TV repair.....

[TDH]

Is that experience talking Jim? In a way though I do miss my flip phone. I would open it up and yell BEAM ME UP SCOTTY THERE'S NO INTELLIGENT LIFE DOWN HERE!

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[browningautorifle]

Is that experience talking

Not a cell phone, but there was an ashtray went out of the lowhouse one day...many years ago. Strange things used to happen out there...

[Mk VII]

I fixed my mother's 1950s Singer sewing machine control unit with info from the inevitable bulletin board on them. One of the electrolytic condensers had deteriorated. They even suggested a modern equivalent replacement with the part number from Maplins.

[Flying10uk]

A service engineer (but not for washing machines) once told me that faulty automatic washing machines can often be repaired by simply turning them upside down* and removing the various rubber pipes, one by one, and cleaning out all the black/brown gunge. I have found this to be true a number of times and have successfully repaired several faulty washing machines using this simple method.

*It is best to move the washing machine outside before performing this task unless you wish to have a sudden flood across your kitchen floor and make yourself instantly unpopular with your other half.

[Bruce_in_Oz]

One of the biggest killers of "modern" washing machines is the "stuff" that gets left in pockets and missed by the designated "washer-person".

Our last washer started showing small leaks from "somewhere", then making odd noises when draining.

So, I grabbed my trusty "Mini-maglite", had a bit of a look into the rubber drain hose and spotted a coin. Fished it out with a bit of bent brazing rod with the end rounded so as to not damage the rubber.

Eventually fished out about twenty coins, several hair-pins, (not mine, honest), odd bits of plastic etc. and the usual "sludge". Some of the coins had been there long enough for a calcareous shell to have built up on one side, whilst the flow of detritus , like other coins, had almost worn the other side dead smooth.

Ran it up again and it drained a LOT better, but the pump motor was still making expensive noises and water was still escaping from underneath.

Took out a zillion more fasteners and discovered that the "drain-hose" had been punctured in several places by feral sewing pins. Ordered and fitted, (pig of a job), a new one .

After that costly little exercise, I ran it up again. Shortly thereafter, the pump, which I had NOT completely stripped out, made even MORE expensive noises and the motor generated a brief burst of terminal smoke.

After twenty years of sterling service, the old girl had "demised".

As for "flat" TVs:

We now have two of the beasts and I also work with them quite a bit, as an operator, not a service tech. The BIGGEST drama, (after screen damage), is power-supply failure. These units are invariably switch-mode modules, usually made by one of several large oriental manufacturers.

The catch is that like just about everything these days, they are built to a price and the TVs, like everything else, are built from the inside out.

Thus, to get at the defective unit, you have to peel away layers of stuff, including fragile, adhesive-backed foil tapes, to get to the "problems". Then reverse the process after replacing / repairing the dodgy power-supply. Many switch-mode PSUs are repairable, IF you can get the components. Electrolytic capacitors are not exactly uncommon, per se, but some of these units use "weird" values and often use ones that have the minimum sane voltage rating, and are thus subject to "stress' from day one. Worse are the "exotic "chips", with indecipherable ID codes or, worse, NO codes at all (wiped off at the assembly plant, just to make things "interesting"). On top of all this, most suppliers are very "economical" in their provision of service manuals / tech data.

And some folk complain about parts for their hundred-year-old rifles!!

[bigduke6]

An old thread Bruce, the TV in question give up the ghost in the end, I got a partial refund for the board and sold the TV for spares or repair on ebay for £10.00......... must admit the picture quality on the new one (I went to Aldi in the end) is good, but its nothing like the plasma used to produce.

Strange as it is, the old Plasma was HD ready but never I got HD until just before it popped........ I've now a TV which is 4k or Ultra High Definition and won't benefit from that for a good few years.

[Flying10uk]

The washing machines that I have had upside down, in order to remove the pipes to clean, have only ever contained a black/brown, foul smelling slimy sludge, sadly no cash.

The black and white television that my family owned and used until the mid 1970's was a small square wooden cased t.v., Pye?, of mid 1950's vintage and was of 405 lines. When it went wrong a local television repair man came out to fix it* and he would normally arrive mid to late afternoon. He would usually have it repaired within an hour or so but he would often stay taking and drinking tea until gone midnight.

*This t.v. repair man normally did the repairs in people's homes and carried a vast quantity of electronic spare parts and his tools with him in his Rover P5 car.

Rover P5 - Wikipedia