Pioneer Elite Pro-510 problem - Page 52

Ah, good - at least I know I'm on the right track, because that's where I leave it. Another thing I find annoying about first-surface mirrors is the aluminum coating. It has a tendency to become highly charged with static electricity the more you wipe it, resulting in fine lint particles sticking to it, to the point that they can't be removed unless you do another wet cleaning. It's a vicious cycle....

Perhaps you might try skipping that buffing step. As I recall, cloth rubbed on ceramic or glass was known to produce static electricity many years ago, at the outset of electricity itself. The name Faraday comes to mind...

I never have anything cling to my mirrors when I clean them. Perhaps it's because I don't buff them.


Mr Bob

Anyone in the NY NJ area in need of their set being either repaired, calibrated, or cleaned. If so let me know and we can fly Mr. Bob out at a reasonable price, assuming there are enough interested.

Don

Hmm.... perhaps you'd like to share your technique?

I have a Pro510. A few years ago, I had the PS problem and had the board resoldered. At the time, the wisdom was to focus on E3 and the 202 and 204 ICs. There were other connections that looked cold so those were touched up as well.

Last week, the 5A fuse went out. I ordered the Sanyo STK392-180 and replaced them last night.

I powered the set back up and it looked great. After about 20 minutes I noticed a blue flicker once or twice and suddenly it shutdown. The 6.3A fuse was blown. I removed the PS board and resoldered all of the connections and ICs (I did not do the entire board). I then powered it back up and it blew the 6.3A fuse again. The only board that has a light on it after the issue is the PS board.

Any ideas? Could the STK392-180 be bad or have a bad solder connection?

Thanks,

Paul

There are lots of bad solder connections all over these boards. While getting the common ones and the obvious ones solves most problems, just handling the boards can make others worse. When we have the boards out for service we usually resolder most of the connections.

That said, you could also have other problems with the convergence. I recommend anyone attempting a convergence repair read the first ten posts here very carefully:

http://www.hometheatershack.com/foru...html#post43725

Thanks for the pointer to the thread. I've rechecked all of the solder connections and all of the resistors on the board and everything appears to be OK. I'm still getting the blue flash that eventually blows the 6.3A fuse.

I'll tackle the connections on the PS board that haven't been soldered. Any other help would be appreciated.

Thanks,

Paul

Check the connections to the deflection yokes.

This thread is all about the blue flash problem and re-soldering the PS board. If you have time, make yourself a pot of coffee or grab a six-pack and read through it, if possible. A lot of good information here.

If you have any questions about convergence repairs, read the information from the link that icaillo posted above:

http://www.hometheatershack.com/foru...html#post43725

Excellent information there, quite helpful when I fixed my set.

When you work on the PS board, it is absolutely crucial that that the ENTIRE board be re-soldered - all connectors, jumpers, components and that one heat sink screw.

Treat your mirror as if it were a window. It was never supposed to be there in the first place but the consumer was never going to accept a RPTV that was 5-6' deep in his viewing area.

As such, like in the Windex commercial it has to "seem to disappear".


Mr Bob

Until you do you're playing Russian Roulette with your set, and have been for quite awhile now, according to your last few posts. That 6.3A fuse does NOT go to your conv bd, the 4A and 5A fuses do. Chances are it goes to your defl bd, and you are flirting with having to replace it if a red LED suddenly goes off on that bd also - the defl bd - along with the one lighting up on the PS bd, and stays on from now on. It ain't cheap. If that happens, you've croaked your defl bd and it will have to be replaced, exacerbating your expenses by several hundred $. Is it really worth it to NOT do all the conn's on the PS bd, and keep taking chances on blowing your defl bd?

And I mean the FIRST time around, people. The very first time. The power supply board is the starting gate - THE most primary source of voltages and current going to the rest of the set. It all starts there, EVERYTHING in your set depends on it. The PS board HAS to be 100% efficacious - not 80%, or 90%. 100%, AT ALL TIMES. Like all the other boards in there, which don't have ANY problems. It takes a bunch of boards to operate a set like that, and they ALL have to 100% efficatious, at all times.

My advice on this has been here on this thread for years already, and has served me well on dozens of boards sent to me from across the continent, including Canada. If you have not perused enough of this thread yet, start reading some more. I spell out many times on this thread exactly what needs to be resoldered on this board: everything having to do with the original defective solder flow run, that has not already been resoldered as a post op to the original job. Except test points and heat sinks, which have no direct electrical connectivity between connecting points in there. That advice has been available here since dozens of pages back, and has been repeated here countless times.


If you don't take that advice as gospel by now, those of you reading this out there, you're on your own. And you're conducting Nazi experiments on your set. I wouldn't...

b

Wow, now I don't feel so bad, thought I was going crazy. Seems like my set has been having the same problems as you all are describing here in this forum.

Bought my Pro-510HD back in June 2001, $5000. Great set up until a few years ago when it started flashing blue then the picture going dim (low contrast), usually following a loud pop. Called my local Pioneer "authorized" service center, they came out and got the set, brought it back to their shop to evaluate. They looked at me as if I was crazy, said they had never heard of this problem before. Long story short, $250 fee (good toward repair) they had the set in their shop for about 3 months trying to diagnose the problem. Well I finally got fed up with the lack of progress and paid a surprise visit. There was my poor set in a room with about 30 other rear projection sets of various makes, all running with no one monitoring them. I don't know how they could diagnose the problem, since it was facing a wall. They said they could not find anything wrong with the picture, so hauled it back to the house.

Well, within two weeks the problem was back, figured just live with it even though it was annoying my wife and me to no end. After the experience with the local authorized repair shop (probably still think I am whacked) since they could not find anything wrong, so no solution there.

Now, after about 30-50 minutes the picture goes totally blank. Something heating up is causing the picture to go blank, hitting it on the side used to get it to come back on but even that doesn't work any more.

Fed up with Pioneer, and this coming from a guy who has spent nearly $20K on Pioneer Elite components since the early 1990s.

I stumbled onto this thread, via a Google search looking for an SH-D09 HD tuner. After realizing that they cost $2000 new, I'm glad that they were discontinued.

So that started me down the path of this thread because there probably was a brief mention of that tuner somewhere on page 35 of the thread. I felt like I'd just picked up a novel and started somewhere in the middle. I went back in the thread, then I went forward and was fascinated by the posts.

Realizing this thread has had a long life and starting with posts written in '06 and '07, I jumped forward to the last page, hoping to find the heros of the novel still alive and well. And to my amazement, it is indeed alive and well with the principal characters still passing out advice to the needy.

It is obvious that Mr. Bob has had a significant impact on a lot of 510/610/710 owners and that as tempting as the new plasmas and lcd's look, there is something truly beautiful about the picture quality of these old Pioneer rear screens, not to mention the handsome $5000 investment.

And so my small addition to the thread........I have a 510 that I purchased in January of '01 that experienced the same blue flashing soon after the extended 3 year warranty expired, as most Elites seem to exhibit . A local repair shop in Albuquerque worked on the set in '06 and the flashing went away.

But alas, the blue flash has returned. It has never stopped working completely. A power down at the main power switch will always get it to come back. Most recently however, I had to unplug it first to get it to come on.

Now I'm freaked because of all the comments about potential damage by letting this problem continue. I also realize that an optical cleaning would really make a big difference in picture quality, not to mention a serious calibration.

So the question is, where do I begin? I would gladly share Mr. Bob with anyone else who was considering a service call in Albuquerque, NM. I guess the back up plan would be to remove and send the power supply to Mr. Bob for re-soldering and then try to do an optical cleaning myself. Having not read the entire thread, are there step by step instructions on removal of the power supply and similarly instructions on cleaning the optics?

I am determined to not let this investment slip away in favor of a compromising digital image. Anyone else interested in Mr. Bob coming to Albuquerque?

Thanks for letting me vent. I feel a little better...

Any suggestions with what to do with this beautiful black Urushi box? Don't want to throw away any more money on this set.

I guess with a thread this long, you can't expect everybody to really get down in the trenches with me, read all the pages and thus automatically know what to do. So I will have to keep repeating myself, as the weeks and months go by. That's OK, I'll do whatever it takes to keep as many of these great sets alive as I can.

STOP USING YOUR SET NOW, even if it is turned on right now. The next intermittent could send a lethal spike down the lines, killing a board downline from the PS board. It could be only a minute away.

SEND ME THE PS BOARD. I will do the comprehensive resoldering job I do, and your set will last and last from then on without any further eruptions of questionable behavior. I restore the board to its original efficacy of 100%, and I never get them back weeks, months or years later because more of the soldering has now let go again somewhere new on the board, as is the case when the typical non-comprehensive job of other techs gets done. I do it all, and you never have to worry about it again.

And if done promptly as soon as you have even one intermittent event happen, and if the board is sent with the set working when you first turn it on and doesn't have any problems till it warms up, I can all but guaranty you I can fully restore your set for you.

Phone me and/or send me an email at my regular email addy in my sig, and I'll fire back all the info you need to know about how I work this. How much it costs - here's a hint, it's cheaper than getting a new board from Pioneer and and it keeps all your original voltages, which your display was originally set up on, preserving their high precision - where to send it, how to pack it, how to remove and re-install it... It's all there, as it has been for literally dozens of boards so far, which are even now as we speak performing marvelously for their owners, who are now no longer apprehensive about what to do about it.

I was just in Albuquerque a few weeks ago, sorry you didn't know about that so I coulda included you in that trip. But I would love to go back again, so form that cal tour and I will come.

Till then keep sending me the boards and I will keep cranking them out and back to you, properly soldered from then on, as I have been doing for owners across the continent for several years now. And I will stay available for phone coaching on optics cleaning. I will also stay available for cleaning and calibrating your sets on location, remedying the dimness that has crept into them all, rebalancing your usually now slewed grayscales, doing overscan reductions and tightening up your focusing, geometry and convergence, and just generally producing for you some of the best video images available.

All resulting in pix like the ones on page 45 of this thread, pix of the results of my MN tour of earlier this year.

Together we will save more and more of these great sets, which even if they hadn't cost an arm and a leg - which of course they did - are also still capable of delivering some of the finest HD viewing available. They are only at cruising age right now, there's ABSOLUTELY no need to toss them and buy new.

See page 45 of this thread to find photo evidence of that.

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showt...402397&page=45


Mr Bob

It amazes me that with all of the Pioneer sets out there that have had the blue flash, the company is still "unaware" of this problem after all of this time. I am grateful that I came upon the thread in its infancy and was able to have it fixed as soon as I had the problem.

Now if some folks from the NC area would band together with me to get Mr. Bob out here for a full calibration/deep optics cleaning...

The repair techs at Pioneer are definitely aware of it, I have talked to them directly in my capacity of being a repair tech, played dumb, and had them inform me of it directly without my ever asking them about it.

All aboard for NC...


Mr Bob

Now back to my original internet search about the HD ready aspect of the Pioneer 510. Not spending $2000 for the box even if they were still making them is where I'm at.
So how do you get the 510 to be HD? I have cable. Does Comcast have a box that outputs RGB or VGA that does the trick into the back of the 510?
Or do I need to get an aftermarket box to make up for the $2000 Pioneer box that no one ever bought?
As you can see, I'm confused by it all.

Use component and you'll retain the abiliity to have color and tint adjustable, and cable, sat and OTA STBs all put out 1080i HD on component.

So does HD Disc.

I find no discernable difference between component and RGB on Elites, except for having greater capacity for colorations with component. Component is what is used in my system, and also what was used to provide the delicious Elite photos I took in MN earlier this year on page 45 of this thread.

On my sys, which is a Mit, component looks MARKEDLY better than HDMI.


b

I just moved our 510 to the basement for DVD viewing and OTA HD broadcast. I am trying to avoid adding another DirecTV box charge by adding a STB for OTA HD reception. I would appeciate suggested projects from the 510 owning community. I hoping to get things up and running before the holidays. Thanks.

I have a "Voom" ( now out of business) receiver that I use for OTA. It works beautifully for my 710. I also have a Terk (looks like a tree) antenna that I keep in the closet with my equipment. I can receive all of my locals and I don't have a monster antenna on my house.

You can buy HD tuners that will work with our Elites for less than $200.

Thanks PamW. I'm already running OTA to other sets via my external antennae. I'm hoping to get some recommendations of presently available ATSC tuners. I used to have an old Zenith SAT-520 that I thought would work without the D*TV subscription, but it has come up missing!!!

I have seen the Samsung OTA tuner used in stores, with splendid results. I think you can get one for under $150 at the right places. Try www.pricegrabber.com. Unfortunately I DK the model numbers to try...


b

I have a VOOM box also, was very sorry to see them go under. I heard that if it was set for OTA reception at the time it went down, that it would continue to work on OTA from then on. Glad to see that confirmed.

Iguana Grande - I you want my VOOM box, I will test it out for you. Contact me directly, not by pm please.


b

still looking to hear from people with this issue in the New York / New Jersey area. Mr. Bob is willing to come east to fix and pamper our sets if there are enough interested. PM me or post here if you live in this area.

Don

...and also the NC area!!!

Quick FYI... when shipping your boards for repair make sure it is COMPLETELY bubble wrapped with the quarter sized bubble wrap, and use a box that is 1' x 1' x 2', and try to put it in the box on a diagonal so the sides of the board are no where near the sides of the box.

My board was sent out in a fedex laptop box with all the padding and it still got a hairline crack in it. These boards aren't cheap to repair or replace, so don't skimp on the packing material.

Don

I am excited about the prospects! Love to see different parts of the country while visiting y'all!

I won't be available between Dec. 23 and January 2, as I will be in Portland OR for the Xmas holidays. But my cell phone will be on while I am up there. Contact me directly - not by pm - and I'll get you that cell number -

For CES I will be in Las Vegas from the 6th to the 13th of January, won't be available for trips to elsewhere in the country during that space of days either.


b

Don's was the 7th one so far - yes I am counting - of the many welcome dozens of boards I have resoldered so far, to have issues with board breakage.

When I say oversize box it, I mean just that. Or double box it, smaller inside bigger, with stuffing in between. Crumpled up newspaper works well.

Looking forward to more and more boards being sent. I am happy to know that literally dozens of Elites are now operating as they should again out there in the world, because of the diligence of their owners.

But let's streamline it as much as possible folks, and breaks in the boards don't qualify for streamlined status! The topside is very vulnerable, even if the edges are strong, on vertical pressures. And the sides have been hit several times, evidently from the boxes being dropped on their sides, which on occasion has literally crumpled the board in key areas. Sometimes at the edges themselves where they got hit, sometimes just because the transformer is very heavy - AND topheavy - which results in tearing of the board when the transformer has abrupt side trama. It tries to yank itself to the side because of this topheaviness, breaking the board on one edge of it, in response.

Whenever I have to deal with board breakage, I have to notify the owner and it usually costs the owner something extra for me to repair it, and it slows down the whole process. Don's was the first time I was able to fix the break without charging anything, because his was just a hairline fracture that only took out 2 runs. In other circumstances huge breaks have had to be dealt with, one on 2 occasions for the same owner, same board!

Oversize box it, people, please -



b

Just received 2 more boxes in, and they are very healthily oversized. Great!

Will get them back to you just as soon as I can.


b