I am rebuilding my work bench at home using the very limited space left over! I have been hoping the CE AD2 deal comes back in ( Analog Discovery 2 (AD2) Bundle no longer available? ) but the downside there is the need for a PC for screen - for simplicity i am looking at a small portable scope to fill the void - so i can probe in-situ rather than moving back and forth between desks.
(If its possible, i will plan to have AD2 on my desk as well as i understand it’s more capable)
would be great to have a miniature logic analyze/DSO the size of the Nano… but i’ll take what i can get!
Very reasonably priced and plenty sturdy for electronics stuff. Also Staples delivers for free (or at least they used to).
I print labels for everything in the cabinet and make sure labels are facing out – makes it super easy to store and find lots of stuff. Got this idea from Bob Pease (can’t find the original article).
Thanks for sharing setups! Very interesting to see what tool ppl perfer! My home desk surves a dual purpose during Covid. Since I lecture Embedded Systems at an Oslo uni, I do streaming lectures from home (once or twice a week), so here’s my setup for a streaming day. I basically move ongoing projects off the desk, so this forces me to clean my desk often. I did a writeup on the streaming setup here.
Normally I’m consulting for customer projects and below is how my desk has been looking lately. Before the customer has a working machine I’ll usually make one of these prototypes containing all the electronics, actuators & sensors, bolted together with blue Makeblock beams. Most of my electronics gear is behind the prototype, but all the hand tools and cables I’ll need are on the back wall of the desk.
Combined unit, a Yihua 853D that also has a hot air pencil. Not fancy, but the soldering iron is solid and I can also do basic reflow using the Hot Air pencil.
DMMs
Fluke 116
Scopes
Siglent SDS2104x
Jinhan JDS6052S (Handheld)
What is the rated bandwidth of your most-used scope?
100Mhz
Do you feel your scope covers your needs sufficiently?
Currently, yes.
Power supply
Do you have a programmable bench power supply?
Welleman LABPS3005DN
How many outputs does it have?
1, but I could totally use one more output
Other Equipment
ET5304 electronic load
Siglent SSA3021X Spectrum Analyzer
Eakins 37MP 1080p microscope
I also have an office at Oslo’s largest hackerspace where I have access to a host of great tools, but I currently primarily work from home due to restrictions. I’ll likely get a higher prcision desktop DMM soon, but the Fluke does the job well enough for now.
everyone seems to have such neat benches, all lots of interesting stuff. mine looks like a bomb hit it and then a bunch of messy people looking for something they couldn’t find it passed through.
i did just start using the ikea cube type storage recently and that is helping, though there is basically no hope for me otherwise, switching from 2d working to 3d is basically all i have left.
My bench is neat right now, but normally looks like a bomb exploded. It’s neat due to work for a client involving HV stuff, so no room for errors
My storage is reasonable sorted, but not perfect. I keep stuff I gathered 10 years ago, thinking I would need it some day. I got a lot of 600V 30mohm FETs that is super expensive from a former employment where they just threw it out. One day I will maybe make a super efficient offline SMPS and get to use them…
In 6 months I will be moving to a new house and will get a lab designed for my work. So instead of 6 square meters, I get 20 square meters, so I will be drawing up the perfect combination of PC work station, soldering and lab bench, CNC bench and storage
Mine would look terrible if it wasn’t for the lectures that force me to clean up. I could post a picture of the one at my office, as that’s quite messy
@rclott I’ve bought most of my Makeblock parts many years ago when they had a working webshop with lots of parts. These days, they’ve reduced the scope of the product to only be kits for kids. It used to be more than 400 parts including pneumatics, chain drives and much more, but now you can only get those basic kits. Due to that, I don’t think I can recommend Makeblock any more? It used to be fantastic, but they didn’t quite understand that they were sitting on a gold mine. It’s the perfect solution for STE(A)M activities in schools.
Now I’d maybe just use 20x20 aluminium extrusions? It’s cheaper and currently has more parts. https://ooznest.co.uk has a good selection. They’re in the UK, but you can find the same parts at Misumi and other vendors.
yeah i started off with good intentions and the things just spiraled people told me to plan out ahead of time and 3d model it up. it is good advice if you already have the gear or know what you’re going to get but mines just evolved over time. luckily my partner has been good at keeping me out of the house so i only infected one room outside the workshop, and the little summer room out back heh. but yeah looking around me its overwhelming chaos, i spent a couple of days cleaning up last week and you wouldn’t know
i should share a picture of it as a cautionary tale.
My bench is never clean. I sometimes go on a cleaning bender but you would never know from looking at it! I am toying with the idea of putting my scope, power supply, lab PC/Monitor/KBD and tool set on swing arms so they can be moved in and out as needed. The idea is to lift them up and leave the bench space clear for the project at hand. They all take up too much space as it is
General equipment:
Amscope trinocular microscope
2 Pace ST50 Soldering irons
Hot air and wand board heater
I am working on my part placement tools and techniques with the vacuum pump on the bench as a gradual enhancement of my assembly capability.
DVMs: two 2.5 digit meters and a clamp-on ammeter DVM. All low-end models. They are sufficient for my needs.
Three variable power supplies, two with digital readouts. Including some home build supplies, 11 outputs.
Test equipment:
Rigol MSO1104 100 MHz mixed signal scope. --=meets all my needs
Rigol DSA832E 3GHz spectrum analyzer.
Nano-VNA 3 GHz model
WindFreaks USB 6 GHz signal source
Slowing growing collection of low-cost antennas for radiated measurements
The latest addition is the small DIY Faraday cage in the upper right. Significant workshop reorganization was required to make space for it. This necessitated the purchase of a rolling tool chest for storage.
My whole workshop is 8x9 feet with an adjacent 3-foot walkway to the garage. The walkway must be kept clear! I also have access to the garage for radiated signal measurements when my wife’s car is not in the garage.
Cleanup occurs when critical mess is reached. – That is a fuzzy combination of state of disarray, current project needs and my mental state at the time!
Interesting. Are you using that for radiated measurements?
I have looked into TEM cells, they can actually be bought for quite low funds now:
Lately I bought a LISN and a Siglent spectrum analyzer, so I can do conducted emission measurements. I would like to add radiated measurements to that capability also
I have this antenna, but have not verified the setup:
I use it for radiated work above 900 MHz. I have done radiated immunity and wire induced immunity testing at lower frequencies. It is also great for RF measurements to test radio sensitivity.
TEM cells have an upper frequency limit based on the dimensions. If you are handy and creative, you can build one yourself. Or, if you have access to a sheet metal shop. You can build it from galvanized heating duct materials. This article is pretty good. untitled (chaosproject.com)
I am contemplating a LISN. I built one a long time back. – WARNING, Always use an attenuator between the LISN and your spectrum analyzer as well as not switching things while the analyzer is connected. The spikes will blow out the front end of the spectrum analyzer. I worked with guys that did it twice!
Often conducted emissions problem areas are from 150kHz to 5MHz, and in that range a big ground plane is not that important. Next time you do the measurements, try to keep the strap and lift the DUT away from the ground plane
On parts storage, I do sometimes spend up to 30minutes to find a part
Anyone dine this: take hires pictures of all the parts, let some AI SW do text recognition, so next time I need a part I can search for it in a database and the picture ID will show where the part is?
I would not be comfortable with that as my protection. The capacitor is a low impedance for transients. I always use a 10 dB attenuator. , – a $15 10 dB sma pad would work. You just have to calibrate it out in the measurements. There is usually enough noise floor margin on a spectrum analyzer.
Yup. Lots of mesh from the hardware store or aluminum foil.
There are a lot of times when you can get away with out it of make something very small and crude for prescan work. You do need it for the certification tests. It really depends on the DUT and the particular test. You have to do it for a while to figure it out.
