Vent: A whole week of 'no fault found' repairs just broke my streak

Last week in the shop, I had five jobs in a row where the issue vanished when I put my probes on the board. The last one was a gaming laptop from a guy in Tacoma that kept shutting off, but it ran fine on my bench for two days straight. I spent hours checking connections and reflowing points just in case, but I had to call each customer and tell them I couldn't find the problem. Has anyone else had a run of these ghost faults and found a better way to catch them?

4 comments

4 Comments

the_sam2mo ago

Read an article about thermal cameras catching faults that vanish at room temp. Might be worth renting one for a day to scan boards under load. Those intermittent power drops can show up as a tiny hot spot before they fail.

harper9142mo ago

Renting one for a day" sounds wild to me. I figured those thermal cameras were like lab-only gear that costs a fortune. The idea you can just grab one is a game changer for finding those ghosts.

jakewhite2mo ago

Just don't rent it from a ghost hunting store.

reese_hayes7114d ago

Rent one from a local tool library if you got one nearby, they usually have em for like $50 a day. Bonus tip: tape a piece of cardboard over the lens to diffuse the image a bit, makes those tiny hot spots pop out way more against the background.