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Warning: I had to choose between a full control board swap or just replacing the relay on a 5 year old dryer

The dryer had a dead heating element. The relay on the main board tested bad, but the board was $180. A new universal relay was $12 and a 30 minute solder job. I went with the relay fix to save the customer money. It worked for about a month, then the board failed completely from another fault, and I had to go back for the full swap anyway. Has anyone else had a universal relay fix backfire, or is it usually worth the gamble on older units?
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3 Comments
adam675
adam6755d ago
Ugh, that's rough and @rubyl35 is right, sometimes that first bad part is just the board starting to fail. I've learned to warn customers it's a gamble on anything over five years old.
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rubyl35
rubyl3514d ago
Oh man, that exact thing happened to me last year. Tried the cheap relay fix on a washing machine control board. Saved the customer a ton upfront, felt like a hero. Two weeks later, a different chip on the same board fried and took out the new relay with it. Ended up doing the full board swap anyway and eating the cost of the second service call. Sometimes those older boards are just on their last legs and one part failing is the first sign of the whole thing going.
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cameroncarr
But a good repair can still buy them a lot of time.
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