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Osem · 17-08-2013, 18:59

I hate chucking away stuff (as my garage and wife will testify) and often justify keeping things on the basis that one day they'll either get fixed, cannibalised or whatever. Whilst I have no specific training, I do understand safety issues and would never tinker with anything potentially dangerous. Anyway I had a favourite digital tyre pressure gauge which gave up the ghost a few years back. As is so common these days it had a sticker on the back saying that the battery was not replaceable so I'd left it in a drawer and forgotten about it until I got so fed up trying to use it's replacement that I decided to try to fix it. Opening it was easy and revealed a small PCB with some components on but no sign of any battery. Removing 4 small screws on the PCB allowed me to free it and on the reverse side was the battery (CR2032). In order to remove it I had to bend the metal cover securing it in place but once I'd done that, putting the new battery in was nothing more than a bit fiddly. Once reassembled I was delighted to find that it bleeped into life on the first push of the button.

I supposed I only saved a couple of quid but it's a very satisfying feeling nonetheless.

One thing which dose confuse me is how the 1cmx2cm LCD display panel works. There were no wires or visible connections to it, just a flat black rubberised ? pad of similar size resting on its reverse side. All I could see were some indentations along one edge of this which were left by a couple of soldered joints and a small, shallow black circular dome on the top of the PCB. So my question to HeeroYuy (and others techie) is how is the display powered and how does the required tyre pressure data get fed to it? The LCD panel was not secured or connected to anything, in fact when I opened the unit it fell out along with the flat black rubberised pad which had been resting on it. Eagerly awaiting the answer!

TVM as always.

17-08-2013, 18:59	#1
Osem Inactive Join Date: Oct 2006 Location: Right here! Posts: 22,316	What have you fixed lately? I hate chucking away stuff (as my garage and wife will testify) and often justify keeping things on the basis that one day they'll either get fixed, cannibalised or whatever. Whilst I have no specific training, I do understand safety issues and would never tinker with anything potentially dangerous. Anyway I had a favourite digital tyre pressure gauge which gave up the ghost a few years back. As is so common these days it had a sticker on the back saying that the battery was not replaceable so I'd left it in a drawer and forgotten about it until I got so fed up trying to use it's replacement that I decided to try to fix it. Opening it was easy and revealed a small PCB with some components on but no sign of any battery. Removing 4 small screws on the PCB allowed me to free it and on the reverse side was the battery (CR2032). In order to remove it I had to bend the metal cover securing it in place but once I'd done that, putting the new battery in was nothing more than a bit fiddly. Once reassembled I was delighted to find that it bleeped into life on the first push of the button. I supposed I only saved a couple of quid but it's a very satisfying feeling nonetheless. One thing which dose confuse me is how the 1cmx2cm LCD display panel works. There were no wires or visible connections to it, just a flat black rubberised ? pad of similar size resting on its reverse side. All I could see were some indentations along one edge of this which were left by a couple of soldered joints and a small, shallow black circular dome on the top of the PCB. So my question to HeeroYuy (and others techie) is how is the display powered and how does the required tyre pressure data get fed to it? The LCD panel was not secured or connected to anything, in fact when I opened the unit it fell out along with the flat black rubberised pad which had been resting on it. Eagerly awaiting the answer! TVM as always.