How long do digital chips last?

[Chadow]

Hi all,

How long do C7005 chips last?  I know this is a complex question, but a bit of backgound first.  Six years ago, I started chipping my 1950s Vanwalls and Maserati 250s (scalextric) and BRMs/Alfa/Lancias etc., from Cartrix.  Bought a batch of 10  chips direct from Scalextric themselves.  I chipped all 10 cars over a weekend.

In the last month or so, four of the cars (so far) firstly, suddenly ran slow mid race, then 'zoomed' and crashed.  Re-setting the chip identity would work for a short while, then the problem would repeat itself.  Finally, the cars would 'forget' their identity completely and just zoom with no control at all.

All cars work perfectly in analogue mode.

No car has run for significantly longer than any other

All are stored in the same conditions.

It is only the Cartrix cars that are doing this - so far!

Does this sound familiar to anyone?

Any fix that anyone knows?

Cheers

Chas

 

[Andy P.]

There is a guy on the SlotForum forum called GregK who can diagnose and repair chips.

Faults can be caused by a wide variety of things and he has pretty much seen them all.

[woodcote]

Hi Chadow. All the Scalextric chips default to an analogue setting if they cannot 'find' the digital command signal in the power rails. That's why you get a 'runaway' - the chip switches to analogue, but the rails are getting full digital power - 'zoom' is a perfect description! The causes for this are often poor track condition or loose connections (car or track), sometimes an intermittent fault in the powerbase or in the chips themselves. Some chips are more prone to runaways than others. My experience is that the C7005 chips are not the worst, but neither are they the best.

 

From what you describe, I would ask myself what changed 'a month or so' ago? If you made any modifications or added new hardware, have a look at that. It could be the track needs a good clean or some maintenance (eg tightening the tabs), which is covered here: www.scalextric.com/uk-en/support/track-maintenance - but I'm sure you've already considered those things.

 

With four chips (so far) out of ten showing problems, it is definitely worth examining each six-year old installation and perhaps carefully desoldering and re-soldering the chips to the guide and the motor. If I had a similar issue, I would suspect my soldering (it's not bad, but I'm no professional). There is also the risk of considerable wear-and-tear at the guide end wiring and I'm sure everything is quite cramped inside those lovely vintage F1s.

 

Finally, as Andy said, Greg's 'All About The Chips' does offer any number of chip repair and upgrade services - as well as far more expert advice than I can offer. One option is to remove the analogue mode from the chip - you'd have to balance the loss of analogue running with the permanent elimination of 'runaways'. All About The Chips can be found here: www.slotforum.com/forums/index.php?showforum=425

 

I hope that helps.

[Chadow]

Thanks Andy for that info.

Woodcote, I think that you may be on to something here - all the 'failures' are on cars with copper braids - and only those with copper braids - the tinned silver braided cars are fine.  A darned good clean first at the slot end and I will see what happens - and report.

The track is a new set up and is copper-taped over the steel rails and I run RCS 64, so though possible a fault has developed, I will try the installation problem first.

Cheers

Chas