Agilent and Davis Onsite Calibration Partnership

[MRD]

Actually, the FSMR belongs to the APSL. I now work with Region 2 at the newly opened TSC Redstone.

How many stateside Army TMDE labs are going/have gone civilian? I remember RSA rather fondly

I was shocked to see Ft Drum go at least paritally civilian, there's a job WG-2602 posting over on ecalibration.com. 

How about those in the know of the large scheme of things start threads for their respective branchs on the current state of affairs, leaving out rumors of what might come just what has happened?

[griff61]

Actually, the FSMR belongs to the APSL. I now work with Region 2 at the newly opened TSC Redstone.

How many stateside Army TMDE labs are going/have gone civilian? I remember RSA rather fondly

I was shocked to see Ft Drum go at least paritally civilian, there's a job WG-2602 posting over on ecalibration.com. 

How about those in the know of the large scheme of things start threads for their respective branchs on the current state of affairs, leaving out rumors of what might come just what has happened?

I saw that, I worked that lab as a green suiter a long time ago...tempted to apply for the nostalgia factor

[Bryan]

Testing an FSMR is not too awful difficult but rather tedious, figure a couple days for your first time manually.
First there is the spectrum Analyzer Portion, pretty conventional.
Next is the measuring receiver, they use an arbitrary waveform generator (R&S model AMIQ) with some test waveforms (free downloads) for modulation Accuracy & distortion. 
The grand finale is the Tuned RF Level function.  You would be best to do it IAW the service manual even if you have some great decade attenuator, just use it in place of the fixed devices they specify but do the tare thing as described in the manual, less grief that way.

This does not include the NRP-Z37 sensor.

Seems like last time I inquired it was over $4 grand for them to do it.

[CalibratorJ]

Well, I reckon I could wander off and write a thread on the state of calibration, or the lack thereof, in the Army. But it would just depress me.

I finished up 2 years at the 94H schoolhouse right about a year ago, and it is a sad sad state. Our new techs are not "trained" in calibration. Heck, they aren't even trained how to use our standards. It is all theory and practical exercises using equipment so bugged out and broken you couldn't even begin to repair it back to within specs, that is IF you could get the parts. Luckily, we will be getting that task here shortly before they pack up and move to the "Center of Excellence", which happens to have a big ZILCH of a community in the neighborhood with the calibration "skill set". Everyone in the neighborhood they are moving to has a GREAT background in wheeled vehicle mechanics though......

Thank you CASCOM for completely screwing the schoolhouses from writing their OWN lessons using NEW equipment and NOT the stuff from TWO generations ago.

And, with the deactivation of 95th Maintenance Company, the dozen and a half or so of military teams left now belong to FORSCOM (think mowing grass, shooting guns, changing vehicle oil, playing GI Joe for weeks at a time while wearing camo and triple stranding a 1 mile perimeter- I mean come on, WHO TRIPLE STRANDS ANYMORE! Call the dang engineers FFS!) No one in the Army has a GARRISON mission, why should a cal team? You don't use multimeters or radios or vehicles unless we are at WAR!

Ok, enough of me rambling.


I guess I should see what I can dig up on the FSMR cal procedure. Might be "fun" to give it a go, if I have the stuffs to do it. Plus it would give me a reason to play with it for a few weeks......

[griff61]

before they pack up and move to the "Center of Excellence", which happens to have a big ZILCH of a community in the neighborhood with the calibration "skill set".

Humor an old, obsolete 35H and tell me, where might that be?

[CalibratorJ]

To the wonderful Fort Lee Virginia, aka Mechanicsville, US Army......

Hit me up at my username on here at gmail

[CalibratorJ]

Humor an old, obsolete 35H and tell me, where might that be?

We never go obsolete, we just use obsolete equipment 

[dminesinger]

Humor an old, obsolete 35H and tell me, where might that be?
[/quote]

When did you go thru 35H school. I went thru in 75/76 and then to Korea and Cp Carroll for 2 yrs.

PapaBear

[griff61]

Humor an old, obsolete 35H and tell me, where might that be?

When did you go thru 35H school. I went thru in 75/76 and then to Korea and Cp Carroll for 2 yrs.

PapaBear

88/89, then Panama (2 years), Drum (3 years) and mass reclass into 27X (PATRIOT), oh the joy of ADA....which meant Ft Bliss/Middle East/Ft Bliss/Middle East/Ft Bliss/Middle East/Ft Bliss/Middle East on and on....then they accidentally sent me to a non-existant depot in Germany so I became Bn Ops Sgt till I got out in 00

[RFCAL]

Davis will not enter this cal lab and cal our standards!They are above Tech Master and that is not saying much.
Agilent has proven that they do not learn from previous mistakes.This will just piss off customers and they will cancel on-site from Agilent.

[griff61]

Davis will not enter this cal lab and cal our standards!They are above Tech Master and that is not saying much.
Agilent has proven that they do not learn from previous mistakes.This will just piss off customers and they will cancel on-site from Agilent.

Seems they've bought some pretty decent labs, not sure I'd be too quick to judge, but maybe you have the inside scoop?

[CalibratorJ]

Money can buy a lot of things: very pretty labs, awesome workbenches, state of the art equipment to fill every workbench, shelf and rack in said lab, accreditations  , and even decent technicians with framed accreditations and certificates. But when it is all said and done, it comes down to business philosophy.

I will take my old Sheffield Modules any day (despite feeling like I am in a submarine) over some of the alternatives. I know what we can and can't do and that every DA Label 80 and test report that goes out my door (without a pretty logo on it mind you) is accurate and traceable.

Not saying anything about anyone, but anyone can buy a nice lab and fill it with nice things and the results can still be less than desirable.

[griff61]

Money can buy a lot of things: very pretty labs, awesome workbenches, state of the art equipment to fill every workbench, shelf and rack in said lab, accreditations  , and even decent technicians with framed accreditations and certificates. But when it is all said and done, it comes down to business philosophy.

I will take my old Sheffield Modules any day (despite feeling like I am in a submarine) over some of the alternatives. I know what we can and can't do and that every DA Label 80 and test report that goes out my door (without a pretty logo on it mind you) is accurate and traceable.

Not saying anything about anyone, but anyone can buy a nice lab and fill it with nice things and the results can still be less than desirable.

No doubt, I've seen many nice certificates that might as well be framed in dookie, I'm just wondering if/why there is such a bias against Davis. To be honest I hadn't heard very much about them until quite recently.

[measure]

It's hard to take you serious when you make statements like that.

Rohde & Schwarz is an ongoing joke in our lab.  The Air Force bought a bunch of that garbage and the stuff that our lab received just sits on the shelf.  Nobody uses it.  The only time it ever gets turned on is when it's due cal.  The performance is subpar and their menus are a navigation nightmare.  Agilent is much more intuitive and technician friendly and is as reliable as the day is long.  Our R&S stuff is so bad that we would much rather use older Agilent and 80s vintage HP Sig Gens and Spec Ans instead. 

Agilent provides excellent support for their products.  At least the type of support that I need.  Most of their manuals are available for free online as are firmware upgrades and software.  Whether the equipment is current or obsolete, it doesn't matter.  Help is just a double-click away.  No other manufacturer provides that level of support.

I don't know what vintage of R&S equipment you have in your lab, but my hands-on experience with the R&S FSU and FSMR shows me that it blows away the Agilent PSA/N5531S, both as a spectrum analyzer and as a measuring receiver.  The performance of the former is much better than the Agilent.

I agree that in the past, the UI (user interface) of the R&S left something to be desired, but they have listened to customers and are closer to the Agilent than ever before, making it intuitive as well as a fairly easy transition for Agilent users, not to mention virtual software compatibility.

R&S has also worked hard to upgrade their support system in the US as well, just one of the reasons why they divorced themselves from the alliance they with Tektronix.

I hate to say it, but Agilent is just a shadow of its former self, in my opinion.