Funny story About A Freq Generator. when I was In HS Our Horticulture teacher was an Old Navy Radioman. He was really Cool. and he knew I was into electronics so he surprised me by bringing in some old electronics equipment. one piece was a signal Generator exactly like you showed in the vid. he trusted me to stay in his classroom [ Holding down the Fort ] with the door locked, while he was having lunch. he let another student that was heavy into electronics hang out in his classroom during lunch one day. Our school bell was an oscillator generated Horn sound. and while me and this other dude were messing around with the Freq Gen.I found a freq. that sounded exactly like the horn bell. it was the lowest scale Sign-wave Forget what the exact Hz rate was tho.. . maybe 70 Hz or So. I noticed that the school Maint. had added a siren horn inside the classroom Up on the wall. under a partitioned Study table. well it was hooked up with wire nuts so we got up on the table, Ran the output up to the Out going speaker connections, and turned the thing all the way up ( The output was Loud without An amp even ) and did a count down. flipped the output switch On and timed it so it was as long a duration as the horn sound. there was a transom window over the door and we saw the campus cops walking around, and we cracked open the door and heard one saying to the other " I don't know where it came from! " this other Dude and I got a Real chuckle out of Pulling one over on the Campus Cops. That Prank Went down In BHS History. LOL
The bulb in the oscillator is used as a variable resistor to keep the gain linear. If the feedback signal gets large enough, the signal stops being a sine wave and becomes a square wave. As more voltage gets generated, the filament heats up and its resistance increases.
Think ive seen this guy in "Back to the future"? Anyway nice video. Also some precautions to think of for ppl that didn't know... When salvaging old stuff (well new ones as well but not as bad) wash your hands after, the flame retardants used is not good for you as they act like hormones and mess with your body. When salvaging things pre 1980~ or medical/military equipment, look out for beryllium containing components. Like ceramic insulators. Ceramic resistors and such. Do not salvage magnetrons and its not worth the risk. Old computer screens (fat ones) contain allot of lead so try not to break them (for fun). The lead is there to protect users from roentgen rays as the screen uses high voltage which generates them (When on ofc).
Hobby Electronics Very sensible remarks. Would like to add: Always use gloves and make sure there is proper ventilation when working with electronics (take a look at the guys hands, you'll know enough...)
As a kid salvaging and learning, a trick I learned was to take a propane torch and wave it over the backside of the board. As soon as the solder appears to soften or change color, give the board a rap on the table. Solder and parts fall out nicely. You could depopulate a board in a matter of minutes.
That stereo you said has a bad transformer. Easy fix. Tear open the wrapping around the coil windings along the primary side. There is a little thermal fuse inline with the wires coming from the primary connections. They get old and fail. Replace it or eliminate it and the transformer is back in business. The thermal fuse is too weak to survive a loud party for hours on a weekend in those units. I would salvage the power amplifier from that with the power supply. Its a robust amp that can be driven directly from computer TV or other source or to use as a bench test stereo amplifier to listen to small signals without all the other junk. Good job on the video :)
Thanks for showing! You are one of the few people left that manually does things, like I do. Everyone now needs clean hands with their eye telephone. I Love using my brains and unfortunately its getting lost for good more each day. Great thanks again.
I love your videos, reminds me of my childhood spending allot of time with my dad in his workshop at the back of the garden, tinkering with stuff... He was also a master at recycling stuff and using it to build or fix what ever anyone needed. Great work, keep on hacking!
thank you sir. I remember my childhood memories! I always love to salvage dc motors and i made it as my generator. hahah mr hackaday before when i was a child i just only dispose those special electronics component like capacitors and transistor! but i never thought they are so special so much. I got tears of joy again because you made me remember my dream childhood. to be an invetor and engineer! ? more power to your channel.
Man, I really do enjoy your vids AND your talents. All the gear that has passed through my hands over the years make me envy your ability to scrounge and build stuff. You're an inspiration for those of us who do not have the space/garage to mess around the way you do. Keep on keepin' on and thanks for posting!
Yep, it's a form of negative feedback, when the there is too much signal going through the lightbulb it heats up and resistance increases, lowering the signal amplitude
I'm so glad I found your channel. I seen your stuff a few years ago. Now I'm into electronics and programming micro controllers and doing all kinds of crap. your channel is cool.
Hi Dean, Glad your back to making videos, always enjoy them. You, All American Five Radio, and Andy Davies by the Sea, oh and Afrotechmods are my goto people for excellent Electronic Tutorials, Thankyou, very much appreciated. Been dabbling with TDA 2002, 2040, etc. chip amps, maybe a video on easy MONO to see what you come up with. Can do LM386 in my sleep, a specialized Op-Amp. Been using LM741,358,1458 ( 14 pin Quad ), non inverting input for from 7W + power output. Glad Hack a Week TV is back. All the Best. Cass.
When I was 16 (1991), I used to sit at my table in a quiet room and desolder components EXACTLY as you have just shown for HOURS - burning my bare fingertips and/or using a small terminal screwdriver :D - I used to make FM audio bugs, and varicaps and high speed NPN transistors are ABUNDANT in old FM radios etc.
Love it. Whether you're tinkering with bikes or electronics I love watching your videos. Oh, and a big thanks for pronouncing solder properly. It's a pet hate I have "sarder"... it's not _"sarder"_.
tobortine I tend to pronounce it not as soLder but sa(w/l)-der but I do ever so slightly pronounce the 'L' but you have to listen for it to hear me say it so I say it sa-(almost silent 'L' that can almost come off as a 'W' as in saw but my tongue is at the roof of my mouth making an 'L')-der and I do the same with the 'B' in comb and the 'T' in castle... as in it's almost but not quite silent... but what I do say wrong is mirror... I pronounce it mirah where the ah is pronounced as in the name Mariah. Anyways cheers.
I'm not too knowledgeable when it comes to this stuff, but I breathed a sigh of relief when you decided not to break down that milliammeter. That device was beautiful. Thanks for this. 😀
I have always taken things apart and fixed most .....I recently came across a old 1940s portable radio....vac tubes and all just a good cleaning and blowing out and the thing worked had all the parts included they don't make em like the use to.....great video oh and I sold the radio on eBay for 100 bucks ....gotta luv what people toss huh....lol
Seriously, there is a special charm about electronics designed and manufactured in the late 70's and early 80's. You can find hundreds of useful salvaged parts from an old radio from the 80's
I'm not huge into this electrical stuff, despite using O-scopes, and all that jazz at work, but I am working on a 74 CB750 and hope to see some of your work down the line. Live the videos
Haha this is the second time I watched this video and I just noticed you have a Prince Edward Island shirt on, that's where I'm from and still live. Love the vids keep em goin!!!
Hahahahaha, absolutely beautiful I love this series. And it is most pleasing to hear the word SOLDER pronounced correctly. SODDER sounds so ugly and is incorrect, of course. I love your workshop too, you seem to have everything there.
Interesting wonderland of electronic salvage. More on safety for the newbies digging into loaded capacitors/power storage and discharging their load safely.
Great video Dino. Harvesting components is what I started out doing years ago. A word on desolder braid: Avoid the radio shack stuff! I'm not sure if it doesn't have enough flux in it, but the stuff just doesn't work well. It turned me off from the braid for a long time until I got some REAL desoldering braid. I'd assume the bulb in the oscillator is because it's a wien bridge oscillator for the side wave.
Wow that was so cool! especially seeing that old audio signal generator still working :-) I think you should take the cover sand the rust off of it repaint it to make it look like new. :-)
so if you wanted to you could get that olm reader running like new again I take it,,thats so kool man,,im getting into this I think,,the other day I fixed a 50 inch lcd t,,,2 capacitors wer blown,,bought a soldering gun and replaced thm,,boom bam bing,,it turned on after being broke at girlfriends moms house for 2 years,,,it felt so good to see that I could do that,,so now im hooked I think,,,im hooked,,im likeing anfd subscribing,,keep the vids coming,,im a new fan,,thnx a lot dude
Hi Bro, I just found your videos and I really enjoy watching them,...I too am an "electronic enthusiast..guru..whatever" I like the fact that your making good use of some antiquated equipment, If its not broke ..dont buy a new one!
Interesting video , i use to have one of those Model 377 waveform gens , think i thru it in the garbage after getting a more modern one , almost regret doing that now.
+Stinky Puppie There are several components to learning electronics. One resource I discovered that successfully combines these is the Gregs Electro Blog (check it out on google) without a doubt the most useful info that I have ever seen. look at this awesome resource.
If you thought that the signal generator was fun, wait till you use one of those cassette deck head's! Just simply connect the head to a high gain input of an amplifier and you will be able to hear what the individual components are doing! It's literally the best way to find noisy resistors because you can hear them arching from the inside, even though they read correctly with an ohm meter.. You will probably end up sticking the head in a plastic pipe to make a probe out of it.. It really is an indispensable tool that that should be on every bench, maybe you might go as far to build a dedicated amplifier with a built in speaker in a nice enclosure... So it's kinda like the old signal tracers except you don't probe directly, you listen to the components as they talk to you in RF... It's the only tool that allows you to hear components in that way... You are going to love it!
@@HackaweekTV your welcome, if you want to have a look at how the idea works, there's a channel called Kreosan where all he did was unscrew the head from a Walkman... It's basically that simple. There's also Mr Carlson's Lab channel where he designed and built a kit where it works both ways in which you can directly probe or use the non contact method... He actually showed how you can actually hear an old noisy resistor that you would otherwise never had known that it should be replaced, it checked out fine with a multimeter and you would never suspect it... It's basically one of the best electronics test tools that you can have, all that you have to do is work out a routine where you find which frequencies to feed into the device under test to figure out which frequencies work best with which devices... I'm looking forward to a video where you have a go at this, I haven't done this myself but it's definitely a high priority... If the normal aux input of an amplifier isn't enough gain, you can try the turntable phono inputs which should have plenty gain... Best of luck!
Check out this video... ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-4T7qkYY7LZM.html He does it with what used to be used as a telephone listening device... Although I'm not sure if he knows that it can be used to sniff out bad components... But you will get the idea...
The light bulb on the bottom is a resistive couple. It limits the current to keep it from overloading. The variance in frequency is likely due to a gassy tube.
You should have a proper load on the output of that audio generator to see the sine wave. It's probably expecting to drive something other than the high mega-ohm scope. Fun watching the antique electronics :) Keep on!
That function generator is really nice, some of the old equipment has such a nice build quality. I'm not sure about the lamp underneath, maybe it's being used as a high wattage resistor?
I think the bulb is for stabilization of the oscillator. As current flows it heats up, resistance goes up, and vice versa. I had built one, though transistor version of it back in the day, simple oscillator and was working fine.
Im pretty sure im a younger version of you. Im in the middle of salvaging all kinds of electronics and I have a 77 yamaha xs750 triple im in the middle of turning into a cafe bike. Fun stuff.
I love your channel. I am very much a greenhorn when it comes to electronics. I am currently working on a vintage Pioneer amplifier. The amp board was pretty much torched in the area of the protection contacts. I was trying to salvage the amp by basically running wires instead of using the destroyed traces. I have not been able to make it work yet, I do have power and the protection points are switching but no sound yet, but I haven't killed myself either and no smoke or fire as of yet. My question is, would it be possible to run a completely different brand of amp board, but use all the original bass and treble, volume, and other switches to control the new circuit board. this way I could keep the original look of the amplifier, or am I dreaming.
Thank you for not parting out the bench multimeter before you gave fixing it a go... I was about to cry... some electrogeeks are all about the audio equipment and those guys are seriously sentimental and get quite hurt when people destroy equipment they love... I'm much the same but with test equipment.
well that lamp in the bottom of the oscillator is a "dim bulb tester" were the bulb won't light if the circuit is working (its connected in series) but if the circuit has a short the lamp will illuminate protecting the rest of the circuit.
started to learn electronic not long ago and that's actually how i'm getting all my stuff right now, add a lot of old broken stuff and thing i know i'll never use again as it is stored away, even my breadboard is homemade from old pc ide cables lolll, and it works pretty well too!! till now i even found 1 7555, 1 7556, 5 mcu, lots of eeprom, and bunch of other usefull chips. the only thing i bought till now is my soldering iron, was planning on slowly buying everything, but from what i learned and found on the net, i think a lot of it is gonna be diy almost completly from recycled stuff, not because i don't have the money, but 1st it's a good way to learn without wasting, 2nd i always liked to recycle/repurpose everything i can, 3rd i think it's a good way to "go green" !!
To desolder resistors I used hemostats or locking tweezers and applied the heat of the soldering iron, the parts were desoldered from the board very fast and you can be faster than using a solder sucker...
The lamp under the chassis is a negative resistance element in the wein bridge, if you have to replace it because of breakage make sure you use the right bulb. BTW the old EICO gear was pretty much bullet proof - good stuff cheap!
Can you use the copper Brillo pads to wick solder instead of buying the braided wick? I buy and use Brillo pads to clean my iron instead of paying extra for the special sponge and little ball of copper that they sell to clean your iron tips.
The osc is probably a wien bridge, these often use a lamp to stabilise the gain and give a distortion free o/p, if it was open gain would have been max or zero killing the o/p.
Where did you get that solder sucker specifically? The only ones I've seen are simply a plastic tool with a retraction feature. None of them simultaneously heat and can apply pressure like yours does. Does that solder sucker specifically have a different name of some kind? Where would I order one? It looks insanely useful from an electronics salvaging standpoint.
Cool Video ma. Im a super noob with electronics but always wanted to know what everything did. I was wondering if you could tell me what to look for in finding a 1:37 step up transformer. or something that I could make a ribbon mic out of. Thanks
