Discharging a CRT - easily!

[Down Under]

Hi All,

I saw a computer tech ages ago pull out a "biro" from his toolbox. Nothing special there, but it had been modified to have a wire with an aligator clip coming out the back of the pen, and a straightened out paper clip used as a probe coming out of the writing end. The aligator clip attaches to the aquadag strap or ground and you can safely slip the paper clip probe under the anode cap to discharge the tube.

The best thing about this though is that he used a high value resistor inside the pen between wire and probe that he'd probably taken from the HT section of a colour TV. (4.7Meg or so) This means that the CRT discharges "gently", rather than a big spark and for some reason, it will NOT recover some charge after a few hours or so! How many here have forgotten about recovery and been zapped slightly?

Best of all, it costs nothing to make!

Please move this post if it's not relevant here.