More of a warning than a question - don't buy JFETs from adeleparts2010 on eBay

xefned said:
Thanks for confirming. It's hard to blame the “cheap tester” and ignore that the ones I purchased long ago (before having kids,) test as N-channel JFETS, and the ones when I got back into the hobby simply do not read as JFETS. (Just “NPN.”)

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I'll never afford an Atlas tester to verify his claims that they're legit. My bad. He offered to take them back, but I declined, placing the blame on my tester. Wish I'd stocked up back in 2002.
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It's interesting that on the 2022 transistor the hfe reading is so high, higher than any of the prepackaged darlingtons i know of while the vf is so low, being lower than any silicon BJT i've ever seen tested.
 
swyse said:
…higher than any of the prepackaged darlingtons i know of while the vf is so low, being lower than any silicon BJT i've ever seen tested …
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The hFE tests all over the map, from 14k to 140k. :) Probably because the tester doesn't know what it's looking at.
Maybe they are JFETs, just different from the old ones? I dunno.
 
xefned said:
This particular style of unbranded ebay cheapie—it appears—
It knows when you've inserted a MOSFET as well. Pretty decent tester for $15.

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I've got one of these (or super-similar). It bricked itself (or I bricked it) just testing it out — never got to use it in earnest. Makes a colourful paperweight.
 
Feral Feline said:
I've got one of these (or super-similar). It bricked itself (or I bricked it) just testing it out — never got to use it in earnest. Makes a colourful paperweight.
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That's a massive bummer.
I also have a dead generic tester: an induction/LCR meter. It never really worked. I wrote to the company name silkscreened on the PCB. They said, "we no longer support that product." I can't bring myself to throw it away.
 
xefned said:
That's a massive bummer.
I also have a dead generic tester: an induction/LCR meter. It never really worked. I wrote to the company name silkscreened on the PCB. They said, "we no longer support that product." I can't bring myself to throw it away.
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I had three different component testers in 3 weeks and each of them died inside a week. I ended up just buying a peak atlas in the end.
 
I forget how old my inexpensive MM is... at least 15 maybe 20 years? But I feel its accuracy may have drifted, at least it seems suspect to me. The manual has a calibration process, but I don't have the equipment necessary to do it.
 
Well, I eventually got a TC-1, courtesy of Fig in one of his contests, bless him.

I think the ones sold naked without a case are more susceptible to bricking.

My one that bricked was probably a second or a reject from the TC-1 production line that's being sold off by unscrupulous factory employees who don't know what to do with the Failed-Stock since they can't throw them out either. So they smuggle the bad ones out of the factory, sell 'm online without the case that protects the unit and ...

Sorry, my imagination tends to run away with the Fork and the Spoon.


I've got two cheap DMMs, one direct from the manufacturer in China I bought at a trade-fair, the other I got from Canajian Tyre, and both are still going strong.
I'd like to get the Peak Atlas 75, eventually. Can't hurt to have multiple DMMs: my amp-builder/restorer/repairer/designer buddy has multiple DMMs setup for different specific tasks plus a few more just for general use.
 
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