“Fixing” Stuff
Jul 17 06 | 4:12 pm
So lately I have been messing with a lot of broken electronics. Broken electronics are fickle things, because the stuff that usually breaks is completely beyond your ability to fix without sending it back to the factory. But there are a few ways to get around that sometimes.
Sam gave me a busted camera of hers. She had spilt orange juice in it, and the autofocus was dead and there was orange juice on the lensy covery thing (it was a cheap camera, so the zoom was completely internal). I opened it up (which required drilling two screws out because Kodak totally overtightened them and I stripped the screws (Hey, I even bought special screwdrivers)) and cleaned off the orange juice. I was also planning to remove the IR filter, but that didn’t work so good. The camera’s autofocus is totally dead. I am pretty sure it is a problem with an electromagnet that actually positions the lens, but I can’t fix that, so this puppy is dead.
However, I have met greater success since then in line with professional iPod repairs. My mom’s Sony CyberShot digital camera died today. It was four years old, and it finally gave up on zooming and took blurry photos. It flashed up an error code that I popped into Google. Lo and behold, the solution is to physically restrict the lens from extruding during initialization so that the overextended motor gets back in line. After confirming that she wouldn’t care if I broke her camera more, I attempted the fix. It worked. I saved the day!
Hey… do you think you can fix a broken Canon Powershot A520? Here’s the problem: the camera dropped, and now the lens is permanently partially extended. It’s off, but the lens is still out a bit. When I try to turn it on, nothing moves. The screen displays the Canon logo for a bit, I hear a little whirring as the motors (I imagine) try to move the lens out, but to no avail. After about 30 seconds or so, it turns off. I’d open it up to look for myself, but I don’t own a screwdriver small enough, and I don’t really want to go buy one… so if you have any ideas, then that’d be great. When do you get back?
Comment by cybertaur1 — Jul 21 06 | 3:14 pm
I think (somehow I’m not sure?) I tried to open that camera to clean the orange juice out too during the short month I had it as a camera.
I didn’t even know it had autofocus…
That is, unless there’s another Sam with an old camera that had orange juice in/under the lens?
Comment by T.J. — Jul 28 06 | 10:14 pm