Airtronics/Sanwa EXZES transmitter problem

[Kez]

Bought a Sanwa EXZES used. Bench tested it and all was working fine. I put it away for about a month and then started to install the radio in a sport 40 when I noticed the transmitter will not power up.

My first reaction was to charge the transmitter thinking that the battery went dead. But that was not the problem. I have checked the obvious. Battery is fully charged. The on/off switch is functioning properly and the transmitter would not power up. Anyone has similar problem?

It is not easy to trouble shoot as everything is surface mount. I can only confirm when the switch is on, the circuit downstream is getting 11V from the battery.

Any suggestions?

kez

 

[shawdaddy]

Get with Eric Canto. I know that he used these radios for years. He may be able to give you some help with it. Ryon Shaw

 

[fletch51]

The Airtronics/Sanwa M8 radio is the pistol grip version of the EXZES

I once fixed an M8, that would not power up, for a friend, by using my working M8 radio as a guideline to test/compare continuity and resistance of conductor traces on the circuit boards and the components surface mount and otherwise.

The guy worked at a cell phone refurbishing company and he had cell phone repair experience, and he used that knowledge to try to swap his "Power-On" LED indicator to a different colored one just for fun.

The new LED had a different resistance or load and it did cause a surface mount transistor to fail. I was able to locate it by metering between a working radios circuit boards and the non-working ones.

Also, I think the this "Power-On" LED is inline(in series) with electronics that allow the radio to come on. Meaning, if it goes bad, the entire radio will not power up. Of course the LED is a diode and will read DC continuity one way and not the other.

If you can get a hold of a working EXZES and have patience and a little experience with board level electronic components and a Multi-Meter, then I think you can find the problem.

BTW, I put the original LED back in, and here comes the "nearly unbelieveable" part, even to me. This guy had access to surface mount solder/desolder equipment, and I didn't, And I was able to desolder this tiny transistor with a normal pecil iron(all three terminals at once) and remove it from the board. then I grabbed an old cheapo Novak rc car speed control, with surface mount components. I found a transistor in it that simply looked like the other one, I took it and soldered it into the M8, and by golly the thing started working again.

"Easily Believeable" part. Within days, He quit RC and sold it and all his RC stuff.

 

[darby96]

You can always send it to Sanwa for repair they don't charge that much and they take a very little time

 

[Kez]

Thanks for your replies.

Ryon, I am going to email Eric next.

Fletch, Do you remember which transistor it was that blew? I do not have the luxury of having another EXZES to compare against. If I had the schematics I will be able to do some trouble shooting. The board is all surface mount components and it is double sided PCB. It is very difficult to trace the circuit.

Darby, do you have the contact info at Airtronics/Sanwa? If I can not figure out what's wrong, I will ship the unit there for an estimate.

thanks,

kez

 

[Mike Hughes]

Is there an internal fuse that may be blown? Do you have the module in? Maybe Airtronics needs the module to turn on. Just some easy things to check.

Mike

 

[Eric Bourlet]

The meter on that radio is actual RF out not battery. It may be a module problem if it is just the meter that is not showing. You can email me direct I don't have the Exzes as that is before the M8 / Super Exzes or M11/ Exzes Plus versions that Airtronics has provided me. If we can't figure it out I can find you the answer, or get you the phone number of someone that can. The most comon cause of no power up at all is that the charge jack is inverted from Futaba and usualy guys blow the fuse when they attempt to charge it with a standard or fast charger setup for Futaba.

[email protected]