Has anyone tried to get schematics or a layout for the circuit board from Simco? They will likely say no to the request. But maybe they have an applicarion engineer tjat is wiling to support the issue
An electronics repair shop (or electrical engineering student with a lab) will need two things to do a thorough analysis:
- The board schematics show what is connected (e.g. components), voltages at each point.
- The board layout shows how the schematics are translated into the actual traces on the board. For instance, a board can have multiple layers of traces or components on front and back.
Without the schematics or layouts, an electronics tech could still look for bad solder joints or cracked traces.
With the schematics and layout, an electronics tech (or a electrical engineering college student / associates degree candidate with a lab) can take a scope and measure voltages (or signals) on components.
Some thoughts:
- Since only some clusters are affected and not all that were built, it is not a design flaw.
- since the failed clusters worked for some time, I believe that
(a) something on the board broke (bad solder joint, broken trace) due to vibration
(b) or an overvoltage fried a component.