Re: Getting En from NV

Chris wrote:

Hi, Paul. Reverse cross-referencing would probably be about the worst
thing for their business model. Once or twice over the years, I'll
admit to flipping through the 2N and 3N pages of the cross-reference
catalog, looking for the NTE or ECG number so I could substitute
something I had on hand. (O shame! O indignity!)

If you take the time to figure out what's going on in the circuit, you
can pretty well figure out what part you need. And that should take
less time than flipping through the pages. But on the other hand, if
you're repairing an old engineering prototype without docs that has an
ECG or NTE part, that may be a valid choice if you're in a big hurry.

On the downside, the NTE cross isn't always perfect. It usually works
-- not always.

If you buy the concept that you're replacing a part with a guaranteed
"as-good-as" or superior part with NTE, you're accepting that going the
other way may very well result in your replacing with an inferior part.

And even if either of two parts can be replaced by one NTE part, that
doesn't necessarily make them equivalents to each other. (Try using
translation websites to go, say, from English to German, and then back
again. Note the potentially hilarious results. Not so hilarious if
your fix doesn't work.)

But the concept of a reverse cross-reference is a pretty good one, I'd
guess. You might have to scan in all the pages of the cross-reference,
then plug the data into a ginormous spread***. And of course, if you
ever tried to sell it, NTE would come down on you like a ton of bricks.

Cheers
Chris


I just sort a lot of leftover semiconductors by the ECG/NTE cross
reference and see what I have on hand when I need a part. If a drawer
fills up, I sort it out by part number of anything I find more than a
dozen or so, and put them into their own drawers. Of course, I have
over 20, 50 drawer parts cabinets full of sorted parts.

The bad thing is that they delete a cross reference when they
obsolete a part number, so you may have the part in stock, but its no
longer in the book or software.


--
Service to my country? Been there, Done that, and I've got my DD214 to
prove it.
Member of DAV #85.

Michael A. Terrell
Central Florida
.

Quantcast