s simultaneously on all four channels.
It’s 50 ohms only, but I also have the matching 4GHz FET probes.
A 12-bit scope might be useful if the ENOB is anything like that, but I
have doubts, especially in a 250 MHz bandwidth.
Cheers
Phil Hobbs
Cheers
Phil Hobbs
The 3 GHz probe sampler, the SD14, is incredible. Its loading is close
to zero and in most cases it doesn't even need a ground clip on the
probe.
I have a couple of the SD32 (50 GHz) heads, if you need to do
something fast.
And one each of the SD42 and SD43 optical-input heads.
Yeah, I have one each of the 20 GHz SD-48 and SD-46, and two of the
slower (6 GHz) SD-42s. They're great except that they're blind north of
900 nm.

I also have an SD-51 trigger head, which is a tunnel diode gizmo that
improves the high-speed triggering, and an SD-20 loop-through head,
which lets you sample the input signal to some gizmo as well as its output.

The 2-meter extender cables are super useful because you can bring the
sampler to the gizmo rather than the other way round.

Cheers

Phil Hobbs
--
Dr Philip C D Hobbs
Principal Consultant
ElectroOptical Innovations LLC / Hobbs ElectroOptics
Optics, Electro-optics, Photonics, Analog Electronics
Briarcliff Manor NY 10510

http://electrooptical.net
http://hobbs-eo.com
john larkin
2024-08-29 23:44:10 UTC
Permalink
On Thu, 29 Aug 2024 19:15:29 -0400, Phil Hobbs
Post by Phil Hobbs
Post by john larkin
On Wed, 28 Aug 2024 17:41:33 -0000 (UTC), Phil Hobbs
Post by Phil Hobbs
Post by Sergey Kubushyn
Post by john larkin
On Wed, 28 Aug 2024 04:28:02 -0000 (UTC), Sergey Kubushyn
Post by Sergey Kubushyn
Post by john larkin
On Tue, 27 Aug 2024 14:55:32 -0400 (EDT), Martin Rid
Post by Martin Rid
john larkin <jlarkin_highland_tech> Wrote in message:r
Post by john larkin
On Tue, 27 Aug 2024 10:40:15 -0400 (EDT), Martin
?>>Any good?>>$350 at tequipment>>CheersI haven't tried that one. We
like the Rigols.I recently acquired a
Siglenthttps://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B06XZML6RD/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1and
gave it to one of my engineers. I'll ask him how he likes it.It has
an up-front DEFAULT button, which a digital scope needs to getyou
out of nightmare states.
Other than the lack of software features, the 200mhz bw for 350
dollars is intriguing.
Cheers
It sounds pretty good to me.
https://siglentna.com/wp-content/uploads/dlm_uploads/2020/02/SDS1000X-E_DataSheet_DS0101E-E04C.pdf
What's missing?
I like the 500 uV/div.
If you want to save the last penny, maybe. But you can get way better scope
for slightly more -- Rigol DHO800/DHO900. It is 12-bit, same 550uV/div, has
all standard serial protocols decoding, very light and compact, can work
from a battery with USB-C power connector, way better than that Siglent that
feels like relic next to those DHOs.
We use almost all Rigols at work. My slow bench scope is a 500 MHz
DS4034 (upgraded from 350 MHz)
https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fo/ns08x686afbayjsw8c2ab/h?rlkey=iu4h89057t755pueg4ijnldbo&dl=0
and my fast scope is a Tek 11802 sampler.
I also have one, 11801C. Couple of SD-24s, SD-20, and SD-22 heads :)
Post by john larkin
Post by Sergey Kubushyn
I don't have any relation to Rigol, just have DHO924S as a go-to scope on my
bench and DHO814 for use as an advanced multimeter wherever I need a
portable one. I like them and I can run them in a web browser if needed.
I bought the Siglent as a gift, and I was curious about it.
Post by Sergey Kubushyn
I do have an advanced LeCroy WR640Zi with all options for serious jobs -- it
is 40GS/s 4GHz bandwidth instrument with all features imaginable -- but I
rarely power it up. It makes a noise like a jet at takeoff (Rigol DHO is
very quite) and it is 8-bit so what you get on the screen looks ugly
comparing with 12-bit DHO. DHO924 covers 99% of real world debugging so
LeCroy is mostly gathering dust...
So is ours! It cost $50K. It doesn't make much sense and there is
basically no support. It doesn't make sense to them either.
Yep, all those features are nice but very rarely needed in the real life.
Next to my bench, I have a couple of TDS 784As, a TDS 694C, an 11801C, and
an 11802 that JL kindly donated when I went out on my own, lo these fifteen
years ago. Also several SD-14s and SD-24s, plus at least one of all the
other heads except the SD-32.
I use them all regularly.
My favorite is the 694C—3GHz, 10GSa/s simultaneously on all four channels.
It’s 50 ohms only, but I also have the matching 4GHz FET probes.
A 12-bit scope might be useful if the ENOB is anything like that, but I
have doubts, especially in a 250 MHz bandwidth.
Cheers
Phil Hobbs
Cheers
Phil Hobbs
The 3 GHz probe sampler, the SD14, is incredible. Its loading is close
to zero and in most cases it doesn't even need a ground clip on the
probe.
I have a couple of the SD32 (50 GHz) heads, if you need to do
something fast.
And one each of the SD42 and SD43 optical-input heads.
Yeah, I have one each of the 20 GHz SD-48 and SD-46, and two of the
slower (6 GHz) SD-42s. They're great except that they're blind north of
900 nm.
I also have an SD-51 trigger head, which is a tunnel diode gizmo that
improves the high-speed triggering, and an SD-20 loop-through head,
which lets you sample the input signal to some gizmo as well as its output.
The 2-meter extender cables are super useful because you can bring the
sampler to the gizmo rather than the other way round.
Cheers
Phil Hobbs
The extender cables cost more than the heads nowadays.
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