Sat Nav drive unit repaired !!
 

Hi guys,
I though i'd share a little success that I had over the weekend ( it doesn't happen too often )
My Sat Nav unit in my 2005 ZTT developed the fault that causes it to stay on constantly and run the battery down, red led permananty on. On taking it out I could see the expected traces of water damage so I was all ready to scrap it and look for another so I decided to take it apart and have a look as I had nothing to lose.
I took out the actual drive to insect it but no visible damage could be seen. So now i'm thinking a component or two are faulty which I don't have th eresources to fix these days. My last attempt was to take the front panel off and strip that down, and I came across the ribbon connector that connects the front panel to the main pcb. On the connector I could see that it had had water ingress and had "furred" up the connector so I took them apart and cleanes up the cable ( carefully as one track had actually lifted from the plastic backing ) used a toothbrush to clean out the connector. I had to do both ends it turns out.
It only works now :-)
When I work out how to post a pic i'll put one up. I only have one of the cleaned up components though as I kinda got focused on fixing it .. but it will be good for a reference of the cable/connectors i'm on about

Excellent news! I have been on with one of Greeners drives for ages. I've repaired all the water damaged components/traces and revived it. However, my luck isn't as good as yours and won't power down. I've tested the power LED pins before the flex cable and have nothing. I suspect corrupted firmware on one of the microcontrollers and haven't had time to investigate further.

Congratulations though!

Good work Im too hamfisted to even contemplate trying to repair my spare drive:}

Another sat nav cd unit success!
 

A big thanks to le-sabre. I've been fiddling with the sat nav cd unit on my 2000 connie for years - the factory fit gave out a few years ago, I got a replacement from Sean in Bexhill-on-sea, this failed after a few months, I bought another on this forum but it had a corrupt display problem (the seller offered to help me track it down but as some months had passed I didn't want to bother him) and in August of this year I bought a mk3 on ebay.

The unit was advertised as good working condition but when I installed it the red power light stayed on so it flattened my battery in a day. The ebay seller kindly refunded my dosh, I unplugged it and ran without.

As per other posts on this forum I had opened all of the units and cleaned up any water ingress I found with no success. Then I saw le-sabre's post while browsing. When I opened up the mk3 the pcbs looked clean and I could find no water ingress, but I wasn't aware of the small pcb in the front panel which has the red power light built into it.

So I re-opened up the unit and dismantled the front panel. Sure enough there was furring on the ribbon cable from the main board to this little one. I cleaned up with a toothbrush and Isoproyl Alcohol, dried it out and re-installed it. Eureka! The power light now goes out. I'm leaving it overnight but every sign is that it's fixed.

Attached a pic of some of the collection I've gathered while mucking about with this. Also a pic of the ribbon cable and pcb that were causing the problem in the hopes that it might help someone else.

Once again this forum proves itself a godsend!

Hi.
Contact cleaner is good for removing corrosion, after though some WD40 will protect the connector and slow down any reoccurance of the corrosion.

Thanks John
 

John,

This post just help resurrect my nav unit...fabulous stuff.

Will post an update on my thread.

Thanks.

Jonty

Here's the link to my post if it is helpful to anyone reading this.

http://www.the75andztclub.co.uk/foru....php?p=2374123

Jonty

I left mine on the gas boiler for a couple of days to get nice and warm and dry, it all powers off now :) I can only suppose there was a small amount of damp somewhere inside it where I couldnt see -i had it open and everything looked dry-