I did another Digirepair job....

digitalwanderer

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My daughter's SAD light wasn't working. (Seasonal Affectiveness Disorder light thing) She asked me to fix it. Looked like a power connection, so I found another transformer with the same ratings and spliced her connector to it, and it still didn't work. It would work if I wiggled it and put pressure on it just right, but no consistency.

Played with a few different transformers and power connectors that I dug up from the basement, took the light apart to see if I could replace the power connector easily, (NOT!), and then spent about an hour with a paper clip, flashlight, and microdrivers trying to get the damned innards of the connector working...all to fail.

Finally I routed the wire THROUGH the light forcing tension on the cable figuring that would make it work and keep it in place, but when trying to tighten it I shorted some wires and fried a transformer..so I gave up that approach.

I was getting REALLY aggravated since it's a $70 light and I really didn't want to buy another one, so I found a connector end that would reliably power it if held at a certain angle and tension and then just planted a self-tapping screw in the plastic housing and tied a zip tie around the power cable to the screw and tightened the hell out of it.

Now it works just spiffy. :)

But, as is traditional with my panicked fixes, it is UGLY! I'm not proud of the aesthetics, but the results make me happy as hell. :)


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Why not simply remove the power connector and solder the power wire straight to the PCB? But, like Han Solo would undoubtedly have said, if it works, then it works! Don't mess with it. :D

Btw - what kind of light does that thing put out?
 
Do you have lots of unplanned fires in your household, digi? :runaway:
LOL! Nope. Believe it or not I played electrician for at least a decade or so plus, my old man had an electrical contractorship that was an all union shop but due to some union rule exceptions me and my brother were allowed to work by the union with our union electricians as "helpers", which meant he could get away with paying us $10/hr while charging for $45/hr. Pretty win/win, the electricians were cool about it because we couldn't stand our father very much either and we learned quick and did great "monkey see, monkey do" type stuff. They'd spend 20 minutes showing me how they'd like a light fixture taken down properly from a school, then I'd show them on the next one I could do it, then they'd go do some piping while I worked on pulling all the lights from all the classrooms. It was fun, learned a lot and the money was unbelievably good at the time to me. Plus it kept me from getting TOO fat and lazy, I really did have to dig a lot of holes and trenches since that was another grunt task the electricians could use us for while they did the more skilled stuff. After a while you pick up on a few things, after a few years they become habit and a few more after that and they're just about like a muscle memory..and the big one every guy I worked with taught me first was always safety first. Not just for yourself, but for what you install.

I know those splices look like suck and just done with duct tape, but there is electrical tape under each of them on each pigtail and then on both collectively and it's in a square knot tie. I threw the duct tape on because I ran out of good electrical tape and only could find some cheap plastic stuff around the house. Fine for insulation, but I didn't trust its adhesive properties so I threw duct tape on top of it to hold it all together.

Ran out and got a fresh roll of Scotch 33+ vinyl electrical tape today, by far my fave type. I'll redo the connections tomorrow and neaten 'em up just to make y'all happy. (And to give me a bit more peace of mind. ;) )

One stupid/annoying/funny thing about my years of playing with electricity was what the guys I worked with called "electrician's reflex", which is whenever you feel the slightest jolt of electricity you throw yourself violently away and deliberately off-balance so if you get froze gravity will break the connection hopefully before you fry. Super calm and laid back guys, but if there was a spark EVERYONE jumped. (We did a lot of heavy duty industrial work, I actually did see someone accidentally swing their boom truck into a hot main line, like those big suckers you see from the big towers. It was sort of like seeing a bug hit a bug zapper, except he was a human just a few minutes before and it smelled REALLY bad. The guy was from a different company and they shut down the site for the day, I wasn't the only guy who puked and then freaked out a bit.)

I don't deny its usefulness, but it's kind of annoying now because the light switch for my computer room is on the outside of the doorway and it's dry in the house in winter so whenever I reach around the corner without looking to hit a switch if I miss the switch and hit one of the screws holding the plate in I get a nasty static shock...which wouldn't be bad except I'm already a little off balance from leaning around the corner and I basically fling myself into a tile hallway hard and off balance before I realize what an idiot I am and turn and try and catch myself/tuck and roll/not fall so hard. I ain't gonna say how often it happens because it's embarrassing, but I freely admit that intentionally put the big puppy beds my sister gave me in the spots I generally dive/fall at since the dogs like to be close and I prefer to land on soft things. (Although I won't land on my dogs so that can REALLY lead to some great slapstick. <sigh>)

I bet you thought you'd get a smart assed one liner, eh? :p
 
Oh, also I'll pull it apart again and try reflowing it. I have at least 3 or 4 soldering irons, I REALLY gotta learn how to use one. :oops:
 
Oh, also I'll pull it apart again and try reflowing it. I have at least 3 or 4 soldering irons, I REALLY gotta learn how to use one. :oops:
Buy a cheap solder-it-yourself electronics kit and have a go. (something like this: http://www.velleman.co.uk/contents/en-uk/p41.html)

It's not hard; you touch the iron to where the two things you want to solder meet, let it heat up for a second or two (it can be longer for components that can sink a lot of heat), then touch the solder to the join and the iron at the same time. The solder will flow on to the join, you pull the wire away, then the soldering iron. Voila, you've got a soldered connection.

It can be easier to get the solder to melt if you apply a small amount of solder to the tip of the iron before you try and solder the connection. It should just be enough to coat the tip of the iron.

Between soldering connections, you can clean your iron off with a damp sponge (or metal sponge) to remove crud if it's building up.
 
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Soldering something like that is dead easy. Something small chip to boards with magnifying glass is a pain. Once you try you will be kicking yourself for not doing it earlier. My plasma that is 9 years old just died. Black speckles then green flash and dead Samsung. Debating try to fix it, but I think it will need new board which is 350. 50 inch can be bought for almost that cheap so seems pointless to repair.
 
Btw when soldering, don't breathe the fumes. It's not angel kisses and unicorn giggles wafting up from there... :p
I wouldn't try taking deep lungfuls of the stuff, but a small amount of exposure while soldering a few joints isn't going to kill you - no need for a respirator etc. If I'm going to be spending an hour or so soldering, I'll turn on a fan.
 
My father learned today that I don't know how to solder and has insisted that he failed me as a parent and he plans to equip and teach me. ROFL!
Ha! I had to buy my own soldering iron for electronics work as my dad's set of soldering irons were probably intended for mechanical work. The tip on one of them, for example, was over a centimetre thick! (And that was just the electrically powered ones. Some of the others needed a blow torch to heat them!)
 
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My father has given me over half a dozen soldering irons over the years, he just never realized I didn't know how to use them. LOL
 
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