updated: help getting my ecu apart? pic added

[je328is]

hey guys I cant remember how to get the two half's of the ecu apart. Any tips would be great thanks!

Jim

[mooseheadm5]

There might be something on Rod Paine's site. Have you already opened the case?

[je328is]

There might be something on Rod Paine's site. Have you already opened the case?

Yeah, I have the case open. I'm trying to spilt the two half's of the board apart, but can't figure out how to disengage the two plastic risers on the back side of the board. I've done a lot of searches and everything just says pop them apart. How is this done??

[mooseheadm5]

Honestly, they just pop apart. After that the upper board pulls away from the big socket on one end after you press in the little black plastic tabs that lock them in. It is hard to describe, but maybe someone has pictures.

[je328is]

got it open kinda, one of my screws is stripped so I can't get the flat metal part of the case off all the way. I can see the cold solder joints though and they looked cracked, I'll post pics in a little while. I doesn't look like I'll need to split the ecu to fix this.

[je328is]

here's a pic of the three solder joints that are known to go bad. They look bad to me, what do you guys think? I'm gonna try to re-solder them in the next few days, hopefully that will do the trick!

[wkohler]

There's no need to split the boards to hit those.

[Mark 88/M5 Houston]

The one on the right definitely needs to be re-soldered.

[Matt]

here's a pic of the three solder joints that are known to go bad. They look bad to me, what do you guys think? I'm gonna try to re-solder them in the next few days, hopefully that will do the trick!

While you've got the ECU apart, you should take photos of the whole board, and then mark them with arrows pointing to the bad solder joints. Then include this closeup photo.

Then someone long term should host the photos and this thread should be a tech / sticky. Good photos of what the failed joints look like and which spots on the circuit board are not something I've come across. When i had to do the repair about 10 years ago, I took it to an avionics certified soldering tech at the Microsoft hardware lab. He could obviously find and fix it, but if I hadn't had that friend-of-a-friend, I might have been in a tight spot.

[tn535i]

fwiw, I'd recommend you get some desoldering tape and remove the old solder first. Apply just enough heat to get the solder to flow and then back off so you don't cook anything. You've done all the hard part and now you're down to a 3 min job to fix the problem. Good picture, I had to look under a stereoscope at work to find the cracks in my 535 they were so slight. Your's is much worse so I'm surprised it could even get that bad.

[wkohler]

I've got an 059 that looks worse than that!

[je328is]

its fixed! my brother and I re-soldered the joints just a few minutes ago and my M5 fired right up!

[twin55]

its fixed! my brother and I re-soldered the joints just a few minutes ago and my M5 fired right up!

know the feelin...