🐿️Pinecone Attack

c/electronics-repairers

14

lily574•14d ago

Had to choose between a hot air station and a soldering iron for an old DVD player board

I was fixing a Panasonic DVD player from 2004 for a neighbor last weekend. There was a cracked capacitor near a plastic connector, and I worried the hot air would melt it. I went with my Hakko soldering iron and a pair of tweezers instead, taking it slow. The cap came off clean and the new one went in without any damage. Has anyone else had to pick between tools on a tight spot like that?

22

abby836•17d ago

Just saw the difference a capacitor swap made on an old receiver

Picked up a Pioneer SX-780 at a flea market in Denver for $40 last Saturday. Got it home and the left channel was weak with a hum. Recapped the power supply board with some Nichicon caps from Mouser, took about 2 hours, and now it sounds clean as a whistle. Anyone else notice how much life these old units have after a basic recap?

14

terryj45•18d ago

Stumbled on a stat that shocked me about capacitor failure rates

I was reading through a repair log from a shop in Austin last night and saw that nearly 40% of dead power supplies they get in have at least one bad cap. That number seems crazy high to me, but after thinking about all the blown caps I've pulled from old monitors, it kinda makes sense. Where do you guys usually see the worst capacitor problems in your repairs?

15

rubyj11•19d ago

Hit 500 board repairs in my shop last Tuesday

I passed 500 board-level repairs last Tuesday on a old Samsung TV power supply. It surprised me because I never actually counted them before, I just fix stuff as it comes in. That number made me realize how much I've learned since I started doing this out of my garage in Des Moines four years ago. Has anyone else tracked their repair count and been surprised by the number?

10

karen_sanchez10•20d ago

Realization at the city dump e-waste pile

I went to the county transfer station last Tuesday to drop off some old stereo gear. Walking through the e-waste section, I noticed at least 30 VCRs and DVD players stacked in a bin, most of them looked like belt-drive failures or bad laser lenses. It hit me that these are super easy fixes with a $5 belt kit or a lens cleaner, but nobody bothers anymore. Do you all ever pull stuff from the curb or dump for quick flips, or is it not worth the time?

24

the_cora•20d ago

Found a $15 thermal camera attachment for my phone at a pawn shop

I was in Denver last weekend killing time and found a FLIR One for $15 at a pawn shop on Colfax. It actually works great for finding hot components on boards without risking my good meter. Anyone else used one of these cheap add-ons for troubleshooting?

22

thompson.christopher•20d ago

That $40 desoldering gun I cheaped out on finally died mid-job yesterday

Bought a no-name vacuum desoldering tool off Amazon about 8 months ago and it worked fine for small boards, but yesterday I was pulling a 24-pin connector and the tip clogged so bad it just gave up. Anyone else have a budget desoldering tool that let them down at the worst time?

2

kevin_roberts41•23d ago

Discovered a weird trick using a hairdryer to fix a bulging phone battery

I had an old iPhone 6s with a swollen battery that I couldn't get the adhesive to release on. After 20 minutes of struggling, I grabbed my wife's hairdryer and hit it on low for about 90 seconds, and the whole back came off clean without prying. Has anyone else tried unconventional heat sources like that or is this just a rookie move that'll backfire eventually?

3

xena_williams•23d ago

That whole 'just replace the cap' shortcut has cost me more time than it saved

I keep running into people who swap out a bulging capacitor on a board like that's the whole fix, but they skip checking the traces under it. Last month a guy brought me a 2007 Samsung plasma power supply where he did exactly that and missed a burnt-out via about 2 inches down the line. How do you even diagnose a problem if you won't grab a multimeter and follow the voltage path?

20

parkerrodriguez•24d ago

Unpopular opinion: hot air rework stations are way overrated for most repairs

My buddy Mike swore by his $40 hot air gun for years until it melted a connector on a board I was fixing last Tuesday. I stuck with my $15 soldering iron and flux, got the job done in 10 minutes flat. Anybody else ditch the hot air and just go back to basics?

10

troykim•26d ago

Guy at the counter said something about flux that totally changed how I do board work

So I was at Micro Center yesterday picking up some desoldering braid and this older guy next to me says to the clerk 'most people don't realize flux expires after a year if you leave the cap off.' I honestly never thought about it. I been using the same tub of flux for like 3 years and wondering why my joints were looking grainy. Went home and swapped it with a fresh one I had in a drawer. Solder flowed way smoother. Has anyone else had bad luck with old flux gumming up their work?

13

troykim•26d ago

TIL I was using way too much heat on my soldering iron for years

I was swapping a cap on a motherboard last tuesday and my iron was set to 400C like always. My buddy whos been doing board repair way longer than me walks by and goes "why are you cooking it?" I laughed it off but then he had me drop it to 315C. Same joint flowed perfect in half the time. Felt like an idiot. I guess I figured more heat = faster work but really I was just waiting for the whole board to soak. Anyone else have a basic thing they did wrong forever?

31

harpergonzalez•1mo ago

Went to a repair cafe in Portland and it changed my mind about taking stuff apart

I stopped by this monthly repair cafe at a library down on Belmont last Saturday. Honestly I went in thinking it would be a bunch of hobbyists showing off their soldering skills. But this older guy fixed my broken desk lamp in about 10 minutes by just cleaning the contact points with a pencil eraser. That simple fix cost me nothing and I had been ready to toss the lamp in the trash. It made me realize I don't always need to swap out entire boards or components when half the time the problem is just dirt or a loose wire. Now I'm kicking myself for all the stuff I threw away over the years that probably just needed a good cleaning. Has anyone else had a simple fix like that make you rethink your whole approach to repairs?

4

barnes.jamie•1mo ago

My $15 capacitor took 4 hours to diagnose

I spent a whole Saturday chasing a ghost in a vintage Pioneer receiver that would power up but put out zero sound. Turned out to be a single bad coupling capacitor on the preamp board that tested fine with my meter but went open under load. Has anyone else had a component pass bench tests but fail in circuit like that?

22

the_wendy•1mo ago

Rant: Moisture meter lied to me on a job in Portland last month

I was going off a pin-type meter reading that said 8% moisture, but the client's baseboards were swelling anyway. Turned out the meter was reading the top layer of dry paint, not the wood underneath. Anyone else had a pin meter give you sketchy readings?

12

wade_young86•1mo ago

Took me 3 hours to realize my soldering iron tip was just oxidized, not broken

I spent an entire afternoon trying to desolder a capacitor on a vintage receiver before it clicked that the iron wasn't heating right because of a crusted tip, not a dead heating element, has anyone else wasted time on a simple fix like that?

6

the_wendy•1mo ago

Pro tip: Overheard a guy at the parts counter say he fixed a weird boot loop by swapping the RAM sticks into different slots.

I always thought that was just an old wives' tale for desktop PCs. He was talking about a specific 2018 Dell laptop that would only get to the logo screen. After cleaning and reseating the RAM did nothing, he just moved the single stick from slot A to slot B. It posted on the first try. I tried it this week on an HP with a similar hang, and it actually worked. I guess some boards have a real picky primary slot. Has anyone else seen this fix work on newer machines, or was it just luck?

10

allen.amy•1mo ago

Hit 50 dead 2018 MacBook Air logic boards this morning and it's starting to feel like a curse.

I keep a tally on a whiteboard, and seeing that exact number made me realize how many of these things are failing from the same flexgate/backlight issue that Apple won't fix for free anymore.

4

susan_nguyen•1mo ago

Rant: A customer brought me a toaster that was full of glitter

They said it stopped working after their kid's birthday party... opened it up and a cloud of pink glitter coated my entire workbench. Now I keep a cheap vacuum dedicated to 'pre-inspection cleanup' for any appliance from a house with small children. Anyone else have a weird 'pre-repair' step they had to add?

11

young.emma•1mo ago

Pro tip: check the local library for old electronics manuals

I was at the downtown library yesterday looking for a book and wandered into their tech section. They had a whole shelf of old service manuals for stuff like VCRs and tube TVs, some from the 80s. I found a specific repair guide for a Zenith model that I've been trying to fix for a customer. It had the exact voltage test points I needed, which saved me hours of probing. Has anyone else found a good spot for old paper manuals like that?

1

janaf91•1mo ago

A kid asked me what a soldering iron was for and it threw me back

I was at a swap meet in Portland last weekend, and this teenager pointed at my old Weller station and asked if it was a 'special glue gun'. I had to explain the whole concept of melting metal to make a connection. It made me think about how twenty years ago, most people had at least a vague idea you could fix a radio or a TV. Now, if something breaks, the first thought is to replace the whole unit. I used to fix three or four VCRs a week in my dad's shop. What's the last common household item you've seen that was actually worth repairing for most folks?

2

diana72•1mo ago

Had a real bad time with a swollen battery in a laptop last week

I was working on a 2018 MacBook Pro for a regular customer, just a simple screen swap. When I opened the case, the battery pack was puffed up like a pillow and pressing hard on the trackpad cable. I had to stop everything, put the whole thing in a metal box, and call the customer to explain the safety risk. Has anyone else had a close call with a spicy pillow during a routine repair?

15

tarak17•1mo ago

Had a weird failure on a 2018 MacBook Pro logic board last Thursday

The laptop would turn on but had no backlight on the screen. I figured it was the usual backlight circuit, so I started checking the usual parts. After about an hour of poking around, I found a tiny capacitor near the display connector that was reading a dead short. I replaced it with a 0.1uF 0402 from my donor board stash, and the backlight came right back. It's one of those things you don't see every day. Has anyone else run into a shorted cap causing a no-backlight issue on these newer models?

28

oliver242•1mo ago

TIL the difference between a cheap and a good hot air station is more than just price

I've been using a $80 no-name hot air station from an online marketplace for about six months. It worked, but I was always fighting it. The temperature would jump around by 30 degrees, the airflow was weak and uneven, and it took forever to heat up. Last week, I finally bit the bullet and got a used Quick 861DW for $250. The difference is night and day. The temperature holds steady within a few degrees, the air comes out smooth and focused, and it's ready in under 30 seconds. I just replaced a BGA chip on a laptop motherboard and it went down perfectly on the first try, no burnt pads or cold joints. I wasted so much time and risked so many boards with that cheap tool. For anyone doing component-level work regularly, is there a middle-ground station you'd recommend, or is it really a case of 'buy once, cry once'?

23

reese_hill•1mo ago

PSA: I almost fried a vintage Atari 2600 board trying to clean it with the wrong stuff

I was in my garage last Tuesday, trying to fix a really dirty board from a 1977 model, and I grabbed a can of contact cleaner that was actually for automotive parts. The second I sprayed it, the board started smoking and I had to pull the power fast. Has anyone else messed up a board with the wrong cleaner and managed to save it?