flir MK1 I3 not charging

[pimpinge46]

My Flir is not charging . I tested the factory charger and it has its 5v out . I believe it is something wrong with the internal charger.    Just wondering if anyone has had made this repairs before and what to look for ? Also when i was trying to pull it apart , i was unable to remove the PC board from the metal housing. It seems to be hung up on something.


Thanks
dave
 

[Fraser]

Dave,

The most common failure is the protection device that protects against reverse polarity. It will sit in series with the power input socket and likely have a diode connected from it to the 0V rail. It serves to protect against reverse polarity

I have yet to open my i5 so do not know the topology of the cameras PCB.

The Main PCB is directly connected to the microbolometer via a multi pin connector. You need to gently pull the PCB away from the metal chassis plate that contains the microbolometer module.

I attach pictures of the disassembled camera taken from a reverse engineering report.

Fraser

Fraer

[pimpinge46]

That helps a lot thanks !!! Now i have to try to figure out what component is damaged .  You wouldn't of happen to have a higher res picture of the board ?

[Fraser]

Sadly no. I grabbed the imaged out of a PDF document that detailed the reverse costing analysis of the i7 camera. I was using the pictures to try to identify the locations of the case fixing screws.

I am not aware of the circumstances of your cameras failure. Did it fail in normal service in your ownership and using only the official FLIR power supply unit ? Will the camera run off of the power supply if the Lithium Battery is removed ? (It should).

If it is only the battery charging function that has failed that is likely just bad luck and the charger circuit has a fault. If the camera will not run off of the power supply with no battery connected, it is likely the protection fuse or polyfuse that has failed at the power input.

If you bought the camera as faulty and do not know the history of the fault, you are faced with two common user errors that lead to power input failure

1. Wrong power supply used - incorrect polarity.
2. Wrong power supply used - too high a voltage

In scenario 1, it is common for an input protection component to sacrifice itself. Some are auto-resetting, others fail and require repair.
In scenario 2 there is the potential for much significant damage to the camera. Input polarity protection does not help as teh polarity is correct, the excess voltage is passed to the charging circuit and the cameras power control MOSFET. If te camera has any rails directly connected to the power connector, the circuits connected to such will often be damaged. If the camera is switched on with excess voltage connected, all manner f mayhem can ensue as regulator blocks become over-volted and damaged. It is worth remembering in such scenarios that the equipment is never'OFF' it is always in a stand-by or deep sleep mode. Therefore power is always connected to circuits that control power distribution within the camera. these may be as simple as some transistors and a MOSFET, or as complex as a microcontroller driving a Mosfet.

I almost bought a faulty Extech thermal camera the other day on ebay.com. That one had a charge fault as well. As long as the camera functions perfectly in all respects except battery charging, it is not normally a difficult task to repair the charging or power control circuits. The small size of the components can make such a challenge however.

If you can post some pictures of your cameras PCB and some detailed pictures around the DC power input, I may be able to help further. Once I have my i5 dismantled I can likely provide more help, if needed.

Fraser

Fraser

[pimpinge46]

I purchased second hand .  I believe it does not  even plugged in. If i charge the battery externally and place it back in it works fine .   I will have to pull it all part this weekend and take some detailed pics and  post them. Thanks !

[Fraser]

That is helpful.

If it will not run directly off of the DC power socket, it is very likely that it is simply the protection fusible component that has failed. Hopefully a simple repair for you 

If I get time, I will reverse engineer my i5 PCB around the power input for you.

Fraser

[pimpinge46]

Here are some pics of the board that I took yesterday

[Fraser]

Is there continuity between the centre pin of the power socket and both sides of the inductor with 'DD' written on top. That inductor is part of the input filtering.

I have not had time to dismantle my i5 yet but when I do I can provide you with some more help.

Fraser

[pimpinge46]

Great thanks!

[Fraser]

I have just dismantled my i5 and will start a new thread on the teardown. I will look at the DC input circuit and report back here soon.

Fraser

[pimpinge46]

Here are some pics I took when I took it apart if you would like to use them in your teardown post.
Thanks dave

[Fraser]

Pimpinge46,

Thanks for the pictures.

I have just sketched out the DC input circuit. Please see attached.

There is no true fuse present in the input which was a surprise. There is a component that I suspect will act like a fuse though.

Description of input......

The 5V DC adapter connects to the DC input connector. The voltage is provided with some filtering via C1 and L1. The supply passes through the surface mount ferrite inductor L1 and is presented to the reverse polarity protection diode D1. If the polarity is correct, the supply is further filtered by C2 and L2. The supply then enters the Charge and System power management IC type bq24032ARHLT. This IC will control the charging of the Lithium battery and power supplied to the cameras circuits.

If an incorrect polarity power supply is connected to the camera the protection diode D1 will conduct heavily to protect the power management IC. The high current draw through L1 will likely overload it and it will fail open circuit or even desolder iself from the PCB !  (I have witnessed such)

If an overvoltage has been applied to the cameras DC input, it is possible that the bq24032 IC has been damaged.

Where is L1 ? ..... L1 is located on the opposite side of the PCB to that of the DC connector. It looks like a large grey surface mount resistor but it is made of ferrite material. Check that it reads virtually zero ohms across its connections. Also check that the protection diode D1 has not gone short circuit by checking it with a multimeter.

Hope this helps

Fraser

[pimpinge46]

Hi fraser,
That makes it a lot easier.  I did test L1 when I first pulled it apart. I have a feeling it's the ic, but will check everything else first.
 
Thanks
Dave

[Fraser]

Hiya,

Just in case needed.... some badly annotated pictures showing component positions.

IC1 is a bit of a pig to replace I regret to say. You will definitely need a decent hot air station to remove it and to fit a new one.

Download the datasheet and have a good check around its pins before declaring it dead.

The Datasheet is too large to attach, but may be found here

http://www.ti.com/product/BQ24032A

Fraser

[pimpinge46]

Fraser,
Thank you very much!!!!  It end up being the diode  (d1) lifted one leg and now it works fine. It looks like it was shorted . I would like to replace it but need to figure out what the value is first. For now everything is working fine and I have the factory charger so I'm not to worried. Thanks again

[Fraser]

The marking on the diode is "AE" with the manufacturer ID "LF"

It is a Little Fuse TVS protection diode type SMAJ5.0A

These can go short circuit for a variety of reasons. The important thing is that it did so and saved your camera from further damage.

I attach the datasheet. Any TVS diode with similar specifications will work in this role.

Specs are as follows:

Transient Voltage suppressor type SMAJ5.0A

Reverse stand-off voltage = 5.0V
Breakdown Voltage = 6.40V to 7.00V
Maximum clamping voltage = 9.2V
Max peak pulse current = 43.5A
Max reverse leakage current = 800uA

Give the dead one a suitable burial...... it gave its life to save your camera 

Fraser

[Fraser]

Just in case anyone needs it, I attach a better image of my input circuit schematic.

I suspect that there is also a tantalum capacitor across the supply rail as well but re-assembled my camera last night so cannot check. It is sitting adjacent to the TVS diode D1 on the PCB. Tantalum capacitors can be another failure prone component and can even suffer a burn-up when they fail.

Fraser

[Bill W]

I hope the tantalum is not that exposed to the outside world or it will go sooner or later from input surge as it charges up from the 2.2mF or whatever lurking in the PSU.  Should be after L2 at least and 25V, or Al electrolytic.

Bill

[Fraser]

I hate not knowing so I disassembled my i5 again.

The Tant capacitor near to D1 IS NOT connected to the DC input circuit. It just looked like it might be, hence I thought I had missed it off of the sketch I did.

I should also correct my sketch to show D1 as a TVS diode that protects against transients and over voltage situations, as well as reverse polarity. Can't be bothered to do so at the moment though

Fraser

[pimpinge46]

Just a quick update. The unit charges fine , shows when it plugged in the screen and led on the light up and changes color when charged. The only strange thing that it does is, if you remove the plug the led will not shut off unless u pull the battery or hit the reset button. The only thing I can think of is mabye the chip got damage at some point. But that's something I can live with just happy it's charging now and I allready replaced the protection diode so no more damage will occur.

[Fraser]

My i5 has a red LED, the light from which is just visible in the keypad area. I noted that even when I switch off my i5 that this LED remains lit. I believe this has something to do with the stanby states of these cameras.

The E4 has two standby states...... Standby 1 is after the power button is pressed to turn off the camera. This places the camera in 'Hot' standby, ready to run in seconds after the power button is pressed. After a period of time the camera goes from Standby 1 to Standby 2. Standby 2 is effectively 'Off' and when the power button is pressed the camera has to go through the complete boot sequence before it is up and running. Maybe the i5 is similar in its behaviour ?

I shall check my i5 behaviour for you today.

Fraser

[Fraser]

OK I have just placed my i5 on charge in order to check the LED behaviour. I have not used it since purchase so did not note if the charge LED stayed lit after charge.

I have taken some pictures of the cameras current LED state. The power pack is connected to the camera and the Charge LED is lit Orange. It extinguishes as soon as I disconnect the power pack. I will test it again once it has gone to green.

I have also captured an image of the very dim red LED light that may be seen coming from behind the keypad. It is dim so I had to take a picture in a darkened room to capture it. This red light is present even after the camera is switched off and I suspect it indicates that the camera is in Standby 1 state so ready for a 'Hot' start. The light is not light bleed coming from the Orange charge LED.

Finally I include a picture of the power pack that I am using with my camera. The original was missing so I bought a nice quality Sony unit that is used with their Tablet computers and rated at the required 5C @ 2A. I tend to buy new or used power packs that were intended for use with quality branded equipment in preference to @universal' or 'Generic' power packs from China. The branded units tend to be of better quality (if genuine and not Fake !) I bought several of these Sony SGPAC5V2 units from a Sony dealer at £9 each. They are perfect for this camera and my NEC AVIO F30's. The connector is also the correct size which is a bonus. For info, any charger of charge cable designed for the SONY PSP is suitable for the i5. I also bought a Sony PSP cable that has a USB A connector at one end and both a charger plug and Mini USB at the other. Perfect for the i5 and t costs around £2 from China.

Fraser

[Fraser]

Looking at the PCB pictures that i took during the i5 teardown, I can see the small LED responsible for the red glow behind the cameras keypad.
I placed a circle around the LED on the attached picture. I would expect such an LED to be a form of 'Heartbeat' indicator that shows that the camera is running, but in Standby 1 mode, ready to restart without a full boot.

Fraser

[Fraser]

OK confirmed, the Charge LED does go to Green on my camera when fully charged and it DOES extinguish when the power pack is disconnected.

This does suggest a problem remains in the camera. How serious this is depends upon its nature. Removing the battery or a full Reset via the reset button likely removes power from the peripheral circuits around the microprocessor and so so unlatches the power to the Charge indicator. I have not looked at the charge circuit in any detail but it would be worth looking at the charge status signals coming out of the charge controller and then look at any LED driver circuit associated with such. You may well find a fault in the LED driver circuit, rather than the charge controller.

I suspect your camera was exposed to an over voltage event at the DC in connector. The charge controller is exposed to damage from such but that damage will normally kill it so the TVS diode may have saved it from damage. There could be other circuits connected to the DC input jack that were not o lucky though. An simple LED driver could well be connected directly to the DC input connector as it does not require any regulation etc. The charge indicator could be some form of simple flip-flop that is driven from the charge controller. Part of it may have become damaged and once in that state, stays on until power is removed.

It is worth investigating further as using the RESET or puling the battery is not ideal and could be unhealthy for the camera.

Fraser

[pimpinge46]

The funny thing about it , is when it's fully charged and you pull the plug it goes from lite green to orange and if you plug it right back it changes to lite green.  Also confirmed that the rest button does not turn only pulling the battery. And finally it will only charge the factory battery(green one )not the afterror market one that I have. What would cause that?

[pimpinge46]

Also let tell you about the history of the unit. I purchased it used a few weeks ago the guy told me it wouldnot charge and he thought it was the battery so he bought an aftermarket one. He did mention he lost the charger at one point and bought a new one (oem).i Was able to charge the battery externally by applying voltage to the red and black wires on the battery and they had no issues holding charge or running the unit. But it  strange that the oem will only charge in the unit now and not the aftermarket one.

[Fraser]

Hiya,

the charge management datasheet contains all that you need to reverse engineer the iX series charge circuit. It is a pretty good datasheet unlike some

I attach relevant diagrams extracted from the datasheet which may be found here:

http://www.ti.com/lit/ds/symlink/bq24032a.pdf

The bq240xx series charge management IC is a pretty clever design. Here are the highlights......

1. It can tolerate up to 18 Volts on its input so it would not be damaged by the inappropriate use of a 12V adapter (most common over-voltage)
2. The IC automatically takes its supply from either the DC input or the USB socket
3. If neither the DC input nor the USB input have voltage on them, the IC goes into sleep mode whilst maintaining power from the battery to the system that it services.
4. There are two charge state output pins. 'State 1' is the fast charge indicator and 'State 2' is the charge complete indicator. Both are open drain FETS and can sink 15mA.
5. The IC uses a thermistor to measure cell temperature. A 10K NTC thermistor is the most common.

So what can we deduce form the above in your case.

1. It is unlikely that the IC was damaged by an over voltage at the DC input unless it exceeded 18V
2. The two 'State' outputs will be driving the Orange (Fast Charge) and Green (Charge complete) LED's, likely via a separate LED buffer stage to protect the IC from over-current on these outputs.
3. The IC goes into a sleep mode when no voltage is present on either the DC input or USB inputs. The drive to the two 'State' outputs will be removed and both should be off (Open Drain).
4. The Li-Ion cell should have a 10K NTC thermistor present in its package. If a 3rd party cell does not contain the thermistor and associated connections to the plug, it will not be charged.

You really need to take a close look at the drive circuit around the LED charge indicator and check that the two State outputs from the IC go to their 'off' condition when the DC power and USB link is removed from the camera. If they do not go to the off condition, the IC may be faulty or it may be seeing a voltage on its input pins.

I suspect that you will find a simple buffer circuit between the IC and the two LEDs. That buffer circuit may have been exposed to teh over-voltage and a component damaged causing the wierd LED behaviour.

I regret I do not have the spare time to reverse engineer the charge circuit for you. The datasheet will provide a pretty good guide, minus the LED buffer stage (if used). That buffer should be relatively easy to reverse engineer though and I remember a cluster of components near to the LED's so they may be what you are looking for.

NOTE: This IC uses a heat plate in the bottom of its package. It may only be removed safely using a hot air or IR rework station.

Fraser

[Fraser]

Last bit of input from me for the moment.....

I have looked at my teardown pictures and ringed the two charge LED's that are adjacent to the DC input socket.
On the reverse side of the PCB, in the same location, there is a little cluster of components. I believe these may be involved with buffering the LED's but I cannot check this as my camera is re-assembled. This cluster of components and associated SMD multi legged component is where I would be looking for your fault first. First determine whether the cluster of components are connected to the the LED's. If so, it is most likely the buffer of which I speak and the cause of your problem.

Over to you........

Fraser

[Fraser]

This may also help you....

Component marked 'KLA' may be the BAT54TW diode pack as detailed in the attached data sheet.

Fraser

[Fraser]

Component marked 'AB' may be the Zetex BCW60B NPN transistor

AB is quite a common marking however but I would expect it to be a transistor so this looks a possible match.

Fraser

[Fraser]

'AB' could also be more diodes but the circuit will identify which makes most sense in this application.

MMBD4448HTS Schottky

Or even a Zener diode !

MMBZ5226B Zener

[pimpinge46]

Great thanks for the info!

[Fraser]

I recently purchased a faulty FLIR i7 as a little fun project camera.

The fault symptoms are intermittent operation and no battery charging...... I wonder which IC is responsible for power management and charging ? 

I ordered the replacement BQ24032ARHLT IC and a spare from China supplier www.SICSTOCK.com. I will fit it once the i7 camera arrives. The IC is very inexpensive, but you do need a hot air station to remove and fit this IC as it is a 20-QFN-EP and has a soldered thermal plate for a heat spreader on its underside. 

Fraser

[Fraser]

A job for my OKI hot air pencil me thinks 

The IC is 20 QFN and measures 4.5mm x 3.5mm

Interesting to work with 

Fraser

[pimpinge46]

I haven't had a chance to mess with mine in a while, hopefully thats your problem .. Keep us updated!!!

[Fraser]

The i7 has now arrived with me.

Symptoms are....

Battery is New and FLIR OEM part, but fully discharged.
Camera will not charge the battery and no Charge LED lit
Camera will not switch on when powered by external PSU and with battery removed

Battery charged fine when charged externally. In great condition as only fitted in Feb 2017.

When battery refitted in camera the camera Charge LED lights
When camera turned on it boots fine but Charge LED remains lit orange.
At top left of screen the external power symbol is present even though no external power is connected.

Camera performs as normal but if the battery is left connected it will be discharged by the Charge LED that remains lit.

Looks like my i7 has a failed TVS diode and likely either the Power management IC or the Charging current sense circuit.

More when I have time to delve further within the unit.

Fraser

[Fraser]

An update on my poorly i7

The TVS protection diode was not shorted.
There was 15.2 Ohms measured across the external power input and 0V rail.
The fault was in the BQ24032a Power management IC.

Not unexpected, hence why I had already bought a couple for this repair.
This is an IC that requires suitable SMT rework tools for its replacement.

New BQ24032a IC fitted. Camera now works as it should and battery charges.

Repair complete.

Fraser