Fried Gecko Anyone?

[David_AVD]

Last week we had a Denon hi-fi amplifier come in with the fault; "smoke came out then stopped working".

Here's the cause.  He was hiding right under the main filter capacitors.  When the owner switched the amplifier on, BAM, full +/- DC rails across the little critter!

Luckily (but not for him!), the only real damage was some burnt PCB traces.  You do have to take the whole amp apart to get the main board out though.

[bitwelder]

From the title I thought the subject of roasting was one of these:

Eh... R.I.P. the Reptile.

[mrflibble]

Is that a bit of chunky solder mask seasoning I see on that well fried gecko?

[David_AVD]

Yes, part of the solder mask did end up more attached the the Gecko than the PCB.   

[mrflibble]

Well, that'll teach it to lick the cap leads to see if there's any charge left!

[SeanB]

Not as bad as the 2 that were making out on a fence post, and his tail waved out to the side and touched the electric fence wire. Talk about going out with a bang.

[Simon]

Are there any darwin awards for geko's ? 

[SeanB]

I think they won it that day...................

[Simon]

I think they won it that day...................

Well nicer way to go

[vlf3]

Well, that'll teach it to lick the cap leads to see if there's any charge left!

This situation reminds me of a friend, who like myself in our school days, experimented with portable battery valves...
well I am retired you see; anyway, one day he tongue tested the L.T. Low Tension heater supply leads however,
he got the wrong pair and found 120 Volt DC, H.T. High Tension  boy did he jump... said he saw stars before his eyes.

[Ferroto]

Fried Geckos are delicious.

[paul23]

I get this quite regularly on air conditioning systems that I service.  Normally they just short out the mains and take a fuse, cap or pcb track out, all of which or easy to be repaired, unfortunately the lizards can´t be repaired.

I did have an incident last year where a lizard stepped across the mains filter cap, the fuse and main processor on the pcb.  There was nothing left of the lizard at all, other than a skeleton, the cpu was fried as well as a few miscellaneous components.  The fuse was alright though.  All in it cost around 2.000€ worth of damage.

They seem to prefer inverter systems for some reason.
 

[Simon]

maybe they like the frequecy they work at

[David_AVD]

I get this quite regularly on air conditioning systems that I service.  Normally they just short out the mains and take a fuse, cap or pcb track out, all of which or easy to be repaired, unfortunately the lizards can´t be repaired.

This variety of lizard is an introduced pest over here.  My dog does like chewing them (the slow ones) up though.   

[NiHaoMike]

I did have an incident last year where a lizard stepped across the mains filter cap, the fuse and main processor on the pcb.  There was nothing left of the lizard at all, other than a skeleton, the cpu was fried as well as a few miscellaneous components.  The fuse was alright though.  All in it cost around 2.000€ worth of damage.

They seem to prefer inverter systems for some reason.

Conformal coat the boards before installing them, always a good idea for outdoor electronics. (When I did a teardown on an old central A/C many years ago, I noticed that the the electronics bay had a lot of rust due to moisture.)

[Things]

Geckos provide hours of entertainment at night for our cat, worst part is she usually leaves them in the hallway outside someones bedroom.

[David_AVD]

I flick them down off the wall / ceiling and let the dog chase them.  It's rare for the Gecko to win that game.   

[Things]

Haha, I usually don't mind them in the house, seems to keep other bug infestations at bay like mozzies, cat always manages to find a few at  floor level and out in the yard to bring inside though.