Thread Number: 11919
New project of the day - Riccar 1500S. 		[Down to Last]

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Post# 127800   3/18/2011 at 22:29 (4,780 days old) by gmerkt (Edmonds WA)        

Okay, this is another vac I got recently along with the Bosch upright. Another $4 special that looked fine but didn't run. Meaning, turn on the power and no action.

This Riccar 1500S canister is made in S. Korea by Daewoo. It came with an electric hose, wand and a turbo floor attachment. You wonder, why an electric hose for a turbo floor attachment?? Well, the hose is electric because it has another power switch on the nozzle. This machine has a primary power switch on the canister, and a rheostat power switch on the hose nozzle that goes from stop, to low and in an increasing range up to full power.

So here's the deal. Since this thing wouldn't come on, I decided to first jump the electrical contacts where the hose plugs into the canister. I bridged these contacts and the machine came up full power like gangbusters. So, it didn't have a bad power cord or motor. Next, I checked the continuity in the hose wires and they were okay. Then I opened up the handle on the hose nozzle and looked at the rheostat switch. It tested good on the meter. It was connected with very small wires, indicating a low-voltage control back to the canister. I unplugged the connector to the rheostat, hit the primary power switch on the canister, and whoooeee, the vac came on but the motor was running in reverse. With the low voltage power control on the hose nozzle, some kind of solid state electronics back inside the vac were indicated.

Figuring out how to take the Riccar canister apart was interesting. It has six screws that hold the top cover on, four are easy to find but the last two are boogers. Toward the back of the canister, there are two large black switch pads, one for the primary power switch and one for the cord retractor. Normally, these are accessed from inside the canister housing on your typical Hoover or Kenmore canister. Not on this Riccar. These pads have three tabs on the edges that hold them in place, and you have to carefully pry the pads out, revealing a case screw under each.

With the cover off, the electronics are found mounted right on top of the motor. It's pretty simple stuff, but if one little thing is bad, the machine won't work. You don't have to be an ET to find a burned component or a badly soldered joint. A quick glance didn't reveal anything obvious. I started snooping around all the soldered joints for a better look. The three soldered pins on the triac (electronic device used to vary current, in this case motor speed) looked a little suspect. They were a little crusty and one had a little divit on one side of the little soldered "Hershey's Kiss." I decided to re-touch each one of these with a soldering pencil (gun is too hot for boards). The one with the little divit stubbornly didn't want to fill in so I added a dab of soldering flux and convinced it to do the right thing.

For a quick test, I plugged the low voltage wires to the hose socket back into the board, then plugged the hose back into its socket, then plugged the power cord in. I activated the primary power switch and the vac came on like it was designed to. I pushed the rheostat switch on the hose back and forth, and the power surged and waned as it is supposed to.

So, the fault was a badly soldered pin on the triac. Someone threw this vac away just because of that.

Badly soldered joints are not all that uncommon in all kinds of electronics. They can exist in several forms. Sometimes, a defect is very obvious as when you look closely where the pin goes through the board, you can see the gap between the two. Other times, a bad connection to the board can be like a bubble hidden underneath the dab of solder. Still other times, you can see crust on the joint and this indicates some kind of fault in the flux used or unclean components that didn't want to take solder. You can save electronic items by simply resoldering these bad connections. You just have to look for them. This goes for TV's, radios, cars, ICMB silo controls, and all sorts of things with solid state electronics in them.

Oh by the way, Riccar is another one of those brands whose manufacturer closely controls service and repair parts for their products. Although I didn't need any repair parts for this machine, I didn't realize this fact before I bought this Riccar. I will be passing on any more Riccars as fixer-uppers in the future. I don't want any projects for which I cannot get parts at a reasonable price.

This pile of parts is the Riccar during repair.

Post# 127801 , Reply# 1   3/18/2011 at 22:31 (4,780 days old) by gmerkt (Edmonds WA)        
Riccar 1500S electronics

 This is a closer picture of the top of the circuit board in the Riccar. The triac with the bad joint is the black square on the left in the picture.

Post# 127802 , Reply# 2   3/18/2011 at 22:32 (4,780 days old) by gmerkt (Edmonds WA)        
Riccar 1500S electronics

 This picture is of the back of the board; the bad joint was T2 which I resoldered.

Post# 127809 , Reply# 3   3/18/2011 at 23:23 (4,780 days old) by aeoliandave (Stratford Ontario Canada)        

aeoliandave's profile picture
:-)

Post# 127842 , Reply# 4   3/19/2011 at 19:35 (4,779 days old) by gmerkt (Edmonds WA)        

The choice of a sewing machine for the basis of a humorous analogy is apt. I've tried but just cannot master the craft of using a sewing machine. The concept of getting those two sources of thread to cooperate and join in a coalition of fabric is just beyond me. That bottom thread, the bobbin, I just can't keep it coming.

Post# 128227 , Reply# 5   3/22/2011 at 20:32 (4,776 days old) by vac_whisperer ()        
Dave,

 That comic was in my local Gazette the same day you posted it!

VW


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