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Sad dimise of a Door Station
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 Posted: Monday Oct 30th, 2006 07:42 pm
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garym999
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Wanted a bit of fun for the kids over halloween but as usual, last minute. Got the smoke machine to work on drive movement but cannot get the spooky reminders to play out over the DoorStation.

After some checking I found a burnt PCB!! Kind of ties in with storms we had the other day and comfort going mental with a communications failure. Also lost the PSU to the CCTV system. Given the lack of time till halloween I like to attempt a temporaray repair.

Chui, what is U5? What are the traces around it? Anyone got a photo of a good PCB. Looks like another component next to U5 has blown to pieces. I think it is this that has smashed the corner of U5.

Attachment: IMG_2040.JPG (Downloaded 104 times)



 Posted: Monday Oct 30th, 2006 08:16 pm
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garym999
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A bit more research has revealed that the chip is an audio amplifier that drives the speaker. The PCB that is burnt has cut off the ground supply to pin 6. I have remade this but needless to say I think it has met its maker.



 Posted: Tuesday Oct 31st, 2006 11:36 am
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slychiu
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Sorry, that board has been throughly killed. It must have been a powerful surge voltage due to lightning in the vicinity
A pity your halloween trick did not work out



 Posted: Tuesday Oct 31st, 2006 11:45 am
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garym999
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I don't give up that easily. Ordered a replacement. But in the meantime have rigged an amplified speaker up off the Voice line and placed it outside.

 

All set to go...

  • Drive movement = smoke machine on
  • Doorbell press plays 1 of 8 spooky reminder messages
  • Opening front door plays creaky hinge, reminder message.
How sad is that? Kids love it though :D



 Posted: Saturday Dec 2nd, 2006 06:30 pm
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gazza
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Can your technicians check this out. I too have lost a door station, burn out look s like it is on the same point on the PCB, and I don't recall it breaking when there was an electrical storm.

More importantly, can you confirm that this would not happen to a keypad- to have the amount of burn on an outside station is one thing, but if there is a chance of this happening on an indoor station, I would be unhappy due to the fire risk.

 

Attachment: DSC00024.JPG (Downloaded 86 times)



 Posted: Sunday Dec 3rd, 2006 10:13 am
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garym999
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Tis intresting because it is exactly the same chip and the same part of the chip that has blown. You can also see which way the unit was mounted, mine was on its side yours vertical.

In my install you could argue that outside influences could have contributed to its failure as I had it interfcaing to a separate doorphone. This meant that the internal speaker and mic were not used and the PCB was connected to external doorphone. As this also had a video camera in it and shared the same ground connection with the DVR that poped its PSU. I assumed it was down to storm damage.

I think I'm right in saying that the chip is the amplifier for the loudspeaker. Were you using the internal speaker?



 Posted: Monday Dec 4th, 2006 01:08 am
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slychiu
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Please have these 2 door stations returned to us through the normal channels so we can analyse the cause of the problem

We believe this was caused by a short on one of the capacitors perhaps caused by moisture or water. This  causes the power supply to short out, but we need to confirm on the individual case. The PCB is conformal coated according to military grade to prevent the ingestion of water so we need to study what failed there

This should not cause a fire risk as the plastic housings are ABS/PC which are fire-retardant. amd should not occur indoors

Gary, have you returned your Door station?

regards



 Posted: Monday Dec 4th, 2006 06:13 am
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garym999
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No I have not returned it but I do still have it. Where would you like it sent to, Andrew or Nigel?

I can also confirm that it is very unlikey to be water ingress in my case, as the unit was mounted in a roof void.

I have cleaned the PCB in an attempt to see the amount of damage and look to a repair. Not only has the chip blown but also the PCB has suffered sever scotching and tracks have been lost.



 Posted: Monday Dec 4th, 2006 04:30 pm
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gazza
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My unit was only a few months old, and unmodified, just using the internal speaker.

It is also located under a shelter, so is very unlikely to be exposed to rain, even though it is out doors. Could get condensation though

Happy to return it, just let me know where to. I would need to replace it with something to make the doorbell ring though first,  At the moment that bit of the circuit still works. I'm guessing that if I just get a new one, it could have the same fault?

 



 Posted: Tuesday Dec 5th, 2006 12:42 am
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slychiu
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Please return the door station to Nigel. We wil investiagte when we receive the door station



 Posted: Tuesday Dec 5th, 2006 01:35 pm
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ndh
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In the meantime if you disconnect the bus and wire a bell push to a spare(?) Comfort input you can trigger Switch NO > Alarm Type 28 to sound Siren > Doorbell and / or Response Announce Blah Blah (Comfort GII) or take dialling off Alarm Type > Doorbell etc.

UK address is on http://www.cytech.biz or private message me as required.

Nigel

Last edited on Tuesday Dec 5th, 2006 01:47 pm by ndh



 Posted: Wednesday Dec 6th, 2006 02:20 am
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slychiu
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Please see http://www.comfortforums.com/view_topic.php?id=360&forum_id=5 in the Installers area for our findings and corrective action



 Posted: Wednesday Dec 6th, 2006 12:25 pm
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gazza
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I don't have access to the installers area, would you mind PM'ing me with the findings?

Many thanks.



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