this is what Im talkin about
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SJMFHutVLlQ
I prefer working from the back-to-front as well
although I am not suggesting that you should just go for it without any prior knowledge but this video is the idea in a nutshell

as well know color code
know schematic diagrams
know circuits
know your meter
know test equipment

join the Navy free
http://jricher.com/NEETS/

These are Naval Training documents in PDF format.)
[Edited for clarification. Hope you don't mind. Chuck S.]

not at all. whatever works. this is what the Navy uses to train basic electronics. must be good. I have found that it is. hope others benefit as well

more video
soldering
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vIT4ra6Mo0s

Also try AC4313:

http://www.faa.gov/regulations_policies ... ntid/99861

Although geared toward aircraft, there is a wealth of information here for anyone in electronics. Wire data, corrosion, evaluation of insulation types, etc. Chapter 11 is probably the one most applicable but they are all of interest..

Bill

They showed us a movie in electronics class, in high school, about soldering the Navy way. Movie was ca. 1950's. Showed those big big chisel end irons like you use to solder pipes or tin cans or something. We wondered, what was that about? So recently I have worked with techs that always pick out the largest chisel tip monster to install in the soldering stations, which makes PC board repairs a challenge at times. And I deride them for soldering with "big ol' Navy tips". That shop actually has a huge Navy iron to solder brass instrument enclosures to make them fully sealed.

Great video, thanks Tubeamp!

Question, at a certain stage where he was testing the tone could be heard, but there was mixed in static/background noise.
Would that stage still be considered fine, as long as you're hearing SOME of the generated signal at least?

here ya go http://jricher.com/NEETS/14174.pdf

In this particular case that would be true. By this I mean, if you had a dead radio and at least some signal was getting through then that stage at least is not killing everything. In this case his test lead was acting as a bit of an antenna and picking up stray noise and feeding it into the receiver along with the desired signal.

As a general rule, the farther back you go in the radio the less signal should be required from your signal generator to get suitable audio output. This is because you are getting more and more amplification as you work your way back through the radio stages. There are exceptions to this particularly for transisitor circuits (it's a weird impedance issue), but for tube circuits it is a pretty safe assumption.

Curtis Eickerman