For those that need a few uncommon old ICs ... ebay.de/itm/322567416699

@PlasmaHH Any project still using any of those has bigger issues than a chip having been replaced by a better, quicker, more energy efficient one

@Asmyldof the electronics of my tsar bomb in the basement and the decomissioned russian thermonuclear icbms don't maintain themselves though...

@PlasmaHH Again, none of those chips are functionally deprecated.

They just got new names and higher speeds

Except maybe some of the DRAM, they may have fiddled a few pins there.

@Asmyldof And you think the crazy russian engineers that hacked together the guidance computers did use them for their intended purpose? ;)

I bet they would use the linear region of a 74 series inverted in lieu of an opamp ;)

@PlasmaHH You can just go and blow yourself up if you haven't fixed that yet

@Asmyldof splendid plan, however I might need to invite some people to my place before I do that

@PlasmaHH Send me an invite too, I may want to put a few sheets of lead in your general direction

@PlasmaHH Thank goodness the Russians still make electronic valves (tubes)

@Marla that makes it easy to find them in a large underground bunker..

especially when they are biased improperly and have that really nice Violet colored glow (Xrays)

bwahaha

@Marla But that'll make them super human monsters

@Asmyldof . . Bu, but, when I was a kid, my government told me they were that.

Now days, when I want to know what is truly going on in my country, I go read the Russian Times ( rt.com )

Next week is my favorite day of the year. All of my grandchildren will be here on the 4th. Thank goodness we don't have firecrackers now days.

you don't? how boring. or have you substituted them by tnt?

@Marla Surely you have an array of old caps you can connect the wrong way around with a set of timed transistors. Tie them to a branch somewhere. Who cares about the environment? You're in the US!

@PlasmaHH when I was a child, there were "cherry bombs" and "M80's". Seems like they were about 1/4 stick of dynamite.

@Asmyldof No thanks. At work, during testing of power supplies, occasionally the cannon shot sound of a 1500 amp circuit breaker blowing would occur. No wonder I need hearing aid now.

@Marla My 78yr old neighbour says the same thing. But about exploding microwave components due to resin impurities

Mostly HV capacitors not as well suited to HV due to limited or no outgassing

@Marla The M80's I've seen have a lot more non-explosive material than gunpowder

@W5VO . . I haven't seen any in years. I wonder if they are same as 50 years ago

inflation or deflation. LOL

@Marla It wouldn't surprise me if they became "safer" over the years

I do know that they worked under water. My Uncle got in a lot of trouble when he dropped a cherry bomb in the water well (drinking water)

actually, speaking of glowing tubes, has anyone not seen the guy who built a nixie tube factory?

@W5VO I have "not" seen it. a Link ?

BTW, I did accidently make the violet glowing tube back when I had a novice License (WN0ZED). Using a 6146 tube as the final.

I've seen some VR tubes that had a nice purple glow

had a rectifier tube that started off glowing purple, but it settled down

In induction heating, there are still vacuum tubes being used at 450kc. (yes I said kc)

from 2.5 KW up to 25 KW (or higher)

when was last time you saw anyone use the term kc for frequency. HA !

@W5VO I do like the content of the video, thank you

hm, can they help in aerating the lawn, or reseeding walk areas in it?

tubes or M80's?

purple glowing tubes

You could add a glowing tube to these : amazon.com/dp/B01MTFI82Y/ref=asc_df_B01MTFI82Y5048031/…

They may keep people off of the grass

@Marla have some of these. useless.

@PlasmaHH . . I figured those shoes would only be good for killing the earth worms.

sad

@Marla as long as you don't make much noises, they seem to live a bit deeper

Here, the big ones are night-crawlers (different species I think). They hang out near the surface

@Marla They wouldn't live long enough here with the birds. We even have birds that stomp on the lawn to simulate rain drops and make them come out.

@PlasmaHH . . that is a good trick

is 7:44 here, and I better go out and do my chores while it is still cool. Expected to be another warm day . adios

ignore the sound

ooh, ok, I want to watch that vid

actually the sound makes it fun

@ThePhoton Any old equipment you "borrowed" from certain ex employers? This guy may have spare parts for you:

eevblog.com/forum/buysellwanted/…

@Asmyldof All those part numbers 18xx-xxxx will be the same type of thing. Like all capacitors or all resistors. Unfortunately it's been more than 5 years since I dealt with that PN scheme daily, so I don't recall exactly what category starts with 18...

I'm pretty sure inductors start with "8", so it won't be that.

@PlasmaHH Recently saw a cache of old spares at a garage sale. Parts with US Navy part numbers on the box. "milli-microfarad" capacitance specs and all that. I passed.

@ThePhoton most of these parts are sold on ebay for quite a bit of money, so you can buy them at .1 and sell them at 10 each and make a bit of money, but the question is if people really buy those parts at ebay or are they just sitting there forever

@PlasmaHH I think I could have gotten a whole bag of parts for $3 or something...but I'm not interested in spending my time mucking around with eBay.

@ThePhoton yeah, that might be quite annoying

but some people seem to like that

@PlasmaHH Back in the day when internet selling didn't yet mean all these morons asking about stupid shit I enjoyed listing quite a lot of bulk-bought parts in 10pc bunches and it paid for quite a lot of things still in my lab, but these days it's not worth the aneurysm it'll cause you.

I have a Q that I don't believe it's worthy of a SE post, because it's specific to a book (LAoE). Is this a good place to ask a question? If not, where should I?

In the meantime, I'll ask the question... (in process of formulating it)

In section "1N.4.6 - A rule of thumb for relating R_out_a to R_in_b" of "Learning the Art of Electronics", it starts talking about R_in and R_out. R_in was mentioned, and I think it's the internal resistance (=R_thevenin?). However, what is R_out? Also, if I misunderstood R_in, correct me on that, too.

I'm re-re-re-re-reading the text prior to this section, and I think R_out is the resistance of the load, correct?

Reading 1N.4.6, it seems my definitions are incorrect, because "R_out_A is much smaller than R_in_B" (regarding a voltage divider B chained to a voltage divider A) makes no sense because R_out_A and R_in_B are one and the same according to my definition. I'm (oxymoronically) clearly not understanding something.

@FineMan R_out is typically the output resistance (impedance) of the circuit/amplifier

R_L is typically the resistance of the load

@Asmyldof could you build a robot that will do it?

@PlasmaHH Yes

Shingle Springs seems to me to be a place you don't want to be for medical reasons

@Asmyldof Or a kind of roof that needs springs...

@W5VO Jeex man, it's in your darn backyard

...

google.nl/maps/place/Shingle+Springs,+CA+95682,+USA/…

@Asmyldof That's like saying that you're close to Moscow

As a side note, google.nl changes units of distance when measuring US travel vs. Europe travel

@W5VO No, because we're not governed by Putin. It's more like saying YOU are close to Moscow

really wasn't trying to make a political statement - just a geographic one

As if intentions matter anymore

How about Istanbul - a bit closer to the distance between me and Shingle Springs

You know how there's this stereotype of Americans claiming everything is bigger there when they come to Europe? Or maybe you don't actually....

@Asmyldof It's only 150 miles from me, but that would probably still be far enough away from you to get to another country.

Well... I just thought, it's a contest between you and the UK, but I think we can add political folly tentatively to that list now

@ThePhoton Depends on which direction

South, East: Yes.

North: No

West: WET!

@Asmyldof I'm checking the map and it looks like you could walk to Belgium in a day.

Or a few hours really

@ThePhoton I don't mind the walking, but the fact that when you're done you're in Belgium is the major issue there

Holy crap! who is responsible for drawing the border here?

@Asmyldof Well, I think it's fair to say that it's a lot easier to find yourself in the middle of nowhere over here

@W5VO Don't look up, you're already there

@ThePhoton Great town to be in

Been there often

@Asmyldof Did every street get to decide what country they wanted to be in?

The 1500-something treaties of Baarle

Nope

This has been done by regents

@Asmyldof I can Baarle cross the street without going to a different country.

In fact, there's houses that have NL front doors and BE living rooms

@ThePhoton It's nice! People are friendly here, and we're just now getting a 3rd lane on our freeway.

Fun Fact: In 2008 (last time I was there, don't know what changed now): In NL you could drink till well beyond midnight, in BE bars close at 23:00. Some bard have a Belgian half that they need to close up at 23:00

And nobody vacuums their front yard

Other Fun Fact (same year): In Belgium you can buy quite a bunch of fireworks any date. In NL they are illegal except for party-crackers and sparklers and the like.

Or put differently, you can drink yourself into a stupor one side of the street, cross the street and buy whatever fireworks you like early in the morning.

@W5VO No freeways is points in your favor.

Also Cheap fuel in Belgium

@Asmyldof Sounds like a recipe for good times.

@ThePhoton Strangely they don't let you into Dutch bars with a bag of Belgian fireworks

@Asmyldof Interesting that you can buy them year round - here it's only economical to sell them at New Years and the 4th

@W5VO My memories are quite vague, but usually year-round they are restricted to tamer kinds at fuel stations and the like, around new-years they become insane grades that are also illegal in NL

Fuel stations along the border already attract Dutch customership, so it makes sense for them to have some mild fireworks