On Saturday 11 April 2009 11:27 am, Terrible Tom wrote:
> Good deal David. I would never have guessed that switch used bulbs and not
> LED's. Go figure. My paranoid mind would tend to think that was done
> because as soon as someone might have noticed the bulbs were out they would
> take it to the dealer where they would have to pay insane amounts of
> dollars to get it fixed.
I doubt it. I don't think repairs cost or possibility is part of the design
process. Certainly not repairs that the end consumer could do. Probably not
even what the dealer guys have to go through, since that just raises the
price on the repair.
> The more rational part of my mind (yes that
> actually exists) says it was a bean counters way to lower production costs
> 10 cents per part. heh.
If you go back to '01, or actually even earlier when they would have been
designing the switch, I think high output white LEDs were available, but were
like $10/each. Bulbs at the time were probably a lot cheaper than LEDs.
Now, ten years later, when I can buy a cheap Chinese 9-LED flashlight for $5,
it's obvious that the price on white LEDs is a lot less than it used to be.
> Was it worth it to go through all that work? I would say so. According to
> Wycoff's parts page - you saved about $30 bucks.
And learned a few things about the switch itself. The actual way it works is
not quite as represented in the FSM diagrams. That may or may not be useful
information some day, you never know.
> Plus its a chance to sit back and laugh in an Evil Villan Voice while
> petting Kitty because you thwarted the Dastardly Dealership Master Plans to
> force everyone into having to buy a whole new componant vs actually being
> able to SERVICE something that is perfectly good.
No Evil Villan Voice needed. Just about everything is servicable to somebody
sufficiently determined to do so. And I like the rush you get from powering
up a repaired part the first time and finding that it works now. It's fun.
One of the posts I read elsewhere on CTM problems similar to the ones I'm
having said that they went away when the circuit board in the CTM was flexed.
That sounds like it's a broken solder joint that works most of the time,
especially once the board warms up. It's possible that my CTM could be fixed
by touching up the solder joints. I usually try to avoid working on surface
mount stuff, but I do have a good soldering iron with a very small tip, so
I'm considering it. It looks like I have a spare, now, just in case I screw
it up. Gotta find out if the spare is good, though, after the Easter
festivities here.
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