Mitsubishi WD-60638 DLP FIXED
I recently had the joy of fixing a Mitsubishi WD-60638. The customer stated that her bulb went bad and after installing the new bulb, the TV started smoking and the TV would no longer turn on. She had taken it to a local shop that has been around for years, but after several weeks of getting the run-around about needing to order two fans, a new ballast and a color wheel, she got the TV delivered back EXACTLY like it left only $100 poorer.
The leads coming from the ballast to the lamp housing had melted the connector. even without being connected to the lamp the inside was so damaged it was arcing and smoking! The lamp housing didn't have any damage The technician said the only way to get a new connector was to to purchase the ballast as it comes with it (seems reasonable). As a temporary test, i simply spliced two female molex connectors , insulated them well from each other, and slid them over the lamps two pins and routed the ballast wires.
The lamp lit! This confirmed there wasn't a problem with the color wheel at all, as the ballast shouldn't get the turn on signal unless the wheel is up to speed. However a few minutes later the set powered immediately off with no cooldown period. The codes on the front panel flashed "42". Although I could not see this code listed in the service manual, a quick google search said that it is a fan code. By manually spinning the fans by hand, it seemed that the squirrel cage fan the blows on the lamp did not spin as freely as it should even though it WAS spinning. Once again as a temporary fix, i spliced a 12V CPU cooling fan with roughly the same RPMS as the mitsubishi fan into its place (i wanted to make sure the tachometer was going to see the same speed and think all was well. Surprize! set ran for several hours using external cooling with no issues whatsoever!
I found the lamp connectors without having to buy an entire ballast at Digikey:
https://www.digikey.com/us/en/ph/Mol...red%20Products
So now I just need to order and install the replacement fan available a lot of places but also Digikey:
http://www.digikey.com/product-detai...-00-ND/1633652
I'm still not sure that her original bulb was bad but I believe she shipped it back to Mitsubishi. I think from reading other threads that when she went to install the new lamp, she did not insert it fully, causing the arcing at the connector and subsequent smoke/melting. The slow fan may have contributed somewhat but I have no way of knowing.
Total cost of repair under $50. Just goes to show that even good companies can have sub-par or even dishonest technicians!
The leads coming from the ballast to the lamp housing had melted the connector. even without being connected to the lamp the inside was so damaged it was arcing and smoking! The lamp housing didn't have any damage The technician said the only way to get a new connector was to to purchase the ballast as it comes with it (seems reasonable). As a temporary test, i simply spliced two female molex connectors , insulated them well from each other, and slid them over the lamps two pins and routed the ballast wires.
The lamp lit! This confirmed there wasn't a problem with the color wheel at all, as the ballast shouldn't get the turn on signal unless the wheel is up to speed. However a few minutes later the set powered immediately off with no cooldown period. The codes on the front panel flashed "42". Although I could not see this code listed in the service manual, a quick google search said that it is a fan code. By manually spinning the fans by hand, it seemed that the squirrel cage fan the blows on the lamp did not spin as freely as it should even though it WAS spinning. Once again as a temporary fix, i spliced a 12V CPU cooling fan with roughly the same RPMS as the mitsubishi fan into its place (i wanted to make sure the tachometer was going to see the same speed and think all was well. Surprize! set ran for several hours using external cooling with no issues whatsoever!
I found the lamp connectors without having to buy an entire ballast at Digikey:
https://www.digikey.com/us/en/ph/Mol...red%20Products
So now I just need to order and install the replacement fan available a lot of places but also Digikey:
http://www.digikey.com/product-detai...-00-ND/1633652
I'm still not sure that her original bulb was bad but I believe she shipped it back to Mitsubishi. I think from reading other threads that when she went to install the new lamp, she did not insert it fully, causing the arcing at the connector and subsequent smoke/melting. The slow fan may have contributed somewhat but I have no way of knowing.
Total cost of repair under $50. Just goes to show that even good companies can have sub-par or even dishonest technicians!