How hard is it to get new test equipment at your company?

[wrh9278]

It can be like pulling teeth at mine. It's embarrassing when I have to pull out some my older pieces around customers. What's even worse is when equipment finally breaks and you get stuck with "the loaner."

[unimployed]

Often I have to use my personal equipment because companies are so slow to approve new equipment. "We only pay for it if you truly need it" is a dumb mantra when every application has new or different tool requirements. No wonder companies go under

[cjones09]

Rental equipment seems to be the best option at our company. It's so easy. We get what we need shipped to our shop, it looks very impressive and cutting edge on the job site, and we ship it back when we are done. This works well for the really expensive stuff we don't use often.

[mikebdub]

It can be like pulling teeth at mine. It's embarrassing when I have to pull out some my older pieces around customers. What's even worse is when equipment finally breaks and you get stuck with "the loaner."

Did it pass calibration? You don't need anything new then! :mad:

[wrh9278]

Did it pass calibration? You don't need anything new then! :mad:

Yup, never mind the missing knobs and crappy test leads, just make it happen. :p

[wrh9278]

Often I have to use my personal equipment because companies are so slow to approve new equipment. "We only pay for it if you truly need it" is a dumb mantra when every application has new or different tool requirements. No wonder companies go under

Does your company at least calibrate your personal equipment?

[Achandler]

Did it pass calibration? You don't need anything new then! :mad:

It has always been a bit of a struggle but with recent management problems it has become a nightmare!

[codycody103]

It can be like pulling teeth at mine. It's embarrassing when I have to pull out some my older pieces around customers. What's even worse is when equipment finally breaks and you get stuck with "the loaner."

Normally it isnt to hard, but i have found the equipment is old and outdated, yet it still gets calibrted just fine

[Frierfly]

Not hard at all, because our owner still likes to work in the field and will buy just about whatever we ask for.

[ironshovel77]

It can be like pulling teeth at mine. It's embarrassing when I have to pull out some my older pieces around customers. What's even worse is when equipment finally breaks and you get stuck with "the loaner."

I work for a large national testing company that claims to be on the cutting edge, what a joke my fluke 87 lead broke the other day (first one in years ) i was told to FIX it ,every test set has taped up leads broken clips cracked screens
etc thats how the shop sends them out not like the techs beet them up they don't have a chance by the time you get something it has to another job tomorrow sucks

[stevepieroski]

It can be like pulling teeth at mine. It's embarrassing when I have to pull out some my older pieces around customers. What's even worse is when equipment finally breaks and you get stuck with "the loaner."

To be honest my company spends the money to have good test equipment. Usually a brand new big piece every year and some smaller pieces to. Just got us a new primary injection set last month.

[jblunt92482]

With my company, it's mainly dealing with IT issues. My company calibrates our equipment and generally takes good care of us if we need new/updated equipment. That being said, we do have some of the older sets (CTER, old Signalcrafter sets, 2253's) that we keep ready to go just in case. Biggest pain in the ass is dragging around multiple computers because we have to keep our test computers "clean" to maintain compliance when talking to BES microprocessor relays.

[SecondGen]

Feeling the pain in this thread. We are about half and half where I work, some equipment is new but we have many pieces that are outdated and have "special calibration" status.

Another problem is that stuff gets passed around so much it ends up getting abused, so you end up with broken or missing pieces. The IT department sucks where I'm at also - I've been working with an I3, integrated graphics, and 4GB of RAM for over 5 years now.

[chils15]

I guess its the same no matter where you work.

[rofo42]

I work for a small testing company, they usually have no problem buying test equipment if it's needed.

[storm89]

I guess its the same no matter where you work.

Every company want's to keep costs down and test equipment is a huge expense. I have found that renting test equipment is a great option.

[backpack96]

It has always been a bit of a struggle but with recent management problems it has become a nightmare!

I started out as a test technician in the 70s and later started a testing group for an international company. When I would have to use an outside contractor I would observe the conditional of their equipment. If they have "beat up" equipment that was missing covers and hinges I would have some caution. If they do not take care of their expensive equipment then why would they take care of my equipment. Calibration stickers can be made up the week or day before starting a job so I am not a fond believer in a calibration sticker on a meter or device.

[Realtime]

When I started at my company, we weren't testing apparatus, just relays and com equipment. We had a very large job where the boss had budgeted the apparatus testing to a competitor. I told him I could handle it and we rented what we needed. Since then, every year we have gotten what we needed, incrementally. Breaker timer, Power Factor, a good CT tester, SF6 analyzer and finally this year a battery tester. We did a big 61850 project and we got 2 Dobles capable of that testing with the software. We knew we had the job so the boss budgeted for it.

We rented along the way and also purchased some things from the rental company at a huge discount. We set up an apparatus testing trailer that has a place for every piece of equipment and the equipment is secured in place for travel. We have our Dobles for relay testing but also now have 4 Sverker 900's as they are great for secondary injection and even primary. We are getting several IRIG converters for the Dobles next year. I recently saw a Fluke Scopemeter from the rental company on sale used for $300 and just bought it. My boss won't blink an eye.

The rental company we deal with (Protec) is fabulous. I call, get a quote in 10 minutes. Equipment is always well packed and all leads, SW, manuals and cal sheet are in the box. I keep joking with the rental guy that our business will dry up with him because he keeps selling us (barely) used equipment that we used to rent. We'll still rent a VLF, corona camera and any other oddball thing that comes up.

[alf583]

It can be like pulling teeth at mine. It's embarrassing when I have to pull out some my older pieces around customers. What's even worse is when equipment finally breaks and you get stuck with "the loaner."

I feel that.
We "don't need it". Yeah, until our old unit takes a dump right before or at a job. Now we're scrambling to rent.

If only we saw this coming! /s

[alf583]

Yup, never mind the missing knobs and crappy test leads, just make it happen. :p

That's when I get, "make new leads then!" :D

[jts1976]

I work for a small testing company, they usually have no problem buying test equipment if it's needed.

Same. Small company, but we can generally get the equipment we need. We rent items that we don't use often, and being small, there's s high standard for taking care of what we have and not abusing instruments. We also calibrate personal tools and instruments - torque wrenches, multimeters, and even 1 multiamp 225 that a guy has that we can use for a backup if needed.

[michaellabeit]

My battalion is only one of 2 NETA accredited units in the DoD but even then getting ahold of test equipment is a pain in the ass. Army calibration is worse than useless, sometimes we don't get our shit back for months. Now the battalion wants to ditch our own test sets in favor of rentals. The issue with this is that getting rentals takes time. Purchase requests need to be approved. And typically we don't know we need something until it's the last minute.