The Keithley Situation: New Electrometer, Nixie Tube Multimeter, SMU Update

Hand crank isolation tester: bit.ly/2QDOB7E
Patreon: / marcoreps
No worries, if it doesn't work out, everything will at least stay the same. But if I get a few extra dollars, everything will get a lot better!
In this video we are checking out the current state of my Keithley Meters. I have sold my 610c because it was very eager to overload the analog meter at every opportunity. I have also sold the dual channel 619 because of its acoustics, size and accuracy. To replace 'em I got a 617 programmable electrometer which I consider one of the best devices from the 'brown-enclosure-era'. These are very accurate and sensitive, get no 'sticky switches' and develop problems rarely.
To demonstrate the capabilities of this new old meter I test the isolation resistance of cables and measure leakage currents of ceramic, polystyrene, hermetic / military and silver mica capacitors.
Next I briefly show a Keithley 164 Digital Multimeter with a nixie tube display, hoping that mentioning NIXIE TUBES will flood this video with new viewers, who like to watch videos with N-I-X-I-E T-U-B-E-S in them.
Finally I try to bring the 236 to 237 upgrade to an end by replacing a couple of parts in the power transistor assembly and by calibrating the newly unlocked high voltage ranges with an Arduino based USB-GPIB adapter.
Smartphone macro lens I am using for the closeup shots in the recent videos: amzn.to/2r9Wc3S
Sorry, I am always loosing patience at the end of longer videos, so it may feel a bit rushed there ...

[@ddlow6455]

Your style is reminiscent of This Old Tony. I enjoyed this video immensely.

[@GAZMANFOREVER]

He is more like "This German Tony"

[@nbreeden]

The 617 brings back fond memories. I used one along with other high percussion test gear in he late 80's and early 90's while working as a parametric and functional test engineer at National Semiconductor. I worked with a great group of talented engineers. We worked on EPROMs from the 2708 through the 27C256. Every time I see a National EPROM I smile. We also took a stab at DRAMs. I'll never forget the first rail of Japanese 4164s we took a look at. The consistency part to part as I characterized them was amazing. We also took a look at some Soviet 2716s, they looked amazingly like the part we manufactured all the way down to the "Kilroy was here" logo on the die. Many fond memories.

[@reps]

Well, kudos to the commies, for figuring out how to make a good EPROM all the way down to Kilroy :)

[@The_Paya]

You can do videos longer than 10 minutes. I strongly believe your audience can maintain longer time spans of attention.

[@ratlinuxgamer2855]

Yes, they are too short

[@bigbox8992]

I'm sorry.

[@kefler187]

Nope, sorry, I'm a millennial that's heavily into gaming, couch potatoing, and did I mention gaming? my attention span is shorter than the radius of the orbit of an electron >.>

[@enlightendbel]

In this space, most certainly. If you can deal with spending hours on end soldering a tiny PCB, an hour long video is a refreshing change of pace.

[@ConorFenlon]

No idea what was going on, but I loved it.

[@madrian_hello]

same

Found your channel recently, love the content and the humor! Good work, please keep them coming!

[@ppitekk]

José Maria Araújo "

[@FooBar89]

agree, you're doing a great job Marco

[@MrHD71]

loved the "watch your back human" part :D

[@vgamesx1]

Where did you get that from? All I saw was a normal Keithley 237(6) :)

[@aklef]

That was so awesome it felt a bit short, you could go longer, maybe 15-20mins and still have my full attention

[@Split10uk]

A lot of what you are doing goes over my head, but I still enjoy watching it! Made me jump when you popped up in that suit.

[@dardosordi]

I just keep re-watching your Keithley videos, what a wonderful master piece those beasts are.

[@vgamesx1]

I quite enjoy your sense of humor, you make some of the most entertaining EE videos I've ever seen.

[@samuelschwager]

Nice! Just bought a Keithley 614. Really like their color scheme.

[@nyceyes]

I enjoy your electronics and electronics repair videos. And very long videos are great, too! 😊 Thank you.

[@-yeme-]

this channel is a joy to watch

[@sonotthere]

i have not had gone true all of you back catalogue videos yet just found you 3-4 days ago but its been a good investment. also about vacuum tubes. a old radio/tv/audio repair and electrician man i knew a bit passed away some time ago. his daughter started clearing out his house and lab/garage, to the dump/recycling station. to sell it of course. but she had started a day early then told me. so by the time i got there she had already move most of the stuff in big boxes. and she had threw out a 37H*38W*55L(cm) box filled with "brand new" Phillips Siemens and miniwatt vacuum tubes. i have aprox. that there were 1300 tubes in it. seal not broken. if they all had the same dimensions as the ones i rescued from the almost empty one. i cloud not bare to tell her what she had done. i just went on with saving some of the rest.

[@m3chanist]

Outstanding, quickly becoming a favourite watch.

[@olafofenmaxi6680]

why did you blur the memes :(

[@DiThi]

I was wondering the same thing myself. It's probably because back then it was used a lot by the alt-right, but nowadays it's innocuous in most situations, like in live stream emotes.

[@shinevisionsv]

Amazing video!

[@douro20]

At least I don't have to deal with such sensitive instruments. My new oscilloscope (a LeCroy 9410) came from Hughes Aircraft on the west coast, was used for less than a year and put away for nearly two decades. Its only issues were a little bit of rust and a noisy second channel. The noisy second channel was corrected just by adjusting the ADC gain in software. A Tadiran battery later and it's practically like new. Did that Keithley multimeter really come from Buescher? I have one Nixie tube multimeter which was made by Dana. It's only 3-1/2 digit but I use it occasionally because it has a very high input impedance.

[@DoRC]

Whoa I was unaware of the arduino gpio project. Finally my bench dmm and I can share everything!

[@TheDefpom]

Another awesome video, I really need to get mine up to your standard!

[@ih8tusernam3s]

"Dollars seem to be in high demand these days."

[@Olli120]

Also, mich hätte die Kalibrierung schon interessiert, darf auch ruhig etwas länger sein. :)

[@APVT80]

Hey man, you are thoroughly entertaining and I love the way you speak! Please keep it up, my friend.

[@zombielinkinpark]

My college have a few bunch of Keithley 2400 lol

[@reps]

Sneak into the cellar / dumpster room and check if they have thrown out a couple of broken ones :)

[@aneeshprasobhan]

2:08, i see you are already well prepared.

[@Braeden123698745]

I love this channel already

[@und4287]

Also, according to the listing, that 164 is a "Gigital" multimeter, not a digital one.

[@psychomanuk2173]

Thank you for your videos, just thank you.

[@douglasRbrown]

LOL!!! OMG THE INTRO!!! :)

[@SergeiKotikov]

"65th week" - nice one XD

[@Bubu567]

I thought the custom text was just a video edit, but of course you did it the hard way :P

[@AlainHubert]

Just for the great sense of humour on this channel, I've just subscribed. Oh, and for the interesting electronics stuff too. Sixity fifth week of 2010 ! Good one ! lol !

[@FlipMeiser76]

Tolles Video, das mit dem Karton war der Hammer 😄

[@dardosordi]

This video is so weird and wonderful, I want more. Subscribed and bell is on! Thanks, keep up the good work.

[@dpro369]

Hey! your just teasing us! More mins pls!

[@msylvain59]

Congrats, this video must have required an insane amount of time for preparation and editing...

[@reps]

Oh well, above average I would say ... And what about your latest creation? Can we expect those microscope shots for every interesting component you find in the future? :) Those were great!

[@bbreeuwer4577]

Always fun to watch. Some great tools. Where do you get them, Ebay? Or do the German speakers have their own secondhand market websites?

[@avejst]

Thanks for sharing👍😀

[@zarkeh3013]

I came for Nixie! and got none :L *stillupvotes*

[@skeggjoldgunnr3167]

Keithley 2001 OLED display conversion video please!

[@wither8]

As usual great work. What screwdriver was used to disassemble the tube MM ?

[@reps]

Cheap exchangeable tip model from Aldi if I remember correctly

[@wither8]

Hmmm, you seem like a man of discerning taste, I'm surprised you didn't go Wiha. Do you recommend the Aldi you have (i.e. have you had any issues with stripping screws / deformation of tips due to soft metallic structure / etc ) ?

[@reps]

I am using a Wiha Picofinish at 2:24, but I don't have a complete set yet, so the cheapo has to stay :

[@gabrielegh4892]

2:09 holly fuc** You skared me man

[@thecombatengineer7069]

Love it!

[@PelDaddy]

LOL 65th week!!!

[@douro20]

What's the resolution of that old Kienzle stopwatch? I have an old Heuer one which isn't quite as nice but has 1/10 second resolution and a 15-minute counter.

[@lucasmonta1]

I've been watching a lot of your videos lately and I need to ask this: What do you use the voltimeters form ( included the one featured in this video) are you doing stuff ( not for videos, obiosly, maybe work) that requires 4 decimal presition on a volt/current messurement? what could that possibly be o.O

[@EdwinNoorlander]

Nice

[@First2ner]

maybe do a video about that gpib, i would like to know if it would work with 34401a meter for logging to pc

[@reps]

I am almost certain that it does, the only limitation is that it can't talk to a big bus of multiple instruments.

[@First2ner]

How would two or more arduino based GPIBs behave instead of one big bus?

[@zaprodk]

It's easier just to use the RS232-port on the 34401a for logging - no weird GPIB to mess with.

[@zaprodk]

The Arduino-firmware that was mentioned in the video only supports master-operation with one slave device on the bus (according to the author of the code) - it doesn't support everything, but most operations should work. I tried it with a HP Plotter, but really never got it to work successfully.

[@First2ner]

It is, but it is also much slower than GPIB

[@cellularmitosis2]

love it :)

[@berni8k]

Yep i wanted that 2400 too but i got outbid!

[@edgeeffect]

... I assumed it was calibrated in the YEAR 1065???????

[@dl8cy]

hard, but you get always better - but please do not fall in love with video fx :-)

[@chuckvanderbildt]

Gigity!

[@reps]

too bad that didn't cross my mind! would have loved to quote Glenn Quagmire there :)

[@EslamsLab]

you are amazing

[@reps]

Thank you.. But I'm actually horrible :)

[@EslamsLab]

Marco Reps you are horribly amazing 😃 i like what you are doing and i think you are an electronics guru And by the way mixing fun with electronics seems be working i like your jokes :)

[@mark_1_102]

This aged well

[@CPD-KD6-3.7]

0:24 Notice me, noticed

[@felenov]

0:20 did you notice the bench meter. Spoiled it. sorry. Video edit or it is the meter doing that

[@reps]

It was a video edit in that case but only because I didn't have the right GPIB adapter yet, K2000 can display custom messages

[@felenov]

Marco Reps I played with this bench meter. I remember flashing my own firmware which scrolls the word KEITHLEY after 5 minutes of inactivity, and then 5 more minutes shuts the display and other stuff off. Any button press wakes it up

[@gacherumburu9958]

👍👍👍

[@nicmost3044]

Unworthy human. Watch your back!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Nice one Marco... RE

[@sykskysyk]

>Waow

[@reps]

> Patience from zhou

[@vega1287]

10:15 the multymeter was right my parents came in the room just 2 seconds later

[@jaenimabrick7069]

did he censored pepe?

[@xDevscom_EE]

Красотень :)

[@zaprodk]

Gigital multimeter :)

[@weerobot]

Keithley shrine....ROFL..

[@laurentgontard9501]

Is it me or Pepe was censored ??? dafuk youtube ?

[@leozendo3500]

Explicit expensive electronics porn.

[@Sirvierl0ffel]

Kennst du "GreatScott!"? Der kann auch kein Englisch.