variac/dc power supply repair

Mar 06, 2006 27 Replies

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I can only add to all that Ross has said. Most of us who take the trouble to try to help posters on here, are professional engineers in one field of electronics, or another, and it would be grossly irresponsible of us to help an inexperienced poster to his death, by recommending that he start work on something that he did not understand. That is why you have suffered the type of replies that you have from some respondents.

For what it's worth, I think that I probably understood where you were coming from on this, in your earlier posts, but unfortunately, some of the observations that you then went on to make, didn't help your case one little bit, and the " abuse ( ?? ) " started. All I can ask is that you don't get too offended by this, and stop coming to the group. Whilst the nature of the posters has changed over the last five years, and probably the way that the group is used now, there are still many good people on here, ready and willing to help.

Please take Ross's good advice on board. It will help you in the future. Also, please remember that Newsgroups are international, and whilst the primary language in use is English, there are a number of different variants - as in English English, American English, Australian English and so on. What may seem like a clear statement to you, in whatever your variety of English is, might appear to be utter nonsense to someone else who speaks a different variety. Also, bear in mind that what might seem like an offensive reply to you, might just be harmless banter from the respondents point of view. I've seen many people get upset over this one.

Take a deep breath, calm down, and put your new fuse in. If it works, come back and tell us. If it doesn't work, or blows, again, come back and tell us, clearly, what does happen, and I'm sure we'll all just start again, and offer you what help we can.

Arfa

Nicely encapsulated Arfa :-)

Yes Ryan, we will sincerely try to help once you have established some facts as to what is happening. Without concise info we are just making wild guesses.

I don't want to interrupt your outburst (heck we all have to let it out at times), but let me point out several things:

1) Another poster posted a picture of a similar supply, which I confirmed had the same type of fuse, and which I assumed everyone had access to refer to. It was pointed out to me that not everyone has a news reader configured to display inline images.

2) Why on earth would I have mistaken the holder for the fuse if there were a fuse in it to begin with?

3) I can't buy the correct fuse locally. I either waste several dollars on shipping for a single order, or I wait until I have a batch of parts for several projects that I need to order.

4) I have "dabbled" in electronics for at least the past 15 years and have never run across this type of fuse holder, ergo, at least one statement regarding my lack of intelligence is false. "Electronics" is a big and diverse field.

5) Apologies for the image link, but this is the fuse holder I am talking about that I do in fact see in almost everything I have repaired. I would be extremely surprised if you have not:
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I'm not offended. It takes a lot to offend me. And I'm certainly not going to be offended by someone who spends their free time helping others for something they could charge money for. All I'm saying is taking an unclear post, and from there jumping to conclusions about the intelligence of the poster - instead of simply stating that the post was unclear - is nothing more than noise. Posting nothing at all is better than posting noise.

I guess I'm not going to get any more replies since I'm in everyone's kill file by now. But I really didn't feel like the ad hominem attacks were on target with respect to reaching a conclusion. Not that they have to be - it's not my time they are wasting - but if the intent is to convince me that I'm incompetent, I'm not interested, since I can gauge my own level of competence and act (or not act) accordingly.

I would doubt that you are in everyone's killfile - yet. But may I respectfully ask that we just leave it as it is now. I'm sure we all understand where you're coming from, and none of us wants to question your intelligence. For the most part, from what I see in the many posts, it was your expertise and competence to work on line powered equipment with a degree of personal safety, that was being questioned, and I certainly don't have a problem with that. I have no desire to help lead you to death or injury. The reason that posters questioned your ability, was because you were unable to recognise a type of fuseholder that has been used for many years on all manner of equipment types - not just test equipment, but if you've never had cause to work on such equipment, then fine, we will accept that you were misled by a component that you didn't recognise, and not question your competence, further.

Now, as I said before, calm down, forget about all the comments that you considered to be at least unkind to you, if not offensive, put a new fuse in, and tell us what happens. If it doesn't work, tell us, and we'll do our best to help you.

Arfa

My only comment is that for someone to never have seen a fuse holder like that means you have nver had the joy of working on older equipment or industrial equipment. Those are the style fuse holder found in nearly every non-consumer electronic equipment. If all you've dealt with are computers, then perhaps not. But just do any kind of search on eBay, for example, of "electronic equipment" and that's what you'll find.

--- sam | Sci.Electronics.Repair FAQ:

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Important: Anything sent to the email address in the message header above is ignored unless my full name AND either lasers or electronics is included in the subject line. Or, you can contact me via the Feedback Form in the FAQs.

Smitty, that's a great offer of help. I would have done the same except sending fuses from Australia by airmail is many times the cost of the fuses themselves.

And to Ryan, I very much doubt that anyone has you on their killfile list. I certainly don't, and anyway, there are a whole heap of very obnoxious posters well ahead of you for this treatment :-)

Just take the advice of Arfa and Smitty and carry out some more testing and note what takes place then tell us here. I'm sure that we will be able to steer you in the right direction. Any schematic details you can work out by inspection would be handy, but here is where knowledge of components is vital in order to describe what you are talking about. Nevertheless, you can only try and see how it goes from there.

Have it your way. You have been doing a great job of pissing off some of the most helpful people on this newsgroup.

Enough said. :)

--- sam | Sci.Electronics.Repair FAQ:

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Repair | Main Table of Contents:
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+Lasers | Sam's Laser FAQ:
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Important: Anything sent to the email address in the message header above is ignored unless my full name AND either lasers or electronics is included in the subject line. Or, you can contact me via the Feedback Form in the FAQs.

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