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Re: How do you decipher HP serial numbers for date.

 

The serial number consists of a 4-digit date code followed by a letter indicating the country of manufacture, followed by a sequence of digits that uniquely identifies the instrument.

In the 4-digit date code, the first two digits are the number of years since 1960 and the last two digits are the number of weeks into the year. This date code represents the date of design, not manufacture. It¡¯s a common misconception that this means build date. It doesn¡¯t.

For the country code, off memory, A is USA, J is Japan, M Malaysia. Probably others too. I think this indicates location of manufacture rather than design, but I could be wrong on that.

I think the 5-digit suffix is sequentially assigned based on build date, but I don¡¯t know.

So, to answer your?question you can¡¯t really know when your instrument was built other than it was sometime after the date code. Previously, I expect HP would have been able to provide this information if you called in, but I doubt keysight would (or probably even could) tell you that anymore. But you could try.

FYI this question has been posed and answered a number of times before. A search on the HP-Agilent-Keysight group would yield the same info. The serial number format is also usually described at the beginning of instrument manuals.

Matt
Re: How do you decipher HP serial numbers for date.

 

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What is your serial number??
There are several ways to decode the number based on the number. ?I recently started a similar thread and was helped out by the group knowledge here.?

Dave



On Sep 1, 2022, at 4:54 AM, Mikek <amdx@...> wrote:

?I recently bought an HP 3400A, and want to get a build date and also find the proper schematic for repair.
?Is there a site that tells how to decipher the serial number?
?I thought I saw this discussed recently, but not sure wher.
????????????????????????????????????????? hanks, Mikek

Re: SA 8560E error 335

 

Hello friend!

ok, i will call you in private, thank you very much!

Em qui., 1 de set. de 2022 08:40, piecolav via <piecolav=[email protected]> escreveu:

Hi imaurente,
at

you will find a series of manuals related to your analyzer, including the complete one for the power supply.

Also I have the CLIP manual of the HP8560E, but I can't find the link from where I downloaded it. If you send me a PM message, I can send it to you.
Greetings.

How do you decipher HP serial numbers for date.

 

I recently bought an HP 3400A, and want to get a build date and also find the proper schematic for repair.
?Is there a site that tells how to decipher the serial number?
?I thought I saw this discussed recently, but not sure wher.
????????????????????????????????????????? hanks, Mikek
Re: SA 8560E error 335

 

Hi imaurente,
at

you will find a series of manuals related to your analyzer, including the complete one for the power supply.

Also I have the CLIP manual of the HP8560E, but I can't find the link from where I downloaded it. If you send me a PM message, I can send it to you.
Greetings.
Re: HP 5086-7906 YTO

 

Ed, you're absolutely right. It's the same thing I thought when I started getting interested in buying one of these YTOs.
Especially the 856X series SAs are still today pretty good tools. They have a low noise floor, wide dynamics, low phase noise and digital resolution up to 1Hz. And surelythere are tens of thousands of instruments still in operation around the world. But, nevertheless, the number of YIG oscillators still seems to be too large.
But the biggest problem, I believe, is the high price required to repair them.
Even Keysight, whom I contacted, hasn't sold any in a while, but continues to repair these YTOs by shipping the complete instrument. Sum required? About 3000 euros!
They are probably shipped to the US for repair, I read in another forum that they would be built by the Microsource of Santa Rosa, and realigned on the instrument, but still it seems like an overpriced.
I understand that they are professional instruments, and I don't even want to think about how much a new instrument of similar characteristics costs today, but still they look like giants with feet of clay ...
Re: Hp 8590a spectrum analyzer

 

Let me try that on mine as well!
Re: Hp 8590a spectrum analyzer

 

There is a chance, of course, that something else is wrong if you see a lower level. The calibration output can be off, some filters or gain stages can be misaligned and so on.
But if you have another spectrum analyzer capable of 2.04 GHz and a function generator, it should be easy to test the first converter separately as shown in the video.

On Wednesday, August 31, 2022 at 06:11:20 PM PDT, Richard Cook <richardcook331@...> wrote:


Thanks I ordered 5 of them just to have them on hand.?

Re: Hp 8590a spectrum analyzer

Richard Cook
 

Thanks I ordered 5 of them just to have them on hand.?
SA 8560E error 335

 

Hello guys,

I have an 8560E analyzer, it is turning on but it shows error 335 on the screen, according to the service manual it refers to the sampling oscillator, I went deeper in the research and detected that the 28V voltage was absent on the A2, I did a brief analysis at the source, where the TP304 had no voltage. I ask, has anyone had this problem? Does anyone have here in the documentation group that the components for replacement can be identified? I appreciate the help of friends! thanks.
Re: Hp 8590a spectrum analyzer

 

Yes, but those are obsolete. These seem to be the replacements nowadays:



On Wednesday, August 31, 2022 at 03:24:13 PM PDT, Richard Cook <richardcook331@...> wrote:


Thanks Alex , I'll try that when I get the power supply re installed tomorrow.? I was wondering how to check that. What's the correct part number for that diode pack?. Hsms 2822 or something like that.?
Thanks.?

On Wed, Aug 31, 2022, 18:02 Alexander Saydakov via <sandy_saydakov=[email protected]> wrote:
Connect the input to the calibration output and turn the corrections off. Is the main tone about -20 dBm? if it is significantly lower (say, -30) then most probably the mixer diodes in the first converter are bad.
The corrections try to compensate, but it is too much to compensate. As I understand, the corrections must be within a fraction of dB typically.


On Wednesday, August 31, 2022 at 02:51:02 AM PDT, Richard Cook <richardcook331@...> wrote:


You are most right. It may be better to leave it alone. But I know the power Supplies are hard to come by so I think replacing the caps with high grade ones and safety caps isn't a bad idea. Like I said I never have delt with repair of one of these animals so I may just keep in mind the noise floor and use it.?

Re: Hp 8590a spectrum analyzer

Richard Cook
 

Thanks Alex , I'll try that when I get the power supply re installed tomorrow.? I was wondering how to check that. What's the correct part number for that diode pack?. Hsms 2822 or something like that.?
Thanks.?

On Wed, Aug 31, 2022, 18:02 Alexander Saydakov via <sandy_saydakov=[email protected]> wrote:
Connect the input to the calibration output and turn the corrections off. Is the main tone about -20 dBm? if it is significantly lower (say, -30) then most probably the mixer diodes in the first converter are bad.
The corrections try to compensate, but it is too much to compensate. As I understand, the corrections must be within a fraction of dB typically.


On Wednesday, August 31, 2022 at 02:51:02 AM PDT, Richard Cook <richardcook331@...> wrote:


You are most right. It may be better to leave it alone. But I know the power Supplies are hard to come by so I think replacing the caps with high grade ones and safety caps isn't a bad idea. Like I said I never have delt with repair of one of these animals so I may just keep in mind the noise floor and use it.?

Re: Hp 8590a spectrum analyzer

 

Connect the input to the calibration output and turn the corrections off. Is the main tone about -20 dBm? if it is significantly lower (say, -30) then most probably the mixer diodes in the first converter are bad.
The corrections try to compensate, but it is too much to compensate. As I understand, the corrections must be within a fraction of dB typically.


On Wednesday, August 31, 2022 at 02:51:02 AM PDT, Richard Cook <richardcook331@...> wrote:


You are most right. It may be better to leave it alone. But I know the power Supplies are hard to come by so I think replacing the caps with high grade ones and safety caps isn't a bad idea. Like I said I never have delt with repair of one of these animals so I may just keep in mind the noise floor and use it.?

Re: HP 5086-7906 YTO

 

I was looking for info on this YTO, and stumbled upon this ebay listing, which I found to be very informative, and disturbing:

https://www.ebay.com/itm/HP-AGILENT-YTO-YIG-REPAIR-5086-7903-8593E-8594e-8595e-8596e-8592L-8593em/252216883196

This has a bunch of info on these YTOs. What I find disturbing is that it appears that a whole family (856X and 859X) of HP portable SAs may have a serious reliability issue - big enough to support a cottage industry repairing their YTOs. Maybe the the actual failure percentage is tiny, and there are just a lots and lots of units out there, so no big deal, but it seems like an awful lot of failures to me. I don't have any of these models, so it doesn't affect me, but I wonder what the deal is. My experience with lots of old-school YIG devices is that they last virtually forever, unless abused.

Ed
Re: HP 5086-7906 YTO

 

Thank you for the information, John! I tried to increase the tuning coil current up to 200 mA but to no avail.

Then, I also wanted to look at the second YTO under the microscope, the one extracted from the HP8560E and I discovered to my surprise that the wire connected to the PIN of the 5 VDC power supply was interrupted.
With a lot of patience and using the finest soldering iron tip I had, I pre-wetted the PIN. Then using a thinned toothpick I bent the wire until it touched the PIN. And I lightly rested the tip of the soldering iron on it for a moment.
I checked and the soldering was successful. I did well? I used as little tin as possible to avoid tin bubbles that could out-scale the YTO.
Unfortunately my microscope has a maximum magnification of 57X. It would take one with at least double the magnification.
I connected the YTO to the power supplies by crossing my fingers and to my surprise I found that it worked!
The peak power, about 13.5 dBm, I get it with a tune current of 90 mA.
Instead I noticed that the absorbed currents, with the YTO running, have varied a lot, that is:
+5 VDC, 73 mA
+15 VDC, 20 mA
-15 VDC, 7 mA
I reinstalled the YTO in its SA and checked it was working properly. I kept it running for several hours doing all the tests possible, all passed positively.

At this point the hypotheses for the breakdown of the second YTO have narrowed down to only two:
1- internally the YTO of the HP8560E, although similar in structure, differed slightly from that of the HP8563E. Question: Were there different versions made? Or is the YTO mounted on the HP8560E not the 5086-7906? So why did it break?
I also found that this YTO has been repaired. Internally there are several scratches ...
2- The +5 VDC voltage of the HP8563E has some problems. I checked it and it is stable and precise but, I doubted that some tantalum capacitor (there are several on that line) is interrupted and the power on extra current, not absorbed by the capacitor, may have caused it to burn the two YTOs.
Could mine be a valid hypothesis?

Sorry if I'm insisting on the subject, but I just want to try to understand and learn and thank you all for your cooperation!
HP8561E and HP8341A as tracking source?

 

Hi All!

Tell me please if it possible to use HP8341A as tracking generator for HP8561E and how to interconnect them (HP-IB, BNC...)?
What steps of configuration in menus?

Best regards,
Roman.
Re: Hp8640b

 

If you're looking to work on it for you try?.
GL,
--Lenny Wintfeld (W2BVH)
Re: Hp 8590a spectrum analyzer

Richard Cook
 

You are most right. It may be better to leave it alone. But I know the power Supplies are hard to come by so I think replacing the caps with high grade ones and safety caps isn't a bad idea. Like I said I never have delt with repair of one of these animals so I may just keep in mind the noise floor and use it.?
Re: Hp 8590a spectrum analyzer

 

In the end I gave up on the noise fail. I just have to be aware that the noise floor is not what it should be, but it has not mattered for my measurements. There should be no loose screws. The lids should be screwed tight. You have a tremendous amount of gain and any leakage will matter.

I did try to tune mine, following the procedures in the service manual. You need to manufacture test fixtures, capacitor and resistor if memory serves me and plug those into the points provided then trim. FWIW you will find that suitable connectors that fit the pins can be bought in any auto store. The ones used for watertight engine connections fit perfectly. Let me see if I can find the ones i soldered and take a picture.

You could also leave it as it is because you might mke things worse..
Re: Hp 400D serial number decoder

 

I will guess the power supply electrolytics were manufactured by Sprague. When I worked at HP in the early 70¡¯s, Sprague was their preferred vendor. The Sprague electrolytics all had a 4 digit manufacturing date code¡ª yyww. yy is the last two digits of the year and ww is the week number.
While this doesn¡¯t precisely date the instrument, it puts a bound on the instrument manufacturing date obviously later than the latest component manufacturing date code. Identifying various date codes is a useful skill.
73 Jeff Furman AD6MX
22661 - 22680 of 151493