Soarer Limited EMV repair procedures.

Repairing Faulty EMV Backlight Inverter.

A fault that seems to be becoming more prevalent as the Soarers fitted with the EMV screens age is that the
backlight fails. This fault usually leaves the touch sensitive screen functional, but the user is left guessing as
to what functions he may be accessing. A second fault that appears to be backlight failure has also been
detected in some EMVs. The difference is that the touch screen does not work either. The repair procedure
for that fault is located near the end of this document. It is a much easier repair than a faulty backlight! A
third fault that sometimes occurs is that the LCD screen goes clear, and the backlight shines through! The
repair for this is at the end of the document.
The repair itself is relatively simple. It appears that a high voltage capacitor fails, and this then causes one of
the two main inverter transistors to fail. The backlight inverter failure sometimes blows a 3 amp fuse located
on the primary power supply board. This board has several different switching power supplies, but the fuse
that blows is for the 12 to 24 volt inverter which then powers the backlight. (I would have said this was overly
complex myself, the backlight inverter could just as easily have run directly from 12 volts!) I have replaced
the original transistors with much larger devices, capable of much higher power than the originals. (One
reason was that I could not identify what the original transistors were, due to the clear lacquer obscuring the
SMD codes on the original transistors.) The new transistors are mounted on the case of the original converter
to facilitate cooling the devices. (This is required! Without cooling, these devices rapidly overheat, and then
expire!)
You will need a new 68 nF capacitor, with a voltage rating of at least 250 volts, and two transistors, I have
tried two different types. You will also require a new 3.15 amp, 5AG fuse.

68 nF (nanoFarad, 0.068 uF (microfarad)) 250 Volt minimum.

MJE340 transistors or MJE13003 transistors.

3.15 Amp M205 fuse.

Insulating washers (preferably silicon rubber insulators)

Some wire (preferably 3 different colours)

3 mm screws + nuts and shake proof washers.

Table 1 Parts Required for repair.

Remove the unit from the car

Remove the computer module from the display.
Remove the back tin coloured cover, disconnect the two plugs from the displays computer board to the touch
screen. (pictures)
Remove the touch screen from the display. You will need to prise up the plastic shroud slightly to pop over
the detents pressed into the case.
If the foam rubber between the touch screen and the display unit is disintegrating, scrap it right off the display
unit, this stuff is worse than snot, and will get everywhere otherwise. Some foam rubber strip can be cut and
contact adhesive used to replace the original when you reassemble the unit.
While you have the touch screen out, I suggest you remove the screws holding the touch plate in, and clean
the whole plate. (Wash in mild detergent, dry off with a chamois.)
Undo the two screws on the computer board.
Lift the board up, and undo the screw holding the thick loom in place.

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Undo all the screws and totally disassemble the unit. There are four small black Philips head screws at the
front of the unit, these must also be removed.
You should now be able to remove one side from the display. (careful!)
The rest of the display can now slide sideways out of the case with a bit of jiggling, and slight bending of the
side. (The screw holes have been extended via deliberate burring, and make lifting the unit out of the case
difficult without excessive bending.)
Note that the flexible strip connecting the electronics to the actual display is captured by special connectors,
the outer part of these connectors must be popped up before the flexible display cable can be disconnected.
(There are two connectors.) This only requires gentle pressure, do not get carried away! There is also a thin
cable which goes to the power supply board. (Two wires in a 4 pin connector.)
Fortunately, although there are connectors of the same type within the unit, where this is the case, the
manufacturer has colour coded them!
At this point, it would pay to examine the primary power supply for intact fuses. The 24 volt inverter
fuse may be blown. (Should be fairly obvious, the glass part of the fuse will be a dirty brown from the fuses
original contents!)

Figure 1 Blown Fuse

You need to replace this fuse if it is blown (Has been in all the units repaired so far!). Using the tip of the
soldering iron, you can melt the solder on the end of the fuse. Apply pressure to the fuse and push the fuse
across several millimetres while the solder is melted. (I use force on the iron for this. Do not press from the
centre of the solder on the fuse end though, you are trying to disconnect the fuse from its mounting wire!
Once you have one end free, you can unsolder the other end easily, and lift out the old fuse. Tin up the ends
of your new fuse, and solder it back in place. (It might pay to check the new fuse with a multimeter after you
have tinned up the ends, sometimes the fuse wire becomes detached when the ends are tinned.) It might help
if you temporarily release the clip holding the wire loom that goes to the main board.)

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(Careful, Glass tends to remain very hot for a substantial amount of time after the soldering iron has been
removed. Use long nose pliers or tweezers to hold the fuse if you do not wish to burn your fingers!)
Once you have the unit out of the case, and the LCD detached from the front, you next need to remove the
cover from the backlight power supply.
Undo the two screws shown in the picture shown below, and bend the metal tabs straight. (Only two tabs are
visible in the picture below, but there are four tabs in all.)

Figure 2 Backlight Inverter Cover.

You should now be able to lift the cover off. (May require some jiggling.)

To make things a little easier, the components for the repair can be purchased from Radio Spares, or
Farnell. (Both companies are in the UK and Australia.) Rockby Electronics are in Melbourne.

The RS part numbers are:

MJE13003 348-4603 (Aus $1.06 each) (I recommend this one!)
MJE340
294-227 (Aus $2.57 each)
The actual value of capacitor required is not stocked by RS, but can be made by the parallel combination
of a 47 nF and a 22 nF capacitor. (Near enough, anyway.) The RS Part numbers are 190-7693 and 1907700 (Each is less than $0.70) (In fact, this is the way I have been doing the repair.)
Insulating washer (part number unkown, I had a part number but apparently it was wrong!

The Farnell Part Numbers are:

MJE13003 3526367 (But, they may not have them in stock!)
68 nanofarad (0.068 uF) 630 volt working. 3038488 (Aus $1.35)

Rocby Electronics: (They do mail order within Australia http://www.rockby.com.au)

MJE13003 12128 $1.65 (Recommended type)
MJE340
0.022 uF 250 Volts AC capacitor 13298 Aus $0.64
0.047 uF 250 Volts AC Capacitor 13300 Aus $0.77
Insulating washers (Pkt of 10)
12680 Aus $1.21

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EMV Backlight repair, Preliminary

Figure 3 Cover Removed.

The transistors to be removed are in the upper left hand corner of the inverter board. To remove them, heat all
three pins with a soldering iron and then flick or slide the transistors off. (Once again, be careful as solder
burns, as would the still hot transistor.) It may help to add some solder to the pins being heated up! The solder
should melt within one to two seconds. Do not apply the iron continuously for more than about ten seconds.

Figure 4 Q1 & Q2 lead identification.

Remove the 68 nF capacitor, (the leads are indicated above), and re-install the new one. This capacitor is
invariably faulty, and I suspect its failure is the main cause of the subsequent transistor failure. The original
capacitor is rectangular, about 1 * 3 * 2 cm. (Coloured black)

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Figure 5 Wires added.

Next, you will need to add wires to attach to the new transistors. Wherever convenient, use pre-existing board
holes for this (for mounting strength). You will need to scrape the solder mask off the plated through holes
first, and then tin the holes with fresh solder. The final required result is shown in the picture above (Fig 5). I
used blue wire for the Base connection, Orange for the collector, and green for the Emitter, although the
colour is not important, use whatever you have at hand. Take note of the wire grouping above, it is important
that the wires for the transistors are not mixed up.
You will need to mount the transistors on
the case as shown on the left. (Fig 6)
Note that the transistors MUST be
insulated from the aluminium case. (There
is a metal backing plate on the back of the
transistor, which is connected to the
collector of the device.)
After the transistors have been mounted,
(but before you connect the wires) you
should check that the insulator is still intact
by measuring between the centre leg of the
transistor and the aluminium case with a
multimeter. .(Using the Ohms range.) This
should read as an open circuit!
NB: the nuts of the 3 mm screws must go
inside the cover, there is insufficient room
inside the main case to have the nut on the
transistors face.
After you have mounted the transistors,
you can trim the leads down to
approximately 5 mm in length in
preparation for the wire attachment.

Figure 6 Transistor mounting.

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Figure 7 Backlight Inverter Cover Re-installed

Carefully slip the aluminium cover back into position, while threading the wires for the transistors through
appropriate holes as shown above in Figure 7. The screws that hold the backlight high voltage inverter board
in position can be re-inserted, and the tabs can be bent back to their original positions.

Figure 8 Transistor Connections.

Take note of the above transistor connections, as the Base and Emitter connections are swapped around
between the two types! (I have been using the MJE13003 type, as it has higher ratings, but either type works
acceptably well.)

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Trim the wire length so that each connection to be made will not put undue strain anywhere. (So as not to cut
through the wires on any part of the casing.) strip the insulation of the wire back by about 3 to 5 mm and tin
the bare end with solder. (Tin the transistor legs at the same time.)
Although not essential, I used insulating sleeves on each connection. Slip a loose fitting plastic sleeve on each
wire before soldering it in place. When the connection has been made, the sleeve can be slid over the bare
connection. After all connections have been made, the job is essentially complete, and you can re-assemble
the unit. Take note that the LCD flexible connection must go under the aluminium bracket visible in the
picture below (Fig 9), not on the outside, as can be seen in fig 7. (Which is shown like that because I test the
units operation before I reassemble it.)

Figure 9 Finished, ready for re-assembly.

The assembly procedure is essentially the reverse of the disassembly procedure, so I will not bother to repeat
it here. (You should have been taking note when you pulled it apart!)

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When the Touch screen does not work.

The second fault that will stop the EMV from working is as follows. The board shown in figure 10 is in
fact the very first board you will access when dis-assembling the actual monitor.

Figure 10 EMV control board.

The capacitors indicated with the arrows go leaky and the contents are slightly caustic. This causes the thruhole plating on/in several holes in the indicated area to disappear, and the board fails. The resultant fault is no
backlight, no touch-screen, no nothing!
The fix is,
1: remove the three capacitors.
2: clean the board up. (water/metho, whatever.)
3: replace the 3 surface mount capacitors with new ones
4: scrape clean the thru-holes on both sides in the indicated area. (Three thru-holes)
5: pass a thin piece of wire through each hole, solder on both sides.
(I suggest before you do step 5, that you verify that at least one of the holes is in fact open circuit.)
If you have done the backlight repair, and your EMV still doesn'
t work, it is likely that the above fault is
actually the culprit! (There was probably nothing wrong with the backlight at all.)
Please check this fault before you proceed to the backlight repair. IF your touch screen does not work, the
above is the most likely reason!
I suggest the following may not be rigorous though. Please check the board visually as your board may be in
a worse state than the one shown above.

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When the display goes clear.

There is another common fault with the display, where the screen goes clear, and yet the backlight still
works (and so does the touch screen!) Again caused by a faulty capacitor, this one is located on the main
circuit board, and is under a tin shield. While you have the unit apart, it is probably a good idea to replace the
other two capacitors Greg has indicated. These are NOT surface mount devices, so sourcing the correct
components should not really be an issue. This fault was found and corrected by Greg Bingham, who sent me
the details which I have now added to this document.

Figure 11 Faulty Capacitor highlighted in red.

The capacitor in question is highlighted in red in Figure 11. (NB: I highlighted this component red, it in fact is
NOT red when you lift the cover!) This component is under a tin shield, which must be removed to access
this area of the main board. The capacitor is an 82 microfarad device. Following is what Greg did to his unit
to repair it.

I'
ve replaced both the 82uF 16V caps under the metal housing, with 82uF 35V from
Farnell. Part # 303-6376. They'
re about 60c each, and only slightly larger in diameter
(6.3mm vs 5mm) I also replaced the two 56uF 16v caps with 35V type.Part # 303-6364.

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Powering the unit up on the bench.

Many people have requested information about powering up the unit whilst it is out of the car, so that the
repairs can be bench tested, verifying that the repaired EMV display works correctly. (Considering the
effort required to remove the EMV from the car, this is not a bad idea!) The 12 volt supply required for this
needs to be rated at above 6..8 Amps at the very least. (Now you know why the EMV flattens the car battery!)
The 12 volts from an old PC power supply is useful in this context! The 4 pin Molex connectors that are used
to power hard disk drives has both + 5Volts and + 12 Volts (The Yellow wire has positive 12 Volts, Either
black wire can be used as the ground (negative) connection.)

Figure 12 Connector on EMV.

It is absolutely necessary to have the EMV computer connected to the unit, as without a video signal from this
box, the display will not produce a picture, or even start up the LCD backlight. (The EMV computer is in the
box that piggybacks the display.)
Ground to:
Multi Display Computer (CPU module)
Connector B, pins 13 & 26
+13.8 (+12) Supply to:
Multi Display Computer (CPU module)
Connector B, pins 11,12, 24, 25
+13.8 (+12) Supply to:
Multi Display (Black LCD unit)
Connector B (on the flying lead)
Pins 1 & 2
The flying lead mentioned above (to the display) ends up terminated on the board that contains the 3.15 amp
fuse mentioned elsewhere (the 12 volt to 24 volt inverter board). (The appropriate wire/s on the flying lead
are red with some other colour stripes. (Sorry, this is from memory, I cannot be more explicit about this!)
Note that the power pins indicated above are substantially fatter than the other pins on the plug.
When you supply power, after a few seconds, you will hear a beep come from the computer. A couple of
seconds after that, you will get video (if everything is working/fixed). Only a few menus can be accessed, but
enough should work that you can verify that the touch screen is alive. You can however access the display
dimmer feature, hidden in amongst the various menus.
NB: If you are lazy, you need only connect one ground and one power on the CPU module, but, the pins
connected may become fairly hot! (Careful, hot enough to burn skin!)
Only one positive supply to the flying lead is required to be connected, this does not get hot. (The wires are in
parallel.)

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Notes:
I have seen several EMVs with varying levels of pixel death evident on the screen. Aside from replacing
the LCD module, there is nothing that can be done to remedy this problem. I have also considered replacing
the tube with CCFD displays available from Jaycar (in Australia). To do this (although I have not actually
tried it) you would need at least 4 tubes, each tube would need a 100...1000 ohm resistor in series with it,
otherwise only one tube will strike. I have experimented with normal fluorescent tubes replacing the original
tube, and although they are not cold cathode, they do strike without requiring heater voltage. Unfortunately,
the colour temperature of the tubes I had were not a good match to the original tube. (I estimate the colour
temp of the original tube to be around 8000 degrees K.)
Another approach would be to replace the backlight with a stack of white LED devices. This has not been
investigated, but, I suspect would be very effective, and the display would potentially end up being brighter
than the original, and use less power from the battery. (I even think I could arrange for the dimmer circuit to
be effective!)
I have seen one unit that someone had totally removed the Inverter, and original backlight tube, and installed
a new aftermarket inverter, and backlight from a laptop computer. (The dimming feature did not work
though!)
The TIF forum shows yet another mod that used a module (dangling out the back of the display) powering
what I suspect were new tubes in the backlight of the display.
Apparently, often the backlight tube may, in fact, be faulty. Check the tube carefully for fractures while you
have the display unit apart. Note that the original tube has several devices glued to it. I am not sure what the
functions of these devices are. (They may measure temperature, light output (or both), but I did not
investigate what they actually did!)

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