Lowrance "Service"

[Michael Wright]

I have a Lowrance Elite 7 Hdi which is about 18 months old. It stopped booting up properly and the right and down arrow buttons were not working properly. I contacted Navico and was informed that that they no longer repaired the units once out of warranty but if I would like to send them $574 they would send me a refurbished one. This really P'd me of as I dabble with computers and mobile phones and it seemed ridiculous that some thing as simple as this could not be sorted for a $100 or so. Anyway I decided to have a go myself, the booting issue was solved by a hard reset I then did a firmware update and everything was ok again. This left the buttons to fix, I removed the back of the unit and removed the motherboard to find a bit of corrosion under where the buttons pressed on the board, sprayed on a bit of contact cleaner and removed the corrosion. Put it all back together again plugged it in and away it went. The whole process took around an hour. So for $36 for a set of torx screwdrivers and a tin of contact cleaner I saved myself $540. I took a few pictures and anyone who needs to pull a Lowrance apart let me know

[Chimo]

You may have found your calling!

Where are you located?

Chimo

[TheRealPoMo]

Had similar with a 2 month old Lowrance VHF set. Dog chewed through the mic cord. Got offered a similar deal but fixed it myself. ..not as well as yourself obviously because it has failed after 12 months.
Should have taken the deal...

[littlejim]

Onya Michael!
Shows moisture can get in.
Any one got a totally waterproof sounder?

[scottar]

Onya Michael!
Shows moisture can get in.
Any one got a totally waterproof sounder?

Yep. Comes in the form of a house brick and string. Only waterproof one I saw in 20 years. Anything else will eventually let water in. Best option is to keep the stuff dry. The water gets in a couple of different common ways IMO from what I have seen. The first is salt crystals forming and pushing the seals out around buttons. The second is due to rapid thermal changes creating a vacuum in the unit and sucking water in - either through a chart door or past a seal. The most common causes of this are the punter that that likes to hose everything when he gets home, heavy rain or a big wall of spray hitting a unit that has been sitting in the sun and heated up. The water induced cooling just sucks the moisture in. Over the years there have been a few radar scanners that were specials for this in the big tropical storms as well.

[scottar]

I have a Lowrance Elite 7 Hdi which is about 18 months old. It stopped booting up properly and the right and down arrow buttons were not working properly. I contacted Navico and was informed that that they no longer repaired the units once out of warranty but if I would like to send them $574 they would send me a refurbished one. This really P'd me of as I dabble with computers and mobile phones and it seemed ridiculous that some thing as simple as this could not be sorted for a $100 or so. Anyway I decided to have a go myself, the booting issue was solved by a hard reset I then did a firmware update and everything was ok again. This left the buttons to fix, I removed the back of the unit and removed the motherboard to find a bit of corrosion under where the buttons pressed on the board, sprayed on a bit of contact cleaner and removed the corrosion. Put it all back together again plugged it in and away it went. The whole process took around an hour. So for $36 for a set of torx screwdrivers and a tin of contact cleaner I saved myself $540. I took a few pictures and anyone who needs to pull a Lowrance apart let me know

Well done Michael. Lucky you got to it before the corrosion killed the tracks all together. To the best of my knowledge, Navico has never "repaired" anything. If a software update or reset doesn't fix it they will issue a new one if under warranty or as you discovered, attempt to keep the customer on side through an exchange program.

[Michael Wright]

I had GME G-Comb in a boat I bought a couple of years ago, it failed and they couldn't do enough to get it fixed,best service ever and all free of charge. I've had lowrance for years and when the Elite failed I bought a HDS 10 to replace it but it will be the last Lowrance I buy.



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[Michael Wright]

Also there is no waterproofing as such just a rubber gasket around the outside.


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[Chimo]

Michael

what are you like at clearing sunburnt screens?

[Michael Wright]

Never done one


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[Michael Wright]

Chimo I have just had just had a quick check and you are probably up for a new screen from what I've seen. In itself its not a big job and they're as cheap as chips just a matter of getting the right one


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[Michael Wright]

Did a bit more research. Google furuno fish finder LCD display how to repair diy


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[Coontakinta]

Also there is no waterproofing as such just a rubber gasket around the outside.


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Aren't / Weren't these units filled with nitrogen to prevent water ingress?

[scottar]

Aren't / Weren't these units filled with nitrogen to prevent water ingress?

They haven't been nitrogen filled since the old large black cased units - lms-350 type vintage. It was a dismal failure anyway. We had people on their 5th and 6th units for fogging up.