Another repair attempt- this time for our out of warranty and out of support solar monitoring system that’s been stuck on “Starting Application” for a year now..
Debugging stuck SunPower SolarBridge
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Category Archives: Repairs
Frigidaire GLMV169 Microwave repair
It’s been a while since something broke, but that never lasts around here. This time our circa 2005 microwave decided to scare us. It started randomly staying on after the door was opened upon cycle completion. That was especially scary since it was hard to tell what exactly stayed on just by the noise.
Warning: Microwaves have lethal voltages inside, always unplug power when working on them. Proceed at your own risk.
Continue readingNexus 5 power switch replacement
Another older repair I am getting around to post. This time it’s a Nexus 5 phone that acquired an interesting habit of getting stuck in a random reboot loop. One moment it’s working fine, next it’s stuck in a boot screen with Google logo, then buzzes and reboots to the same thing. After a bit of Googling around, I realized that the likely culprit is a power button getting stuck. To confirm, I’d smack it a bit and watch the phone exit reboot loop and work for a while. That smacking was satisfying but not sustainable if I wanted the thing to survive. So back to ebay we go. I suppose Mouser/Digikey were also an option if I felt like desoldering the original, measuring it and then combing through all similar parts to find the fit. Instead I let other people do that. Most sellers had an exact replacement switch, but one claimed a new and improved one. It also looked a bit better so for $2 shipped I grabbed one. The typical title for these is “4mm Power On /Off Volume Switch Button For LG Nexus 5 D820 D821 Optimus L4 E440”.
Tiny thing
FrankenPad part deux
Hot on the heels of a touchpad swap in my “new” Thinkpad T440P, come the next two upgrades: backlit keyboard and an IPS display. I shall call this machine Frankenpad as it’s rapidly deviating from the original configuration (20AWS series).
A tale of buttons
It all started innocently enough.
I finally decided to replace my 6 years old Thinkpad X200 with a bit more modern used T440P. More power, better battery life and all the other modern goodies were all things I was looking forward to. Unfortunately I also knew that for the 44x series Lenovo changed the design of the trackpad to a single piece clickable square. No more beloved buttons, so easy to use with the trackpoint. Not a big deal- plenty of people reported using the newer design of the trackpad off a T45x series to get those buttons back, so I figured i’ll just swap it in. The laptop came in, and I tried really hard to like the trackpad as is. No go: total lack of feel, constantly pressing RMB instead of LMB and a very annoying clicking sound heard in the whole house. It had to go!
Don’t mess with success, Lenovo!
What can we learn from simple things?
Today’s post is a bit of a challenge to myself- what (if anything ) can be learned from analyzing a simple thing like a garage opener button wall button?
It’s a button, what can there be to learn?
And now for something different
Hey, it’s electric!
Today we have a crappy Chinese Tea Kettle to take apart and see what makes it not tick. This is an Ovente model #GK83R bought less than a year ago. It randomly refuses to heat and smells of molten plastic.
Hot-rodding a Keithley 2304A power supply
I’ve been lucky enough recently to score a Keithley 2304 power supply off ebay for a measly $75. For those unfamiliar, these are high speed battery simulator units capable of measuring very low currents and also behaving like a battery and sinking current.
Original ebay picture
Whirlpool Duet GEW9250PW0 resurrection
It’s been a while since we’ve fixed anything. But no worries- something always breaks around here! Lately, our fancy electrical dryer decided to call it quits. Continue reading
BioBrite SunRise Clock backlight brightness hack
Here is another silly hack I’ve finally got around to do and document. We have a BioBrite SunRise alarm clock at home that nicely simulates sunset and sunrise.The clock is almost perfect with one notable exception- backlight is exceptionally bright even when it dims it for the night mode. This post describes how I fixed that. Continue reading