Tips for buying used (and some new) electronic test equipment in 2023 – my experience
My experience and some tips for purchasing used high end electronic test equipment of yesteryear in the United States in 2022-2023
Tips for buying used (and some new) electronic test equipment in 2023 – my experience
Did a Facebook market place search like you suggested, found me a 576 for $500 20 minutes away from my house. Barely any wear on it, user and service manual included.
Your advise is spot on. I’m a newbie getting ready to retire and have spent the last 18 Imonths building my bench, mostly all through marketplace. I’m got a full Rigol and BK precision bench for half retail. Traveling for work to other cities also is a treasure trove of product.
Very happy for you that you put in the work to find stuff and get it, and that you were rewarded! Love your lab. It all looks like new even if long in the tooth. Subbed
There’s a lot of redundant test gear here. Especially the oscilloscopes and signal generators. Could clear up bench space here by selling off
Awesome video and great advice. Any extra advice regarding where/how one can find those blue cabinets with the plastic drawers for small components like you have. I have three that came with various vintage stuff, but paid a premium and haven’t seen any since. Thanks!
All these nice professional equipments must be calibrated once a year in professional adecvated labs otherwise over the years going to be out of real measurments giving erronated values, working in the industrial technology leading company they calibrate these equipments twice a year my company called Plexus !
Great advice! I’ve gotta build a small lab soon. I’m an hour and half south of you. Sure wish I had your education and knowledge!
Nice tips for ebay purchases. Used equipment from surplus merchants might not be expensive in your geo location, but other locations (like Southern California) most of your gear sells for $300 to several thousand depending on condition (in operative HP 8640 sells for $340 while inop HP 8644 sells for $800 and up… double if it turns on). My advice would be, I guess: drive out of state for deals if necessary ^_^ . You have a commercial looking shop there! impressive … (me… I remember when the TEK 575 was almost new (1979) when I used it for the first time …. I retired recently after doing 5G transceiver hardware designs ).
Another good tip is to have a copy of the manual for equipment you are looking for, some time ago an Ebay seller listed a Keithley 228 for $100 because it had an error code displayed. The going rate at the time was $400. The error meant that the temperature sensor was disconnected or faulty, I bought it and the sensor was unplugged, otherwise the 228 was fine. If I remember the quote correctly "Knowledge is power".