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sunbeam electric blanket no heat

the great potato

Dec 2, 2016
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Hello all, I'm new here but seems the place to ask. I have a sunbeam electric blanket that is not heating. I do know about electronic repair and testing but I don't know much about electric blankets, this is the first one I ever owned. I tested the blanket for continuity with my multi meater and the blanket seems fine. The controller lights up and stays on but don't heat. I tested the control and its putting out power as well, but if its not connected to the blanket it goes into fault and the light flashes, but tested it said it was still 50.4 volts. But what do yall think?? I was going to buy a new controller for about 25 bucks to see if that was the issue. And before I hear new blankets are 30 bucks this is a queen size that is 87 bucks. So from what I said.. You think its the control unit? I took out the connector where it plugs in, on it are 3 inline resistors and a ( I want to call it a diode) but 2 of the resistors wouldn't give me a reading. But the others seemed fine, think I should replace those first?? I might work on it tomorrow so if I do ill post some pics of the small board to show what I mean. Any input would be greatly appreciated. Thank you.
 

73's de Edd

Aug 21, 2015
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Ohhhhhhh . . . Esteemed grand . . . great potato . . .and Revered Pooh Bah extraordinaire . . . .

We SURE could have used its model number .
But any chance that it is being this series and its controller might look like this ?.

Repaired.jpg


also It has to have the 3 prong plug making GOOD and FIRMLY seated connection
before the unit is plugged into AC.
Any chance that the small board, which you describe its . . a . . looka . . .like a . .this ?

Circuit.jpg


If so there are 3 small surface mount resistors on it and NUMBERS are on them plus there is one surface mount PNP transistor which can be tested by DVM in its diode test mode.
See how much of this info might be the same as your unit

73s de Edd
 
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the great potato

Dec 2, 2016
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Hello, and thanks for the reply. Well when i made this post i was pretty tired, it was like 2 am and i used a phone.. so yeah was a lot of small typing.. (not big on phones for things) but .. the controller is different but that small board is the exact same one. I checked the connections over and they are strong solders and the multi meter tested them no problem for conductivity, so i don't believe the problem is in the pins. Im going to use your pic of the small board and highlight the 2 areas i believe the problem is. And im sure i can find the controller with a fast search. I can post pics of the actual unit here in a bit. Yes it is a 3 prong and the model of the controller says, PAC 0595 Style Y85, on the blanket theres 3 number sets, 3P 5H , RN 17280 and P.N. 116776-009 Rev. 1 Hope this helps a bit, and thank you so much for the reply.


HAIL POTATO !
 

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73's de Edd

Aug 21, 2015
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This small circuitry is wired in between the two halves of the heater wiring of your blanket for temp sensing and it sends back a corrective signal to the main SCR based controller unit.
I now can make out the R1? of the first of 2 resistors, being side by side , then there is a Pee-in- Pee surface mount transistor and a final resistor.
You need to pass to us, all of of the numbers on each of the resistors and possibly any small alpha-numeric designations being on the transistor, for us to techno-translate.

ALL HAIL . . . .THE MIGHTY 'TATER FARMER . . . .got a big 'un in the MW . . . 'rat now . . . . gettin' nuked.
 

the great potato

Dec 2, 2016
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ok ill get a pic up tomm of it. Been working on fixing this set of 8 solar lights most of the day. Got them all working though.. yey.. thank you all for your time on this so far !! :)
 

the great potato

Dec 2, 2016
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Hello all ! i have those Pics and a new report ... Those two Inline resistors ( or what ever they are) Did give me a reading. I used the conductivity setting and 2 chips gave me a reading and the other two didnt, but those two chips did give me a reading when i used the OHMs setting set to 200k. But here are those pictures, I took pics of everything and tried to get decent pics. I got pics of the Small Pcb Board, the controller in and outside.
 

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KTW

Feb 22, 2015
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From what I've read this is common with these Sunbeam blankets.
There might be a microcontroller in the blanket causing the problem.
 

the great potato

Dec 2, 2016
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i was considering buying a new controller to see if that worked, you think its inside the blanket ? or the controller?
 

Alec_t

Jul 7, 2015
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The electrolytic capacitor, at top centre of pic _014, looks to be bulging at the top?
The component in the bottom left of that pic seems to be a wire-ended fuse. If so, check its continuity with your meter.
 

KTW

Feb 22, 2015
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you think its inside the blanket ? or the controller?
This is what I read ...
We bought 2 throws and a blanket, all of which have drastically dropped off in temperature. I called Walmart and they won't take them back after 1 month. being the electronics technologist that I am, I cut open the blanket to see what could have failed. There is a temperature sensor in the blanket that sends the temperature back to the controller. I looked up the part # of the microchip and found it was a microcontroller that has some internal memory. I also measured the resistance of the heating wires and calculated how much heat I should be getting. The heating wires are fine. What is happening is the microcontroller is detecting a temperature that it thinks is to high and permanently programming itself to not let the temp get very warm. This is permanent and cannot be repaired. This thing is programmed to fail, which should be against the law. After this I don't trust Sunbeam at all and they will never see single penny from me again.
 

the great potato

Dec 2, 2016
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The electrolytic capacitor, at top centre of pic _014, looks to be bulging at the top?
The component in the bottom left of that pic seems to be a wire-ended fuse. If so, check its continuity with your meter.


the inside of the controller looks brand new sadly, If it was a simple defect like that i would have already replaced it. i will check them though just in case but actually having it in front of you it seems perfectly fine =/
 

the great potato

Dec 2, 2016
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This is what I read ...
We bought 2 throws and a blanket, all of which have drastically dropped off in temperature. I called Walmart and they won't take them back after 1 month. being the electronics technologist that I am, I cut open the blanket to see what could have failed. There is a temperature sensor in the blanket that sends the temperature back to the controller. I looked up the part # of the microchip and found it was a microcontroller that has some internal memory. I also measured the resistance of the heating wires and calculated how much heat I should be getting. The heating wires are fine. What is happening is the microcontroller is detecting a temperature that it thinks is to high and permanently programming itself to not let the temp get very warm. This is permanent and cannot be repaired. This thing is programmed to fail, which should be against the law. After this I don't trust Sunbeam at all and they will never see single penny from me again.


Sooo.. you read this somewhere? or you know this for fact ?
 

the great potato

Dec 2, 2016
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wow reading those makes me want to file a class action on sunbeam. I had a " just wondering moment" anyway to rip out the micocontroller and just hook it to a diffrent power source,and maybe resist the power flow? and put it on a timer so it only heats for like an hour .. i just want it to warm the bed i dont need it on all night. this is totaly just a what if im NOT GOING to try it. But thinking of things ,, i seen how to make a blanket with carbon ribbon using a 12v power supply for cheap. Like i said i just want it to heat the bed a bit and turn it off.
 

73's de Edd

Aug 21, 2015
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Sir great potato . . . . . . .

Hey y y y y y mo' photos . . . is you a fotiegrafferist . . . . or something ?.

We will be interested in the small sensor board in your #23 photo of your post #7.
Have the board disconnected from the plug that it normally goes into, and then go into your meters OHMS mode and test for the SMD resistors values as being

wp_20161204_023-jpg.30702


22,000 ohms
1500 ohms
62000 ohms
Realize that we will then have to take a little foil slice out between R14 and R15, for correcting of shunted readings, and then solder bridge the gap later.


Also . . . whilst you gots ye olde ohmmeter warmed up and running good . . . . test for resistance of all possible resistance connections of the

PCBs central 2 Top and 2 Bottom tabs:

TL to TR
TL to BL
TL to BR

TR to BL
TR to BR

BL to BR


And then use DIODE test mode of the DVM for checking out the junctions of the PNP transistor Q1.
Collector is the sole tab at the top near the Q1 symbolization
Base is the bottom left tab
Emitter is bottom right tab
Expect in the range of ~500------ 800 millivolts for good junctions.

OUR RELEVANT, GOLDEN TECHNO REFERENCING IS NOW BEING ON PAGE 2 :

https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=1&ved=0ahUKEwiB9_TLjd3QAhVJ82MKHYQHBjsQFggdMAA&url=http://patentimages.storage.googleapis.com/pdfs/US6355912.pdf&usg=AFQjCNEe8cmhvbOH-ZNmCN8pz4DufTRXeQ

Thasssit . . . .

73's de Edd
 
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the great potato

Dec 2, 2016
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I'll test it out, was working outside today finishing a few things before snow hits. And got it just in time its hitting tomorrow morning. Glad I refinished and fixed my snow blower engine last week. A big hobby I found I love is small engine repair.
 

the great potato

Dec 2, 2016
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Dec 2, 2016
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Ok so far I checked r 13-14- 15 and in the same order I got a constant on 13 of 21.4 on 15 got 1.5 and on 14 I got different readings, 60.5 and 59.9. Using my meter set to 200k omhs.
 
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