Ever fix something without having any idea how you did it?
 

I had a 2005 explorer come in last week with the odometer and information display out. I had diagnosed it this past summer , I knew that all the circuts to the cluster were working.
I pulled the cluster out last monday, and before shipping it off to the rebuilder, I opened it up, to look for any obvious signs of cold flow solder joints failing. I had recently repaired one on a 2004, and it was easy peasy. This one was much more complex when I opened it up, and after looking for 30 minutes or so, I said " this is one for the pro's " and mailed it off to my rebuilder.
He calls me back and says that there is nothing wrong with it, it works perfectly . He said that he threw every test at it that he could think of , including heating it , and cooling it.
I did touch and manipulate all the connectors, and solder joints that I thought that would have been relevant to the LCD's functioning, and somehow must have gotten lucky, because I just re-installed it, and it is working 100%.

Funny, I just did the same thing on my new Saab beater. Instruments kept flickering. Talked to a guy in Canada who said to reflow the solder. I reflowed everything on the board. Now it works.

Happens to me all the time. The bike will be running rough or not at all. I'll take it apart, stare at the pieces with my mouth hanging open for a while. Then put it back together and everything is fine.

Never know what was wrong or how I fixed it.

Honda lawmower wouldnt start. I took the carb off, it fell apart in my hands when it came off. I put it back together, had a couple of pieces left over when I was done. The thing is running like a champ two years later.. go figure.

I get nervous when this kind of thing happens. How do I know it wont revert the the previous (broken) state again?

I hsd a lawnmower once that WOULD NOT START. Man I was angry with it. I came outside with the .45 and was going to blast it when I thought I'd give it one more try; and it started.




I found out at a later date it wasn't really the mower at fault. The air cleaner had never been cleaned.




.

I work in IT, and this happens all the time.

+1

Sorry Fred, but you haven't fixed a thing. You have an intermittent problem and it left your shop in the "ON" state by chance. It will be "OFF" again soon and no doubt, you will hear about it! :)

Georg

:D

Did you "fix" it?

Danged if I know...ask me a year from now :p

Happens all the time with Italian cars.

If you poke it enough, or check the monitors on a faulty system just one more time, or rerun the exact same configuration script or compile/activate the exact same code, they somehow get fixed without explanation. That is often the nature of Information Technology (IT for short). No pixie dust or magic wand required...

-Z

Beat me to it!

I always explain to people, if it's working now I get the credit, whether or not I did anything!

Oh, I lived IT too Z...I understand completely :D. Easiest way to "fix" a problem....turn on a trace (won't happen while you're watching for it) :p

my 951 was blowing fuses in the power windows last summer. took apart the regulators, took apart the doors, followed the wiring up to the fuse, replaced the switches, into the relays ... never found a short. did this several times even, never found anything.

then one day it stopped blowing fuses. hasnt blown one since.

no idea ...

although my father could build just about anything from houses to boats to blowout preventors.. he didn't know motors.. he would tear apart something, put it back together and sometimes, somehow it would run again. always got the same answer everytime I asked him about it. what was wrong?.. I fixed it. what was the problem? I fixed it. what did you do to make it run? I fixed it.

I know you are right, and I have advised the customer of this, however, it did come into my shop in the "off " state" . I am guessing that either banging the cluster around during removal, or my manipulating all the connections, and solder joints made it go into the " on " state"
I just find it odd, that my rebuilder could not find anything wrong with it, these guys are good and fix everything...

You are a luckier man than me.

The fuel gauge on the wife's Tahoe had been erratic for some time.

Assumed sticky float but unlike a car access requires dropping the tank so I ignored it / her.

One day the fuel pump goes so now I have no choice. Of course it went on her way home from filling the tank.

Dropping a Tahoe tank by yourself with the vehicle on the ground is not pleasant.

Long story short get it all back together, toss enough gas in to get me to the gas station and fill up.

I get back to the house and she's all excited, "is the gauge still acting weird?" she asks.

I say "nope, now it doesn't work at all"

FML

This is a good example of "percussive maintenance"

Worked all the time on the old tube TVs - before doing anything inside it was accepted practice to give a wack with a flat hand. I still apply this to most anything that quits working - it it wakes up you know you can hold off on a fix for the intermittent problem that is likely to be a loose connector - somewhere.

It is the reason that DIYers save so much money - we can accept that the problem may recur and we can try again later - a business wouldn't tolerate this so they are stuck replacing parts.

I work in Live corporate events and we use the phrase - Evolve immediately --

Sometimes my spouse is upset with me. And then later she is not. I don't know what I did to cause or fix the problem.