Restoring an HP-120B Oscilloscope from 1961!

I have a soft spot for old test equipment, particularly old HP test equipment. My HP-150A is my all-time favorite oscilloscope. It’s rock solid, looks gorgeous, and is stunningly good. It also weighs about nine million pounds (that’s roughly four million kilograms). I was lamenting that I needed a front-end loader to pick my 150A up to a good buddy of mine, Chris Fala, and he said “I’ve got an HP tube scope that won’t send you to the doctor for back pain.” Chris is an absolute legend and hooked me up with said scope, which is the HP-120B you see here today. It’s not currently working though, so let’s dive into it. Should be easy, right? Right?

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Intro Music adapted from:
Artist: The Runaway Five
Title: The Shinra Shuffle
https://ocremix.org/remix/OCR01847

Thanks for watching!

Chapters
0:00 A bit of reorganization
2:34 Scopes!
4:43 Testing the test equipment
5:40 Throwing electrons at the 120B
7:25 Deep cleaning time
12:43 6U8 vs. 6GH8
14:05 Testing after cleaning
15:21 So close, let’s dig in deeper and find out what’s wrong
17:38 Thor: “Is it though?”
19:35 I fought the HP and the HP won…
21:56 Battling someone else’s modifications
24:11 Please work correctly, for my sanity’s sake
25:48 Nailed it!
26:48 What am I going to do with another oscilloscope?
28:46 Derpy cat is derpy