Past or present tense when describing a well-known method in the description of an experiment?

Question

I am describing an experiment for a scientific paper. In this experiment, I use a very well-known technique which I briefly describe, similar to the following variant (#1):

In this experiment, we measured the performance of our machine using the well-known method B.

B took the machine, turned it around three times, did some weird things with it, and then came up with a performance number.

Should the second sentence be in the past or present tense?

Since it should be a general description of how method B works and not what it actually did, it sounds strange to me that it is in past tense but a native speaker (but not a technical writer) told me to do so.

I would prefer this variant (#2):

In this experiment, we measured the performance of our machine using the well-known method B.

B takes the machine, turns it around three times, does some weird things with it, and then comes up with a performance number.

What variant makes more sense?

Answer 1

Variant #1 does not make sense. Using the past tense implies a particular instance: Someone performed method B one specific time. The omission of a person's name or personal pronoun from the example sentence adds to the confusion and seems like a typo.

Use variant #2. It makes more sense but still needs something. Method B doesn't do itself. Identify the person performing method B by their role. For example, "In method B, the tester takes the machine, turns it around three times, does some weird things with it, and then comes up with a performance number."

Answer 2

The first sentence refers to the experiment in the past tense ("measured"). For the sake of consistency, the second sentence should be past tense as well.