dimented24x7

iTrader: (2)

I was using my PPII to program the 512s and it worked ok for awhile, but suddenly a transister literally just totally burned up. It was so badly overloaded that it really heated up the power supply as well. The chip itself appeared to be in correctly and wasnt noticably warm compared with the burner, which would have probably caught fire eventually. The kicker is that other then that burnt transister, everything else is visibly in perfect order. The transister is located on the underside near a v-reg and feeds into what appears to be an xformer. I assume its used to generate the Vpp.

Has anyone experienced anything like this? I emailed xtronics, but am still awaiting an answer. Im just curious if its something thats happened before.

3.8TransAM

Mine has been flawless thus far, I believe Grumpy had an issue or two or even plum wore out hit PPII lol

There is one or two things common that tend to die on them, just not sure what it is exactly

later
Jeremy

jeeps2creep

I had this happen already with the 27sf512. But found not to be programer (I also have PP2) but something goofy or shorting internal to chip. I know I'm new but how I found it was when it was installed in ecm I was running truck and looking at winaldl info, went inside for a sec and when i came out winaldl had stopped and wasnt giving me any info. Reached down to make sure chip was in good and it was hot as a pistol. I did try to clean it and reuse it only to have it happen again so I "chucked" it, I like that word. LOL

JPrevost

Got a picture of the damage?
I burned off a transistor from the main board by hooking up the power supply polarity reversed. Who know Xtronics wasn't standard center pin positive .

AlexJH

Ouch. Every board designer should really put a 'dummy diode' after their power connector.

dimented24x7

iTrader: (2)

JPrevost

That looks like the power transistor that I fried off the board when I reversed the polarity. Looks like you need to replace it . Any chance you've been using one of those RadioShack "flip tip" power supplies? That's how I broke it.

dimented24x7

iTrader: (2)

It was the little no-name unit that came with it. Still puts out 9 volts at the right polarity under no load. I dont know how it is while under load, though.

Replacing it is easy enough. The question is: is there anything else damaged?

dimented24x7

iTrader: (2)

That always bothered me. Who the hell doesnt include reverse input protection? Its easy insurance against stupidity. Maybe that transister is simply there to burn out when stupidity strikes and generate additional revenue from future repairs

JPrevost

Or it was a poor design. Serious damage could have resulted if I hadn't picked up on the smell of burning plastic. The transistor got so hot that it burned off the board in about a second and was burning it's way through the plastic case! Poor design, great product when you follow the directions . You can only expect it to have been a weaker design by the price. Compare it to those expensive programmers and the only thing cheaper are the DIY kits, Imported copy cats, and the Burn1 but none of them are as flexible.
I hope for your sake that only the transistor is damaged. They're cheap enough to replace even if the 2nd one blows.