Dodgy power board on HEQ5 Pro

[Andrew*]

My HEQ5 pro is intermittently not starting when plugged in. I've determined that it is unrelated to the power supply, so I assume it's something on the mount itself, and probably in the power board (if that's what you call that bit the plug goes into).

Is this easily fixable or do I need a new board?

Andrew

[Astro_Baby]

Could be a great many things - could be the board to connector solder has cracked which is easy enough to fix. It could be the board itself has cracked - harder but not impossible. Could be the connector on the board is clapped out.

It might be something more subtle - something on the board itself - failing component etc.

If the mounts new get it returned under warranty. If secondhand how good are you with a soldering iron ?

[Andrew*]

Thanks Mel. No good with a soldering iron really, but first I'd need to know what to look for...

If I took some photos of the board do you think you'd be able to tell what's the matter?

[blinky]

Andrew,

Why not bring it down and I can take a look?

[gary1968]

Andrew, mine had a similar problem from new. Turned out to be a dodgy cable from the Hand Set to the Mount, a cat5 cable from Maplin solved the issue

HTH,

Gary

[Astro_Baby]

Well I doubt a pic would show much to be honest. It could be so many things - the handset cable is another as already mentioned.

Anyone near you whos dab handed with this kind of thing ?

If your totally stuck you could take the power block off the mount and mail it to me and I;d take a look for free for you - no guarantees though.

[adamh]

I had a similar issue that again turned out to be the cable. Once I'd got a new one the problems disappeared.

Adam

[Merlin66]

One thing I see often is that the wrong 12V cable plug is used...

The Skywatcher is a 2.1mm centre pin and there's lots of "lookalike" cables which are infact 2.5mm

Double check.