An additional concern is that we have a hard enough time making sure the people who come through the e-room are educated in the tools enough not to be destructive. If the tools go far afield, there’s all kinds of opportunities for using soldering irons as woodburning kits, or trying to troubleshoot ignition wires with an o-scope. Since a lot of these tools are relatively inexpensive these days, and e-lab tends to have the most need for nicer ones (it’s harder to solder a PCB with a crappy soldering iron than a couple of wires) it just works out better that these stay in the e-room where they can get the most supervision and best utilization.
Yes we have. Most recent was something as simple and relatively inexpensive as a panavise. Glitch in video prevented identification of the culprit. The video problem has since been solved.
Unfortunately very true. Screwdrivers, pliers, etc… come and go. We also see the ones from the workshop wander in to the Electronics toolbox as well. People really need to remember that they need to put the tools back where they belong.
YES! We are still having to use the wire cutters that were used to cut some hard wire and chipped the blades as well as being used to pry something and bending the tips of the blades.
This has been discussed, but the problem is that the workshop environment is not a good place for test equipment. Personally, I think that much like the multimeters, Automotive really ought to purchase a scope if one is needed for working on the cars. Till then the Twintex is what is available to use outside of the Electronics room.
Something along these lines?
https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B004KTFZAC/ref=pd_aw_sim_sbs_328_3?ie=UTF8
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I’m going to respectfully argue that I think that the workshop is EXACTLY where we want electronic equipment. Now I would agree that it may not be the safest place on earth for equipment, humans, children, and my car. However, members of DMS have all on their own accord made the decision that they were willing to endure some small risk in the spirit of making cool stuff. This is what we all have in common.
Now I’m not up for retirement just yet, but I’ve been around a minute, and I have seen nothing but increased use of electronics and software in everything around me. It started sorta slow when I was a kid. I remember Merlin (played tic tac toe, memory, etc. had chip inside from TI), Atari, Walkmans, my family’s first color TV, etc. Slowly at first, new electronic and software products were introduced, some with mixed reception, but most new introductions became huge markets. Nowadays, I have grown into the mindset that unless electronic/software/computing capabilities have been tapped for a given field or science, then there is plenty of development left to be done to improve/perfect that field.
Cars now are required to have computers in charge (for emissions compliance), computers and robots do the largest part of design and assembly, and now no one wants to buy a new one unless they are surrounded by colorful touchpanels that can speak all languages and read the driver’s mind. There are many welding situations that an automated system could perform better than a human hand, wood is being milled by machine, metal benefits from computing interaction. We even want the technology to grow our plants for us. And this is all good.
While I do understand the desire to protect equipment from abuse, I think that the priority number 1 at DMS should be to provide the tools to enable its talented members to advance the technology interfacing to their chosen field. I’d like to see both of these things happen, and I’m willing to throw in some of my time to help clean up for Mouser if it will help me get a voice.
I would argue that ‘checked out’ equipment or test cart would be safer than equipment just sitting in the lab because a person is responsible. I know that when I borrowed the virtualbench, it never left my sight. There was no way I was going to have to explain any troubles concerning that instrument. It was promptly locked up when I was done.
Checking out equipment is a clever method of assigning responsibility. I’d be willing to bet that 100% of missing tool issues across space occurred when the items were not checked out… hmmmm…
The tl;dr of one of the discussions we had around the theft issues was that there was no way to tell on the video camera if someone walking out of the room was checking equipment out or carting it to their truck.
As I said, in general the equipment in the e-lab is much nicer than what is necessary to work on a car. If you need a scope, consider something like @zmetzing suggested for automotive committee. A portable, battery-powered unit is going to be 10x better for under-the-hood anyway.
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While I recognize that those involved in electronics would like to keep the equipment in good shape, and yes it appears that we are getting better and better equipment. As I understand things, the equipment is still on the less expensive side of electronic equipment. The half-million-dollar Rohde & Schwarz is really not all that uncommon, but our elab at DMS is not ordering such on the regular…yet…
However, as ee, I regard scope as fundamental for a large percentage of the types of projects I ordinarily would be involved in. Combined with the reality that an increasing number of systems in production today contain an ever-increasing amount of electronic components, floating scope availability is a big item to me and one I believe all electronically inclined makers would feel is important.
Considering that the person making this request has broken / stolen 0 out of 0 items from the electronic lab, it would be very nice if we could tend toward Solutions that don’t unnecessarily hamper my ability to make.
So please don’t take my response as pointed, but instead an effort to keep DMS the magic Maker Place that has earned it the notoriety in the first place.
Lets enable the makers,
And stop troublemakers…
Mouser stuff will be at the space Wednesday evening. How is the clean up and purge coming? Painting will happen next week as well. Is stuff easily removed from the walls?
Not sure painting the ELab is going to be worth the trouble. We are in the process of going through stuff and reorganizing. We will not have another “purge” under my watch. I have had a number of people tell me they are very unhappy how it was handled. We had people who were not part of electronics come in and start filling trash cans without looking at what they were throwing away. Wasteful.
If you’re going to flame about this - don’t bother.
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I’ll volunteer a night or two after work to help sort the good stuff from the too-old-or-unidentified-to-be-useful. We’ve also discussed how to orient shelves for better access. Just let me know when.
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I’m happy to help sort too…
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