Hello, I am new to building electrical devices, I am in the middle of building a power supply and found this as my output signal. Any Speculation would be appreciated. Thank you.

 

Welcome to AAC.

That is a sine wave, but the scope's timebase is too short to display it properly, and it is also not triggering properly.

Make the time base longer and adjust the trigger and it will look much better.

[EDIT: had things backwards there for a moment]

 

Here's the same sort of thing on a more modern scope.

Trigger not properly adjusted


Trigger adjusted properly, timebase too short


Timebase adjusted properly
​

There may be times when you want to fill the screen with one cycle of your waveform. On a CRO (Cathode Ray Oscilloscope) like yours, too would shorten the timebase to "stretch out" the waveform. On a modern DSO (Digital Storage Oscilloscope) there will be a facility to "zoom" in on the waveform and move along it.

Normally though, you'd expect the timebase to be set to show a few cycles not just one. Timebase is may be labeled "horizontal" because it affects the horizontal axis, which is time. The "vertical" would be the height of the wave.

 

Welcome to AAC.

That is a sine wave, but the scope's timebase is too long to display it properly, and it is also not triggering properly.

Make the time base shorter and adjust the trigger and it will look much better.

Here's the same sort of thing on a more modern scope.

View attachment 261829
Trigger not properly adjusted

View attachment 261830
Trigger adjusted properly, timebase too short

View attachment 261831
Timebase adjusted properly
​

There may be times when you want to fill the screen with one cycle of your waveform. On a CRO (Cathode Ray Oscilloscope) like yours, too would shorten the timebase to "stretch out" the waveform. On a modern DSO (Digital Storage Oscilloscope) there will be a facility to "zoom" in on the waveform and move along it.

Normally though, you'd expect the timebase to be set to show a few cycles not just one. Timebase is may be labeled "horizontal" because it affects the horizontal axis, which is time. The "vertical" would be the height of the wave.

Here's the same sort of thing on a more modern scope.

View attachment 261829
Trigger not properly adjusted

View attachment 261830
Trigger adjusted properly, timebase too short

View attachment 261831
Timebase adjusted properly
​

There may be times when you want to fill the screen with one cycle of your waveform. On a CRO (Cathode Ray Oscilloscope) like yours, too would shorten the timebase to "stretch out" the waveform. On a modern DSO (Digital Storage Oscilloscope) there will be a facility to "zoom" in on the waveform and move along it.

Normally though, you'd expect the timebase to be set to show a few cycles not just one. Timebase is may be labeled "horizontal" because it affects the horizontal axis, which is time. The "vertical" would be the height of the wave.

Thank you guys so much for your reply's. I build engines and diagnose automotive electrical faults for a living and have started building circuit's as a hobby because my brain is peaked out on the auto stuff. Sometimes I feel stupid for asking basic questions but then I remember
when I was 18 some old guy at the corner mechanic shop tought me the skills that would carry me down the road for the rest of my life so...thanks guys.

 

Thank you guys so much for your reply's. I build engines and diagnose automotive electrical faults for a living and have started building circuit's as a hobby because my brain is peaked out on the auto stuff. Sometimes I feel stupid for asking basic questions but then I remember
when I was 18 some old guy at the corner mechanic shop tought me the skills that would carry me down the road for the rest of my life so...thanks guys.

Don’t ever worry about asking questions. There are many people here who will be happy to answer them. As long as you do your part of providing enough information and carefully read the answers which will often have very specific questions for you, iyoull always be welcome.

 

Don’t ever worry about asking questions. There are many people here who will be happy to answer them. As long as you do your part of providing enough information and carefully read the answers which will often have very specific questions for you, iyoull always be welcome.

Awesome! Thank you again. Another quick question. On my Oscilliscope Leader 15MHZ. There is a ground wire attached to the probe, also a port on the machine for ground. When measuring AC any idea where I clip the ground side to? Do I connect it to the neutral side of the circuit?

 

Awesome! Thank you again. Another quick question. On my Oscilliscope Leader 15MHZ. There is a ground wire attached to the probe, also a port on the machine for ground. When measuring AC any idea where I clip the ground side to? Do I connect it to the neutral side of the circuit?

You should it connect your scope to the AC mains without knowing more about scopes and having a good reason. You can use a transformer to reduce the voltage and isolate the scope and in that case it would make only a subtle difference which wire you connected to which.

 

What is the model number of your oscilloscope?
Show us a photo of the whole front face. We want to see the controls and the markings as well.
Then we would be able to tell you how to set up your scope.

You want to set the HOR TIME/DIV to about 10ms.
Simply touch your finger on the tip of the probe and observe the waveform.

After that we will instruct you on what to do with the ground clip.

 

What is the model number of your oscilloscope?
Show us a photo of the whole front face. We want to see the controls and the markings as well.
Then we would be able to tell you how to set up your scope.

You want to set the HOR TIME/DIV to about 10ms.
Simply touch your finger on the tip of the probe and observe the waveform.

After that we will instruct you on what to do with the ground clip.

I am making a not completely wild guess this is the scope he has:

Leader LBO-513A
​

Not a bad scope to start with. It's not overly complicated but has all the controls needed to learn the principles and operation of an oscilloscope. 15MHz is more than enough bandwidth at this point. I don't even have a guess at what he has for a probe, though.

 

Awesome! Thank you again. Another quick question. On my Oscilliscope Leader 15MHZ. There is a ground wire attached to the probe, also a port on the machine for ground. When measuring AC any idea where I clip the ground side to? Do I connect it to the neutral side of the circuit?

This is worth a watch on youtube to understand grounding of your oscilloscope and playing with your AC power system:

 

This looks like a useful / fun tutorial

https://learn.sparkfun.com/tutorials/how-to-use-an-oscilloscope/all

 

Doesn't look like a mis-triggered sine wave to me. My first guess would be line-freq ripple.

Please post the schematic of your circuit, and indicate on it where the scope probe(s) were attached. Without a schematic. we have *zero* information about the signal you are displaying.

ak

 

Doesn't look like a mis-triggered sine wave to me. My first guess would be line-freq ripple.

Please post the schematic of your circuit, and indicate on it where the scope probe(s) were attached. Without a schematic. we have *zero* information about the signal you are displaying.

ak

I do think though the signal would look good as an old TV Scifi background,

 

I decreased the scan rate to show a few waveforms and I synced it.

 

Hello, I am new to building electrical devices, I am in the middle of building a power supply and found this as my output signal. Any Speculation would be appreciated. Thank you.View attachment 261825View attachment 261826View attachment 261827View attachment 261825View attachment 261825View attachment 261826View attachment 261827
View attachment 261825View attachment 261826View attachment 261827

May be I missed it
but what is your volts per division. and time base per division set at ?

 

S.c.h.e.m.a.t.i.c. . . . .

To paraphrase Rear Admiral Joshua Painter,

"Engineers don't take a dump, son, without a schematic."

ak

 

I am making a not completely wild guess this is the scope he has:

View attachment 261856
Leader LBO-513A
​

Not a bad scope to start with. It's not overly complicated but has all the controls needed to learn the principles and operation of an oscilloscope. 15MHz is more than enough bandwidth at this point. I don't even have a guess at what he has for a probe, though.

Yes, that is my scope, picked it up for $80 because my digital one was acting goofy and needed something to compare it against that didn't go through the adc process. What do you think about this Waveform? I can see it is like a sine wave but what about the periodic fuzzys in the center?

 

Yes, that is my scope, picked it up for $80 because my digital one was acting goofy and needed something to compare it against that didn't go through the adc process. What do you think about this Waveform? I can see it is like a sine wave but what about the periodic fuzzys in the center?

What that looks like to me is an disconnected probe picky up the mains and switching hash around it. I see that triangle wave a lot, and there can be all sorts of periodic glitches in it from power supplies in equipment nearby,

This psychedelic mess is from the general hash and the two PWM dimmed LED task lights on it. The second shot is zoomed in, see the funky PWM waves?

​

The important question is, what is the scope probe connected to? What do you expect to see on the scope?

 

Why do you think the distorted triangle waveform is a sinewave?
What are the 'scope inputs connected to and what is the measured AC voltage?

 

		I have no idea what I expect to see, and I don't have a schematic because there is no electrical components besides a diode and a few resistors. This device that I am in the middle of building has both A/C and DC voltage simotaniously. The device has a self DC voltage of 1.0-1.3 volts, that will no matter what discharge even left overnight or days on end connected to a T5 compact bulb. It can pass 30ma but dumps down to 0.8 volts @30ma. I have a bunch of connected in series but am struggling to get a buffer or another IC to work with it. Everytime I try to connect it to ground everything stops working. Probably has something to do with the positive & neg outputs have super high resistance (OL) on a multimeter. Possibly ics won't work because of a resistive load drive issue. I'm not sure, it's super complicated. Also, The AC voltage is applied. The DC Voltage is self induced phenomenon.
					Why do you think the distorted triangle waveform is a sinewave? What are the 'scope inputs connected to and what is the measured AC voltage?