What part of DIY do you HATE?

[jon_010101]

I enjoy the design aspect of DIY. However, actually building anything really tests my patience.

[smoking-amp]

1) Not enough AC outlets to plug all the power supplies and test equipment into. And AC cords and power supply leads running all over the bench.

2) Can't find enough clip leads.

3) Erratic, intermittant scope probes.

4) Smell of soldering iron melting insulation inadvertantly or of burning components.

5) Not enough colors of wire/insulation on hand.

6) Scratching paint on xfmrs during breadboarding.

7) Not enough room to store all my junk/components, and can't ever find anything besides.

8) No surplus/cheap HV SMPS. And not much interesting at the usual surplus electronic sources anymore either. (robot gears or backlight LCD panels anyone?)

9) Microsoft absolutely ruined the Basic programing language (Visual Basic) for doing data acquisition, so very hard now to use a PC to do measurements and take data/graphs/curves unless you want to run DOS/Basic.

10) Touching HV inadvertantly while probing/testing and too many power supplies to turn off each time for safety, to change a circuit/component. (And the need to sequence power supplies correctly to avoid burning something up.) Need a sequencer to control the supplies with a single push button.

[NIC1138]

9) Microsoft absolutely ruined the Basic programing language (Visual Basic) for doing data acquisition, so very hard now to use a PC to do measurements and take data/graphs/curves unless you want to run DOS/Basic.

If you are not willing to upgrade to Linux, at least try learning C in windows!...

Now, following popular dislike: I hate the smell of burnt ICs!... Not only it's fetid, it's a constant reminder of your stupidity!!!

I burned a triac the other day, it was in series with a transformer, but I switched the secondary and the primary! GOSH! What a smell!!!

[Klimon]

Luckily we have our self-help group here at diyaudio.com. My name is Simon and I am a diy-er.

Simon

[Johannes LeBong]

As soon as I have finished something, it is clear to me, that I could have done better.

BR Johannes LeBong

[luka]

Hi

1. When pcb track blows away so that there is no way of fixing it
2 When you get shoked by 230Vac of 330Vdc, hopefily you are still alive to tell.

[jane]

Enamelled (transformer) wires are not one of my favourites...

Jan E Veiset

[Gregm]

Originally posted by Johannes LeBong
As soon as I have finished something, it is clear to me, that I could have done better.

BR Johannes LeBong

That's already advanced diy-ing in my book. You've actually finished it!!!

What i'm invariably up against (& hate)
- every time I improve upon part of the circuit, I lose sleep about how I can further improve on the improvement. Six months later, I've forgotten what the initial point of the design was.

- As a general rule, any improvement I make invariably leads to another improvement, all of them together often leading back to the initial schematic -- by which time I've lost track of what is better -- if anything.

- making holes in the chassis only to find that I can get away without those holes -- or I need holes in a different place.

- putting together a beautifully performing "test" circuit on a piece of wood (you don't expect much fm a piece of wood, right?) and then transposing same nicely onto pcb, only to find that there is noise coming out of nowhere. Put same back to piece of wood, noise stops. (I gave up on figuring that one out)

- putting the bare circuit into a box (finally, six months later) only to find it no longer sounds as good /or I think it doesn't.

- the continued and justified complaints fm wife about that live experimental dac test-board with outboard PS (i.e. any tranny I found lying around & connected), waiting to be perfected and then put into a chassis for the past 60 months.

*- It usually takes me 6months' gestation period to think about what I'm going to do with anything that seems to work after the first assembly, so:

-I HATE having to go fm first assembly to final version, including that beautiful wooden chassis with internal copper sheet divisions that always end up with a hole in the wrong place because I've eliminated the component that was supposed to be there AFTER getting the tech to drill the hole.

Jeez, EEs are lucky in some respects; they've been taught all the things I have had to find out (the hard way).

[pilli]

Ok, this is great!
I've read all your posts, to earn the right to tell my piece of the story.

My most hated is when I figured out how to repair that jewel bought broken on eBay nearly for free, and in the process of fixing it (like a blown 7805, and of course we have hundreds of 'em in our junk) you make the idiot thing (invert power polarity or discharge that fat cap into the 100 pin controller chip the can't be replaced) and make the whole thing ready for the junk pile

I did it almost five times. Then I stopped counting.
After that I just go to eBay and buy more...

[NIC1138]

Originally posted by Gregm
Jeez, EEs are lucky in some respects; they've been taught all the things I have had to find out (the hard way).

Now this is another interesting hateable aspect too: Graduate in e engineering, then start to play with some Real Life project, and discovering you were only told half the story!

Ooooh! I also hate electronics stores!! I don't know how is it abroad, but here in Brazil, it's like visiting a sphinx! If you don't know what you want exactly, get ready to be devoured. I specially hate when the balconist thinks I don't know what I want, and gives me the "the engineer told him wrong look", and I can't just say "I'm a ******* engineer, shutup!!" because it's just too cocky!

On the other side, there are some rare new stores with young girls as balconists, and I think they are trained to ask you things like "which one is the phillips screwdriver??..." Soooo lovely...