A Technicians view of some equipment repairs.....

Repairing Electronics equipment is not an easy task contrary to the thoughts of so many. Often people get mixed up between repairing and replacing due to the nature of practically every piece of consumer/domestic electronic equipment such as TV, Stereos, Microwaves, Cameras, Computers etc. "Just change the board" - or better still "Throw it away and buy a new one".

A truly qualified Electronics Technician would have spent many years studying and at major cost to enable him/her to understand the complexities of electronics, and to apply their knowledge to repairing a piece of equipment.

In most cases when a piece of equipment is presented for repairs, it is a number of years old and no longer supported by the manufacturers representatives, or in some cases the manufacturers themselves. This hardly ever deters a good technician from repairing the item.

The technician will examine and establish a cause of fault, and then proceed to locate suitable substitute replacement components by searching through reams of documentation. Once a substitute is located, the next step is to locate a component supplier that has the component available. Only once the technician is pretty certain of the fault and the availability of a replacement part/s can an estimated repair cost be calculated. Up until now, probably a good hour has been spent. Just opening and accessing the circuitry can take up to an hour, especially on the dreaded Powered Mixer or Mixer!!

The Powered Mixer is probably amongst the worst pieces of equipment to repair in the music related field. The time it takes to open up, set up on the bench, fault find, reassemble and test can equate to more money than the blasted thing is worth!

Take all the knobs (noting where the various colours go), socket nuts and screws off the front - then the power section at the rear, then in some cases split the case to remove the circuitry so as to be able to see the boards. Then disconnect the internal interconnecting cables. Now attempt to reconnect the pieces on the workbench so as to work on it. Mostly one has to make up extension interconnecting cables, then become a contortionist, like standing on your head whilst holding a soldering iron between you teeth, steadying the boards with your left hand and adjusting the front panel controls with your spare hand - some technicians have been known to operate bare feet so that they can use their toes to grip various parts of the circuitry whilst fault tracing.

Once the fault is found, say an integrated circuit which is of course surface mounted, which takes extreme skill to remove and replace successfully. Now test the unit and ensure its working OK. Start the assembling trick observing where all the knobs go, the variety of shapes sizes and colours of screws. Plug it in, test every channel and function (up to thirty sometimes) before declaring the unit as repaired and ready to go, placing it on the completed shelf.

This repair would typically take at least three hours (more often up to five) at eighty dollars an hour ($240.00) plus spares and material ($20.00) plus GST of $26.00 making the completed repair bill say $286.00

Advise the customer its ready, wait up to two months for them to pick it up and mumble about how expensive the repair bill is!  They will tell you how a new unit (a much inferior one) cost not much more at about $400.00.

The Technician very politely assists the customer off the premises!

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