Celestron Service in Australia

[Johno]

Has anyone had any experience of having their Celestron gear serviced in Australia? Is it done by Extravision or any of the dealers? If so what was the quality of work and turnaround time like?

John.

[[1ponders]]

I've recently just had a C11 cleaned of fungus inside and out (full pull down) by Bintel in Sydney. Quality of the work was great, bit of a mixup with return courier, but otherwise great.

[Johno]

Thanks Paul. I know Bintel have good Meade training and I suppose one SCT is much the same as the next but what about Celestron mounts and electronics? What about warranty service in Australia? I believe that Extravision do this. Has anyone had any experience of this?

[gary]

People such as Don Whiteman at Bintel have also had extensive training at
Celestron in California over the years.

Best Regards

Gary

[bobson]

Hi

I have Celestron NextStar 80 GTL, just bought it second hand. Played with it, decided 8 AA batteries don't last long and would be better to hook it on car battery. Made everything, checked polarisation and still hooked it wrongly :( and blew up stepper motor circuit. I had 1 in 2 chances to do it right, but it went wrong, how the hell can I win lotto than?

Now, where in Australia can I buy this circuit?
I know which part blew up, its L293DD, not available in Australia, can order it through x-on website but its printed circuit.

Who can do surcafe mount soldering in Perth, or maybe someone on this forum could do it, I will pay of course. Some companies here in Perth ask $100 just to change this little part with 20 legs :(

Can anyone help please!

Thanks in advance

bob

Here are the pics:

[mswhin63]

Generally you have showed up damage that has shown up on the outside, with that sort of damage there is more than likely more internal damage with other components on the board. I wouldn't risk it; source a new board.

I think I would love to be a service centre but not quite ready as yet and wouldn't start until i studied the curcuitry anyway. Maybe I could get rid of one of my stupid contracts, but it makes good money at the moment.

[netwolf]

I think some time ago Bintel did sell Celestron gear and recently I think they have again started to list Celestron gear.

[bobson]

I'd love to get new board, I assume there is more damage than just one part, but thats where I'd start. Maybe, if I am lucky thats the only thing that blew up.

I emailed Celestron asking for new board, no response yet. I'll call Bintel tomorrow to see if they can help. I also called Celestron in Sydney, she took my number as someone will call me about it, and nothing.

Malcolm,

Looks like you know something about surface mount soldering, but you don't have time for it. It's only one little 20 legged part :)

cheers

bob

[Barrykgerdes]

Repairing PCB's these days is not worth the trouble. You need the skill of a micro surgeon and get paid at the rate of forced labour.

I looked at the picture and repairing that board could take all day (at $120 per hr) it would probably be cheaper to buy a new telescope. Yesterday I replaced a 74LS14 chip on a board. It took an hour just to get the old chip off the board without damaging the board. After replacing it there was still another fault so the board was discarded.

I do do some PCB repairs but I never get paid for it except by the experience

I recently fixed a board in my ETX125. It was a very simple fault an O/C choke on the dec board which I found on the first test. I shorted it out and the scope worked again. However disassembly and reassembly of the scope took three hours. I have been able to get a replacement board but it will still take me an hour or so to put it in. To repair this ETX125 commercially would have cost $500 about half the cost of a new item.

I have two or three motherboards for LX200 classics waiting repairs. One board I repaired took 9 years to get it right! I only do these boards for experience. My usual advice to an owner who has a faulty motherboard now that you can't get repair kits is. "Remove the OTA, salvage the undamaged parts and get a EQ6," or similar and mount it on that. It will be cheaper in the long run.

Barry

[Omaroo]

My guess is that most of these LSI chips you'll see on these boards are proprietary, and I severely doubt that you'd ever be able to source them anyway. I'm not certain ( ;) ), but these are not the sort of thing that manufacturers like Celestron and Meade want to sell to individuals.

Dick Smith anyone? :whistle:

[Barrykgerdes]

Hi Chris

Yes this is normal. The manufactures do not like to supply these parts to individuals because it usually leads to more trouble than it is worth although they would probably be happy to supply the parts if there was no risk of litigation. Just look at some of the comments from some of the inept USA users on the forums.

However both Celestron and Meade supply warranty and service parts to their accredited dealers if the parts are available. Bintel are accredited dealers and highly respected by both Celestron and Meade. If the repairs are practical Bintel can do them. Also Don and the Mike's have specialised contacts that can even do the impossible.

Barry

[koputai]

L293 is a very standard motor drive chip, you should be able to get it from RS, Farnell, or Digikey. Tricky Dicky etc will only have the DIP package, whereas you want the SMD. But as everyone says, if you can do it yourself all well and good, but paying someone to fix it may well not be worth it. Hopefully you can find a hobbyist locally who can do surface mount.

Cheers,
Jason.

[bobson]

I can get a part from x-on website in Australia. They get it from USA in 6-10 days. $8 for the part and $15 for postage from USA.
But as Malcolm said, this is obvious part that blew up, maybe there are other ones too, maybe not, its a risk. I found out that the guys who do game consols mods all do surface mount soldering, and that might be the way to go if I can't get a whole board.

Today I got call back from Celestron Australia, he asked me to send him pics of the board to see if he got some or if he can get some for me. So fingers crossed.

At the end of the day, if nothing works I'll sell it as is, maybe someone who knows how to fix it would buy it.

[mswhin63]

I have in the past done a lot but I don't have the gear for it now. Everything started to become throw away after a while and found doing less and less as the years went by.

I used to maintain Satellite and Microwave radio gear. Fiddly stuff RF side precision PCB antenna tracks.

The stuff started to get cheaper to buy versus labour charges to repair and most people just gave up on repairing, then so did I. Also needed glasses for many years as well but only recently decided to do something about it, so for a long time got out of the SMD/SMC soldering game.

ATM don't have the right gear, would consider doing things in the future but not right now, sorry.:shrug:

[bobson]

Thats OK Malcolm, I hope Celestron Australia will come up with solution. As you said, it might be more than one part that blew up. I am waiting for their advice.

Celestron from USA sent me email saying that they don't deal with Australia directly and to contact my local dealer.

I'll let everyone know how it goes. Lets see how good is Celestron service.

cheers

bob