31-10-2016, 02:31 PM
I had a (remote controlled!) 16" colour portable TV (bush I think) when I was about 13 which would occasionally go 'PHUTTT', the CRT would flash brilliantly white and the noise from the speaker was an immense thump.
Occasionally it would do this repeatedly, a few times a second. On the occasion that I reached it in time I'd give it a good hard whack and it would return to normal operation. I opened it up and looked for dry joints, which I found one completely unsoldered. Alas after 20 minutes of operation it went 'PHUTT' again and I was crestfallen.
Took me another few attempts, viewing it in the dark from the PCB, poking it with sticks, tapping various things etc until I eventually gave up and fixed a 20" Philips GR1AX chassis set and just got on with life.
At the ripe old age of 34 I'm now taking a different view on the jobs and indeed the junk I take on. I simply don't have the time or the energy any more, I prefer to spend my time working on programming etc. At one point I'd simply fix something because it was broken, irrespective of whether it was financially viable or not, because of that I now feel somewhat guilty throwing something away which could otherwise be fixed. Example: this morning, I binned a portable phone/tablet charger with a single huge lithium ion cell inside (10Wh), because the fried 8 pin SOIC which connects the Cell to the boost converter is some exotic device with a 1Vgs turn on rating. I could probably find a replacement, but will I ever use it? how much of the cell's original capacity is remaining? Could I ever travel with the thing because I've pryed open the case and it it taped/glued together? CIBA?
Dave.
Occasionally it would do this repeatedly, a few times a second. On the occasion that I reached it in time I'd give it a good hard whack and it would return to normal operation. I opened it up and looked for dry joints, which I found one completely unsoldered. Alas after 20 minutes of operation it went 'PHUTT' again and I was crestfallen.
Took me another few attempts, viewing it in the dark from the PCB, poking it with sticks, tapping various things etc until I eventually gave up and fixed a 20" Philips GR1AX chassis set and just got on with life.
At the ripe old age of 34 I'm now taking a different view on the jobs and indeed the junk I take on. I simply don't have the time or the energy any more, I prefer to spend my time working on programming etc. At one point I'd simply fix something because it was broken, irrespective of whether it was financially viable or not, because of that I now feel somewhat guilty throwing something away which could otherwise be fixed. Example: this morning, I binned a portable phone/tablet charger with a single huge lithium ion cell inside (10Wh), because the fried 8 pin SOIC which connects the Cell to the boost converter is some exotic device with a 1Vgs turn on rating. I could probably find a replacement, but will I ever use it? how much of the cell's original capacity is remaining? Could I ever travel with the thing because I've pryed open the case and it it taped/glued together? CIBA?
Dave.
