Re: [time-nuts] Oscilloquartz 3210 Cesium Standard
I have one of those modules but in a Telecom Solutions wrapping. It seems like for your purposes, at least bypassing the output synthesis would be a good thing. Cheers, Magnus On 08/29/2014 10:06 AM, Javier Herrero wrote: It seems that later, they decided to shameless use the FTS/Datum/Symmetricom FTS-5045 module http://www.gigatest.net/datum/5045txt2.pdf The OSA-5585 I've has one inside, labeled Symmetricom everywere, and the Oscilloquartz contribution is a subrack containing the DC-input and AC-input power supplies, a controller that manages the FTS-5045 through its serial port, and some clock synthesis and distribution cards to provide PPS, 10MHz and 2.048MHz, with a spectral quality a lot worse than the output from the FTS-5045. I find the Oscilloquartz part of the equipment not very good nor very usefult to my purposes, to a point I'm thinking on to remove it completely an control/monitor directly the FTS-5045 with whatever thing with a serial port and a display (my Blackfin module, a Beaglebone o whatever similar) Regards, Javier On 29/08/2014 1:23, Magnus Danielson wrote: FTS had a patent on microcontroller steered cesium, which could naturally have limited the spreading time of that technology. Oscilloquartz at the time where more focused on the telecommunication market and meeting the ITU-T G.811 PRC quality requirement, keeping within +/. 1E-11 in frequency, and that is achievable with the analog design, so no rush changing it. FTS and HP where more into time-keeping, so therefore improving the design made more market sense for them. Anyway, that's about how I have perceived the market at the time. Cheers, Magnus On 08/28/2014 11:47 PM, Chris wrote: On 08/28/14 19:53, Javier Herrero wrote: Hello, Then it is a quite different beast to the EUDICS 3120, that they also call OSA-3120... I note now that yours is a 3210, not 3120 :) Regards, Javier The 3210 looks like a much earlier design, prior to the inclusion of microprocessor control. Date codes look mid eighties, by which time companies like FTS did have microprocessor control. Maybe their later design products ran in parallel because of gov or esa contracts. In theory, the more straightforward hardware design should make it easier to keep running, tube life permitting, assuming the info can be found. Thanks for sending it anyway - it all adds to the sum of knowledge... Regards, Chris ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
Re: [time-nuts] Subject: Re: Oscilloquartz 3210 Cesium Standard
Hi Chris, Hi Magnus, Thanks for that and also the notes about initial startup. I guess there may have been other reasons, such as contractual requirements to buy product built in the eu, say for military or the ESA. Sure. I have a bunch of OSA cesiums and did a trim-up of them all, so that's basically what I did. With regard to startup, more or less followed your route. In pump / osc mode until the meter indicated zero, then into open loop mode and calibrate oscillator against the lab Z3816. Leave for a couple more days, recheck oscillator and switch into closed loop mode. Yet another couple of days and still no 2nd harmonic on the meter and no lock :-). Meter indications are currently: 1-4 Psu voltages, All ok 5Cs Oven +4 divs of 10 = 8v 6Osc Ctrl+5 divs of 10 = 10v 7Integrator Initially +offscale, loop open, then falls back to zero, loop closed 8Preamp-6.5 divs of 10 = 0.325v 92nd Harmonic 0, loop open or closed Modulation on, autolock on. The fact that your integrator reading goes down to 0 (mid-point) indicates that the first harmonic does get you into locked state. The second harmonic is just a quality measure and easy to detect lock on, so the lack of lock lamp correlates with lack of 2nd harmonic reading. Try adjusting your oscillator slighly out of tune and see if the integrator tracks it out, and then try adjusting it back to 0 again. If so, you do have a lock. Put up some pics on Photobucket earlier today: http://s775.photobucket.com/user/NikonFtn/library/?sort=6page=1#/user/NikonFtn/library/?sort=6page=1_suid=140932843589702368659727058955 Nice unit, got a bunch of nice stuff I don't have on mine. So what am I missing ?. Did fill in the enquiry form at the Oscilloquartz web site a few days ago, but no reply. Should I try again, or are are there some special runes you need to recite before they will talk to you ? :-). Would be quite happy to pay a reasonable fee for a copy of the manual, paper or pdf... Them being swiss in the lovely town of Neuchatel, runes does not come into great use for them. I think that you're cesium core is about the same as mine, so the manual I have will suffice, but you should try to get one from them. Looking at the pictures, what you got is the same as mine, except that I don't have the time section. Wish I had. Exactly why I found that manual laying next to my bed I'm not quite sure... Cheers, Magnus ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
[time-nuts] Hp 5061a power cord
Anyone know where I might find a power cord for a 5061a? Failing that, the pi out of the connector? Thanks! Bob ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
Re: [time-nuts] Subject: Re: Oscilloquartz 3210 Cesium Standard
...and don't forget that it may have a BVA OCXO: it is not clear from the pictures but I suspect that it has got a BVA inside. On Sat, Aug 30, 2014 at 2:11 PM, Magnus Danielson mag...@rubidium.dyndns.org wrote: Hi Chris, Hi Magnus, Thanks for that and also the notes about initial startup. I guess there may have been other reasons, such as contractual requirements to buy product built in the eu, say for military or the ESA. Sure. I have a bunch of OSA cesiums and did a trim-up of them all, so that's basically what I did. With regard to startup, more or less followed your route. In pump / osc mode until the meter indicated zero, then into open loop mode and calibrate oscillator against the lab Z3816. Leave for a couple more days, recheck oscillator and switch into closed loop mode. Yet another couple of days and still no 2nd harmonic on the meter and no lock :-). Meter indications are currently: 1-4 Psu voltages, All ok 5Cs Oven +4 divs of 10 = 8v 6Osc Ctrl+5 divs of 10 = 10v 7Integrator Initially +offscale, loop open, then falls back to zero, loop closed 8Preamp-6.5 divs of 10 = 0.325v 92nd Harmonic 0, loop open or closed Modulation on, autolock on. The fact that your integrator reading goes down to 0 (mid-point) indicates that the first harmonic does get you into locked state. The second harmonic is just a quality measure and easy to detect lock on, so the lack of lock lamp correlates with lack of 2nd harmonic reading. Try adjusting your oscillator slighly out of tune and see if the integrator tracks it out, and then try adjusting it back to 0 again. If so, you do have a lock. Put up some pics on Photobucket earlier today: http://s775.photobucket.com/user/NikonFtn/library/?sort=6page=1#/user/NikonFtn/library/?sort=6page=1_suid=140932843589702368659727058955 Nice unit, got a bunch of nice stuff I don't have on mine. So what am I missing ?. Did fill in the enquiry form at the Oscilloquartz web site a few days ago, but no reply. Should I try again, or are are there some special runes you need to recite before they will talk to you ? :-). Would be quite happy to pay a reasonable fee for a copy of the manual, paper or pdf... Them being swiss in the lovely town of Neuchatel, runes does not come into great use for them. I think that you're cesium core is about the same as mine, so the manual I have will suffice, but you should try to get one from them. Looking at the pictures, what you got is the same as mine, except that I don't have the time section. Wish I had. Exactly why I found that manual laying next to my bed I'm not quite sure... Cheers, Magnus ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
Re: [time-nuts] Subject: Re: Oscilloquartz 3210 Cesium Standard
On 08/29/14 22:10, John Miles wrote: Looks like a really nice piece of hardware, well worth fixing up. You might check the hot-wire ionizer filament on the Cs tube for continuity, as a failure there may not show up in a meter indication. Apart from that, the detailed troubleshooting steps in the contemporary HP Cs service manuals (5061A/5061B generation) would be very much applicable to this one. The block diagram will be similar. You could try measuring the beam current and SNR manually if all else fails; one approach that I used is detailed at http://www.ke5fx.com/cs.htm . -- john, KE5FX Miles Design LLC Hi John, Nice piece of kit and it will be fixed, one way or another. Neat setup you have there and could probably do something similar, other than for the hv psu's. Can take decades to build up a good lab. Cheap test gear bought broken and fixed + the occasional real bargain from Ebay etc, but there are still quite a few gaps to fill in here. I restore old test gear as a hobby and for some items, you really need a very well equipped lab if you are following the book calibration procedures. While you can often find workarounds, it's so much easier and faster if you have the right kit in place. Had a look at the manual for the FTS4060 to get some background, but will have a good read of the 5061 manual as well As mentioned. one of the boards has an sma jack input from what looks like a coax lead to the tube area. It's terminated on the board in a 1meg (misread that earlier as a 100K) to ground and straight into an op amp. There's a test point at the output of the op amp and hung a scope on that earlier today. Reads ~80mV p-p, noisy sine wave and guess what ? - around 138Hz and verified using the scope fft function. No idea if this is enough, but the signal is definately there, so looks like the tube hv, ioniser and cesium heater is at least functional. Can't really determine the op amp gain without feeding in an external signal in, as it has a trimpot in the feedback loop, but suspect either unity or a few X, as it's primary function will be as a high Z input buffer for the tube signal. It's been in the bench for a week now and will have to put it to one side soon for a few days to get some work done. Will give me some time to do more background reading / manual hunting... Regards, Chris ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
Re: [time-nuts] TU60-D120-041 power up
Hello Michael, I apologize for the long delay to your reply. I have spent a lot of time upgrading my computers from Windows XP to Windows 7 and I ended up losing a lot of information - my fault. I have been using the TAC32 demonstration software and I have been able to verify that my GPS unit is working fine. I would eventually like to build my GPS into a 10 MHz disciplined oscillator. Since I know my GPS is working OK I would appreciate hearing about the program you mention in your reply. I have limited software experience but I would like to try it on my system. Will you please send me your program with some basic instructions? Thank you for your kind offer to help. Jerry, WA0ACF ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
Re: [time-nuts] Need help with transformer core
So we're nuts. I thought that was a given. David On 8/29/14 9:58 PM, Mark Sims wrote: Frankly, anybody that builds up a Simple Switcher type converter from scratch is more than a little nuts and/or awfully lonely. You can buy small, adjustable pre-built boards (buck or boost configs) off of Ebay for as little as a dollar each... including shipping from Old Cathay. I usually buy them 10 or 20 at a time. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there. ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
[time-nuts] Old 500 kHz oscillator
Found at a surplus store today three of these guys new in the box. The box only has on ir RCA 500 KHZ OSC. And each came with a drawing of what is inside and what it takes to use one. Had to buy to add to my collection. Anyone seen these before and or know where they were used ? https://drive.google.com/folderview?id=0B86wM5n5RE3kbVllZnNoVWZYMXcusp=sharing -pete ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
Re: [time-nuts] Subject: Re: Oscilloquartz 3210 Cesium Standard
On 08/30/14 00:24, paul swed wrote: Chris Sorry its not working. Very nice looking unit though. I did the Frankenstein thing on my 5060/5061. So if its bad there is no harm in seriously digging in. After all its just physics. On Frankenstein it took me an honest 6 months and the support of the time-nuts you already have. Learned a ton in the process and the monster lives. I was lucky at the same time I came across a HP pico-amp meter and could read the tube current directly and it was pitiful. Good luck Paul WB8TSL Hi Paul, Thanks for the reply - just curious, by Frankenstein, I guess you mean take the tube out of the box and partially / completely power up and feed signals in to check functionality ?... Regards, Chris ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
[time-nuts] Old 500 kHz oscillator
One of these was my first frequency standard that I used as a marker for checking the calibration of an old Collins TCS-12 receiver I used around 1959. I built a small power supply for the oscillator and used it for a few years until the filament opened and it died. Even way back then I felt that it was worth saving and set it aside to repair later. This past spring I was at the Nearfest ham fleamarket in Deerfield, New Hampshire and found 2 new oscillators on a table. The seller had no idea what they were and at the end of the day I bought the 2 of them for a total of $5, because, like Pete, I just had to have them. I searched around in one of my many junk boxes and found the original dead one I had bought over 50 years ago. (I know most of you won’t find that too strange but my wife thinks my affliction is sad.) The difference between the original and these 2 that I just bought is there was a covered access hole to trim the original but the 2 I just got lack that. Where I had opened the unit up all those years ago I compared the schematic you show to the circuit of my original and they do differ slightly. The cover over the crystal oven says ‘Bulova AB-200 crystal oven’ and there is a thermostat (not shown on your) bypassed by a .01Mfd. The date on the crystal can inside marked ‘VC-1-NL RCA’ is 1/57 so that and my previous experience will help date them. My original only has the 1.5-7pf NPO trimmer and uses a fixed cap across the inductor in the plate circuit. One of these days I’ll power one up and see how I view its accuracy compared to my GPSDO. -Arthur ___ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
