eBay purchased NE5534s literally went up in smoke

[Cjuried]

Just stumbled upon this: http://www.cti-us.com/pdf/CCAP-101InspectExamplesA6.pdf
Nice read with lots of pictures

Great find! Printing out a few copies for friends.

I have found many obvious counterfeits of PTC PT2399's. Do a search on ebay, for PT2399. You will find that many of the pictures plainly read "DTC" as opposed to "PTC". Coloration of denotation is not accurate either. Obvious fakes, but people still buy them.

 

[Johnny2Bad]

A couple of nit-picks:

1. The technique is generically called "pad printing." Tampo is one company which makes machines for this, but there are many. The company I work for owns one of their competitors.
2. Pad printing can give a much more even and high resolution print than screen printing. That's why it's the method of choice for very expensive products where appearance is part of the appeal (e.g., high end golf balls). It is an offset method.
3. The cheaper printing is almost assuredly done with an ink jet.

I had a client who owned a couple Pad Printing machines as part of his MN-based Silkscreening business.
Was visiting him one time, his wife was running one of the Pad Printers.

While she stopped to chat briefly, I had the opportunity to take a closer look at what she was working on ... she was printing Audio Research face plates for power amplifiers (white ink on black anodized aluminum, in case anyone was wondering).