[ale] tech "magic"

[Richard Bronosky]

Especially if the business deals with carbon fiber, graphite, or PAN.
(from personal experience)

On Wed, May 27, 2009 at 12:57 PM, Neal Rhodes <neal at mnopltd.com> wrote:
>> Everyone here has had it happen. Something fails and you get called to
>> "take a look at it". You get there. take it and it isn't working. So
>> you methodically take it apart, inspecting everything alonmg the way
>> looking for failure points and find
>
> I keep swearing I really do software, but somehow I've spend a fair
> amount of time in factories and other grungy places.
>
> Yesterday I was installing a new server in a warehouse of vintage
> British Motorcycle parts.    Had two Epson printers that were failing to
> power up.
>
> My experience is that dust, especially factory dust, CAN CONDUCT some
> electricity.
>
> With both printers, after the client was ready to take them to a repair
> shop,  I removed the covers, blew out the dust really good, checked the
> fuse, put it back in, and wiggled the board connector.     Voila.  My
> diagnosis - contact resistance and slighty conductive dust bunnies.
>
> Then the owner's desktop fails to come up, beeping a single long bleat.
> Again, owner about to drive it to Windy Hill, the dealer said that was
> battery bad.  I said let me take a quick look.  Re-seat the RAM, tested
> the button battery, it was fine, wipe it on my shirt, stick it back in,
> and voila, it comes up fine.
>
> As a result, my theory is that if it's not soldered, it's a suspect
> connection.
>
> Some of us old enough to remember Altos boards with 7400 series logic
> can remember that the chips would try to crawl out of their sockets at
> night, and first thing to do after blowing out the dust is push all the
> chips back down.   Glad those days are over.
>
> Neal Rhodes.
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.!# RichardBronosky #!.