Testing a repaired monitor at work... the third one today.

When something goes faulty, I don't just (attempt to) fix it, I'll also try to establish the cause of the original fault, and if possible, tackle that too. These monitors, of which we possibly have about fifty, have been very reliable. So when three all arrived for repair on the same day..."That's strange. What's caused this?"

For the first one, it was reported as, "It stopped working." (Ahem) The fault was at the mains connector. Where it was soldered on to a printed circuit board, the copper track connecting to the live pin had fractured. The reported fault for the other two was, "There was a sparking noise coming from it." Which to me, sounded like it could be the same fault.

But why had this suddenly happened? The monitors don't tend to be moved about much, and for this type of fault to occur it would mean someone had been pulling and pushing the plug out and back in again... and probably wiggling about in the process. The answer came to me when replacing the back cover. There was a "Safety Tested" sticker there, that indicated it had been tested recently... as had the other two. Suspect the Contractor that did these, was somewhat heavy handed...

A very simple repair. The most difficult part of the job being taking the things apart! When I took back the last of the three, "Oh Dave, there's another one just come in." Same again...


[This Blip may have been a wee bit late as this camera I'm testing had the date set incorrectly - either by me or the previous owner. Probably me when I was putting its clock back yesterday! - Approval sought from the Blipfoto Gods]