Repairing Kessil A360W no light

[_AV]

Some of my previous repairs:

Radion XR30 shuts off at high intensity on blue channel - repair

Some of my previous repairs: https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/radion-xr30-complete-no-light-repair.792711/ https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/radion-xr15-doesnt-power-on-due-to-corrosion-repair.809136/ https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/another-attempt-at-fixing-apex-eb832.804717/ And as always...

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Radion XR30 complete no light repair

My previous electronic equipment repairs Radion XR15: https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/radion-lights-board-level-repair.774331/#post-8197536 A fellow reefer mailed me their Ecotech Radion for repair service as it's long been out of warranty. The unit turns on briefly before shutting down and...

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Radion XR15 doesn't power on due to corrosion repair

Some of my previous repairs: https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/radion-xr30-complete-no-light-repair.792711/ https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/another-attempt-at-fixing-apex-eb832.804717/ https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/ai-hydra-fan-connector-repair-significant-corrosion.793402/ And as always...

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Another attempt at fixing Apex EB832

Some of my previous repairs: https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/radion-xr30-complete-no-light-repair.792711/ https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/radion-lights-board-level-repair.774331/ https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/ai-hydra-fan-connector-repair-significant-corrosion.793402/ First off, let me...

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And as always, uncensored, updated and corrected versions of my repair articles are a quick internet search away.

A fellow reefer asked me to look into their Kessil A360W blue tuna light which does not turn on.
Kessils are quite compact but powerful lights. This adds certain complexity to the repair.
The primary hope is that the LED array works and the problem is somewhere else on the main board.
Let's take it apart and look inside:

Not looking too bad. There is a bit of dust here and there, but otherwise everything looks fairly clean.
Looking closer at the board explains why the condition is good:

You may be able to see that the board has a shiny hue to it. This is a protective silicone coating over the entire board. It prevents salt and humidity related oxidation that we are so used to seeing on other lights.

Let's keep going. The goal is to take the board out and connect it to the bench power supply for testing:

Testing power input indicates a short to ground, but where is it?

Protective coating is great to protect against corrosion but it makes it harder to diagnose and repair issues. It has to be removed prior to repair.

Let's use some voltage injection we used with other lights to find it. That brings us to these diodes:

You can see that I had to remove protective coating to get to the diodes to test them.

Removing the first diode also removes the short! Aren't we lucky today.
This diode turns out to be to protect the light from reverse polarity among other things in it's protection circuit.

Let's grab a brand new diode, repeal and replace:

Now we just need to restore the protective coating and let it dry:


And the light is working again:

 

[Scorpius]

Threads like this is what makes any forum great. Good job.

 

[SOAHC]

Nice write up, I have a kessil 360we an everytime I plugged it into the power brick I hear a poping sound an nothing works. I end up having to unplugged the brick from the wall an plugg it back in for it to work again. I've tried 3 different power bricks all with the same result. I know the problem happened when a small part of the hanging chain jammed up the fan an I suspect it over heated. I took it apart and cleaned it, didn't see anything that looked burnt up or abnormal. Any advice? Thanks

 

[_AV]

Nice write up, I have a kessil 360we an everytime I plugged it into the power brick I hear a poping sound an nothing works. I end up having to unplugged the brick from the wall an plugg it back in for it to work again. I've tried 3 different power bricks all with the same result. I know the problem happened when a small part of the hanging chain jammed up the fan an I suspect it over heated. I took it apart and cleaned it, didn't see anything that looked burnt up or abnormal. Any advice? Thanks

Hard to tell for sure, but this behavior is consistent with a short somewhere in the light. The popping sound is possibly due to a short triggering the power supply into overload protection to avoid further damage.

 

[reefpizza]

Any idea why in my 360we the spectrum knob dont work but from an external 0-10v controller it work?
Maybe i have the knob damaged?

 

[_AV]

Could be the knob or could also be the circuit that sends the signal from the knob to the controller.

 

[shadow1013]

I got a A160 from someone on marketplace when they did their tank teardown. I had it on for a bit and the blue lights started flickering until they went out, the whites stay on. I took the case off, couldn't take the lens off as either the screw stripped or my allen tip stripped, and there was so much dust covering the heatsink. Cleaned that and put it back together and still have the issue. The fan is noisy so I'm going to look to see if that needs cleaning. What would you suggest I look at next if that doesn't help? Since they come on at first and turn off not sure if heat related or other issue. Thanks.

 

[_AV]

I got a A160 from someone on marketplace when they did their tank teardown. I had it on for a bit and the blue lights started flickering until they went out, the whites stay on. I took the case off, couldn't take the lens off as either the screw stripped or my allen tip stripped, and there was so much dust covering the heatsink. Cleaned that and put it back together and still have the issue. The fan is noisy so I'm going to look to see if that needs cleaning. What would you suggest I look at next if that doesn't help? Since they come on at first and turn off not sure if heat related or other issue. Thanks.

I'd say either the LED matrix went bad, perhaps due to overheating. Or the issue is somewhere in the blue channel circuit. There is not much you could do with the matrix, but the circuit may be repairable.