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The unwritten laws and rules of Electronics

Anyone who's worked in the industry for a while will know some of these. Feel free to add more..

The likelihood of forgetting to put the one piece connector shell on the cable first is directly proportional to the number of soldered contacts and/or fiddlyness of soldering involved.

Any carefully setup and aligned assembly ready for soldering will always be jolted/moved by the soldering iron lead as soon as removed from the stand.

When soldering very small SMT parts with tweezers, the likelihood they will ping off never to be found again increases ten fold when it's the last one of that part you have.

A stereo microscope's focusing range will always need around 1mm more travel to focus completely on the assembly under it.

Using the search function on a manufacturers web site for their part you want info on will always return zero found items. Bizarrely doing the same part search via Google home page will instantly locate the part on the self same web site.

That obscure very rarely used lead/adapter you see everyday will be nowhere to be found the time you actually need it.

Hardware engineers will always blame the software. Softies will always blame faulty hardware.

Reply to
Richard Jones
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Soldering bare interconnect cable conductors to their jack lugs will always go the smoothest when you've forgotten to slide the piece of heat shrink onto the cable lead first

Reply to
bitrex

In any parts order, the part you need the most, that cannot be second sourced, will be missing, the wrong part, badly substituted, or backordered.

Lightning does not strike twice in the same place. Static electricity does.

Messy breadboards work great. Neat and organized breadboards never seem to work.

If one designs an oscillator, it acts more like an amplifier. If one designs and amplifier, it oscillates.

Having an instrument calibrated does not guarantee that it will be returned in working condition.

--
Jeff Liebermann     jeffl@cruzio.com 
150 Felker St #D    http://www.LearnByDestroying.com 
Santa Cruz CA 95060 http://802.11junk.com 
Skype: JeffLiebermann     AE6KS    831-336-2558
Reply to
Jeff Liebermann

The first prototype will have (at least) one 'golden' part. It will work better than expected and you'll slap yourself on the back and move on. Then you'll go to production and find it doesn't work as well as you thought.

George H.

Reply to
George Herold

There was someone (I think it was John Woodgate) who had a tagline: "Oscillators don't. Amplifiers do."

Reply to
Tom Del Rosso

"Hardware eventually fails. Software eventually works." -- Michael Hartung

Tim

-- Seven Transistor Labs, LLC Electrical Engineering Consultation and Contract Design Website:

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Reply to
Tim Williams

The connector is the wrong sex, the wrong type, or only available on a cable that has the wrong end B.

... and I have a cable in service now that has three adapters in series to make the end B connection...

The connector is known by a name which is (a) a misnomer or (b) a reference to a former corporation or (c) a gobbledygook part number or (d) three different gobbledygook part numbers (one for catalogs, one for engineering, and one for Eris).

There's a standard for the connector. SCSI standards are the reason that "the SCSI connector" refers to only twenty-three possibilities that I know of.

Reply to
whit3rd

In the Standard Model of particle physics, USB connectors are categorized as fermions of spin 1/2. This is why a 720-degree rotation is frequently required in order to match the quantum state of the mating connector.

-- john, KE5FX

Reply to
John Miles, KE5FX

He's *very* optimistic.

Reply to
krw

The connector and it's mate have the same pin numbering when looking at the top.

Reply to
krw

This is especially important for 25, 37, 50, 68, and 80 pin SCSI connectors, because they're all compatible. Somewhat compatible. With a few exceptions.

Reply to
whit3rd

"It isn't a problem if you can give it to someone else" - Dilbert's boss

Thank you,

--
Don Kuenz, KB7RPU
Reply to
Don Kuenz

I heard it as:

Amplifiers oscillate. Oscillators oscillate on more than one frequency. m

Reply to
makolber

in a new layout..no matter how many people checked it some connector or socket will be

backwards reversed inside out upside down mirror imaged

sometimes a combination of two

m
Reply to
makolber

that's the nice thing about standards

there are so many to choose from

m
Reply to
makolber

also heard in the good old days..

funny how our amplifiers never oscillated until we bought that spectrum analyzer.

m
Reply to
makolber

formatting link

Tim

--
Seven Transistor Labs, LLC 
Electrical Engineering Consultation and Contract Design 
Website: https://www.seventransistorlabs.com/
Reply to
Tim Williams

Someone here recently noted that it always takes three tries to mate a USB connector.

It's a minimal-asymmetry design.

--

John Larkin         Highland Technology, Inc 
picosecond timing   precision measurement  

jlarkin att highlandtechnology dott com 
http://www.highlandtechnology.com
Reply to
John Larkin

Type-C doesn't have that problem, though it's too close to a micro-B for my liking.

Reply to
krw

We try to use the old giant B connector, the classic printer one, on an instrument, when there's room. It's obvious how to mate it, and it's pretty much indestructible.

The micro types are harder to mate and can rip off a board.

We also like to use the FTDI usb-to-serial converter chip, so the box enumerates as a serial port.

--

John Larkin         Highland Technology, Inc 
picosecond timing   precision measurement  

jlarkin att highlandtechnology dott com 
http://www.highlandtechnology.com
Reply to
John Larkin

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