- Joined
- Feb 11, 2009
- Messages
- 23,453
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- Location
- NJ (The nice part)
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I was working on routing the power cables in my new electronics bench when I heard a loud pop and smelled the magic smoke. Weirdly, everything seemed to still be running, but I cut the power at the source. The sound seemed to come from the floor where I had a TrippLite power strip so I assumed that to be the source of the problem. That would have upset me greatly because they're pretty much the only power strips I trust anymore and it was $85.
After completely disassembling it there was no trouble found (they are made really well - highly recommended). Weird. I examined the outlets - no scorch marks. Thinking about why there would be sound from the floor when nothing happened down there, I thought more about the room design and realized that the equipment on the shelf is right under a 45-degree angled wall that's under a gable (the room is over the garage), so it's possible the sound came from the shelf and bounced around making it sound like it came from the floor from where I was siting at the time. Hmm.
I then did the thing I should have done first and took a deep wiff of every piece of vintage tech on the bench, and that's when I discovered the culprit, now banished to the garage: My beloved Tektronix 2465A CT Oscilloscope.
I haven't done any further testing because holy hell does it smell bad, so it's possible it's just one of the option cards, but she's lived a good long life and it might just be time. I have a Rigol 1054Z that's been hacked to 1100 firmware so it's not a critical loss, plus I have two or three USB scopes if I need them, but I really prefer an analog scope for audio stuff.
I love vintage tech, but yikes. Oh, and the smoke detector in the room didn't do anything, so now I don't trust those and they all need to go.
After completely disassembling it there was no trouble found (they are made really well - highly recommended). Weird. I examined the outlets - no scorch marks. Thinking about why there would be sound from the floor when nothing happened down there, I thought more about the room design and realized that the equipment on the shelf is right under a 45-degree angled wall that's under a gable (the room is over the garage), so it's possible the sound came from the shelf and bounced around making it sound like it came from the floor from where I was siting at the time. Hmm.
I then did the thing I should have done first and took a deep wiff of every piece of vintage tech on the bench, and that's when I discovered the culprit, now banished to the garage: My beloved Tektronix 2465A CT Oscilloscope.
I haven't done any further testing because holy hell does it smell bad, so it's possible it's just one of the option cards, but she's lived a good long life and it might just be time. I have a Rigol 1054Z that's been hacked to 1100 firmware so it's not a critical loss, plus I have two or three USB scopes if I need them, but I really prefer an analog scope for audio stuff.
I love vintage tech, but yikes. Oh, and the smoke detector in the room didn't do anything, so now I don't trust those and they all need to go.
I love a challenge (Tektronix still hosts the service manual for it) and it would likely be good experience… or I could buy a different model that does all I need for two hundred bucks and use that until it explodes. 
