So I have (had?) a few (6+) of the older nRF51822-EK dongles hanging around the shop, and was recently using one related to some BLE sniffer hackery (more on that later). As I was getting the code running, I noticed that one of the timers (Timer0) was acting peculiar. No matter what bitmode I set the timer to, it was always counting in 24bit mode ... long story short, I was directed to this - https://devzone.nordicsemi.com/question/1310/nrf51822-bit-width-and-bitmode/ Basically Timer0 of the rev1 and rev2 Si of the nRF51822 was broken. So, what does any good engineer armed with a shop full of expensive re-work equipment do ... re-work. 
 
I removed the nRF51822 Si off these and replaced them with nRF51422 QFAB A1 (rev3) Si ... works(ed) like a charm. I do have access so several nRF51 Dongles (newer style), but why throw these way when they can easily be updated. The only difference between the '822 and the '422, is that the 422 supports ANT (along with BLE). 
 
Click to embiggen (~2MB) 
 
Funny. Looks like there were a few nRF52s (nRF52832 QFAA AA) in there. I had 2 nRF52 Preview Development Kits that had engineering samples of the nRF52 on them. Again, why throw them out when they can be easily updated with new Si. 
 
A little closer ... 
 
Click to embiggen (~2MB)