You likely recall that
I got Rock Band last January (I considered it a birthday gift from the Universe). I intended to post about my first repair, but perhaps I forgot. I won't bore you with the details other than to say that an integral component in the guitar stopped working. As it turns out, there was a broken spring involved. After 12 or so screws that stood in my way, the repair itself was fairly simple. I feel great when I repair these things because it saves both me and the companies involved money (Well, technically the warranty wasn't expired -- the first time, but who cares, it was fun)
- I don't have to be without the controller for 4 weeks
- No one has to pick up the tab for thousands of miles of shipping
- I (hopefully) learn a bit about the electronics involved
So, I refashioned the existing spring -- simply stretching it out a bit further and making a new loop so it could reattach to where it had fallen from. The repair lasted about 4 months only to surface again. Small surprise really, since it was the same crappy spring only a centimeter shorter. The second time, I found a perfect substitute: a spring from a clicky pen.
In January, (now a year since purchase) the drums suffered a critical failure. One of the pads ceased to accept any input. The drums were much more difficult to get into. The culprit was a broken wire. With quite a bit of luck and some soldering skill, I managed to extend the origianl wires and put Humpty together again. There were any number of hidden screws in this process and in the end, I'm pretty lucky that I didn't break anything that I could not fix.
So, I refashioned the existing spring -- simply stretching it out a bit further and making a new loop so it could reattach to where it had fallen from. The repair lasted about 4 months only to surface again. Small surprise really, since it was the same crappy spring only a centimeter shorter. The second time, I found a perfect substitute: a spring from a clicky pen.
Comments
Good point about shipping around the world for a small repair. Too bad they can't find local people to do it.
With the cell phone example, often times they aren't really repairable. With Anna's iphone, I think the gps comes on a "system on a chip".. wifi, gps, processor, and a whole wackload of other stuff all integrated onto one chip. If the gps stops working, I think the part is bad, and likely way too small to solder anything successfully. And they're made in China, so that's pretty much what has to happen.
When I got my last mac, I watched it come via courier and screen capped the travel. Shanghai, Osaka, Anchorage alaska, Louisville KY, Buffalo NY, Mount Hope ON, Winnipeg, Saskatoon.
If you were that sort, I suppose you could list your skills and rates on Kijiji... sort of a Void Your Warranty Here service ;)
Good to hear that activity is once again a powerful ally.