Programmable Logic DesignLine Blog
Smoke re-concentrator refurbishes blown electronic components
Clive Maxfield
1/28/2013 3:24 PM EST
You know what it's like when you connect a power supply to your system with the incorrect polarity – or maybe you connect the power supply the right way round, but you've inadvertently soldered the pins of some component to the wrong power plane(s) – and "poof" – a small cloud of pungent-smelling smoke appears.
Many people think that this is "game over" and the component in question can no longer function. What you may not realize is that it was only the concentrated smoke that was loaded into the component under extreme pressure during the manufacturing process that made it work in the first place.
In the not-so-distant past, almost any old smoke would do. More recently, we've seen the introduction of solid crystalline smoke because of its small feature size... that popping sound you hear when you apply the incorrect potential to the component is the rapid phase change from solid crystal to gas (the gaseous form is the one with which we are most familiar).
Furthermore, the rumor on the street is that, for next-generation silicon chips implemented at the 20nm process node and below, they are going to have to dispense with even the solid crystalline smoke – my contacts tell me that they're just going to fill the space with individual Bucky-balls and hope for the best.
As one engineer told me: "It's amazing how much black smoke they can fit into even a small FPGA these days, and once it's out there is no getting it back in again – even if you catch it all in a jam jar."
Well, I can certainly understand where he's coming from, but that's because he's not acquainted with the Electrical Smoke Re-concentrator from those clever folks at AEROstich.com:
When you read the product description on the AEROstich.com website, I think you will agree that this little scamp looks like a "must have" for every workshop, and it's a bargain at the price!
If you found this article to be interest, visit Microcontroller / MCU Designline where – in addition to my Max's Cool Beans blogs on all sorts of "stuff" – you will find the latest and greatest design, technology, product, and news articles with regard to all aspects of designing and using microcontrollers.
Also, you can obtain a highlights update delivered directly to your inbox by signing up for my weekly newsletter – just Click Here to request this newsletter using the Manage Newsletters tab (if you aren't already a member you'll be asked to register, but it's free and painless so don't let that stop you [grin]).
Last but certainly not least, make sure you check out all of the discussions and other information resources at All Programmable Planet. For example, in addition to blogs by yours truly, microcontroller expert Duane Benson is learning how to use FPGAs to augment (sometimes replace) the MCUs in his robot (and other) projects.
Many people think that this is "game over" and the component in question can no longer function. What you may not realize is that it was only the concentrated smoke that was loaded into the component under extreme pressure during the manufacturing process that made it work in the first place.
In the not-so-distant past, almost any old smoke would do. More recently, we've seen the introduction of solid crystalline smoke because of its small feature size... that popping sound you hear when you apply the incorrect potential to the component is the rapid phase change from solid crystal to gas (the gaseous form is the one with which we are most familiar).
Furthermore, the rumor on the street is that, for next-generation silicon chips implemented at the 20nm process node and below, they are going to have to dispense with even the solid crystalline smoke – my contacts tell me that they're just going to fill the space with individual Bucky-balls and hope for the best.
As one engineer told me: "It's amazing how much black smoke they can fit into even a small FPGA these days, and once it's out there is no getting it back in again – even if you catch it all in a jam jar."
Well, I can certainly understand where he's coming from, but that's because he's not acquainted with the Electrical Smoke Re-concentrator from those clever folks at AEROstich.com:
When you read the product description on the AEROstich.com website, I think you will agree that this little scamp looks like a "must have" for every workshop, and it's a bargain at the price!
If you found this article to be interest, visit Microcontroller / MCU Designline where – in addition to my Max's Cool Beans blogs on all sorts of "stuff" – you will find the latest and greatest design, technology, product, and news articles with regard to all aspects of designing and using microcontrollers.
Also, you can obtain a highlights update delivered directly to your inbox by signing up for my weekly newsletter – just Click Here to request this newsletter using the Manage Newsletters tab (if you aren't already a member you'll be asked to register, but it's free and painless so don't let that stop you [grin]).
Last but certainly not least, make sure you check out all of the discussions and other information resources at All Programmable Planet. For example, in addition to blogs by yours truly, microcontroller expert Duane Benson is learning how to use FPGAs to augment (sometimes replace) the MCUs in his robot (and other) projects.
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Duane Benson
1/28/2013 3:47 PM EST
Do they have a RoHS compliant version? I'd hate to have my Pb-free smoke contaminated with lead or peanut butter.
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Max the Magnificent
1/28/2013 4:08 PM EST
It's amazing how many young engineers remain unaware of the dangers of peanut butter when you drop a big "glob" onto your keyboard, and -- with a tear rolling down one's cheek -- watch it slither its way between the keys -- shortly before the keyboard inexplicably ceases to function (not that this has ever happened to me, you understand :-)
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SteveD_Aus
1/31/2013 5:31 PM EST
Ooooh, I know how to fix that...
Lift your keyboard above your head and slowly rotate it. hat should solve the problem.
Inspiration: http://xkcd.com/237/
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bdfloyd
1/28/2013 4:02 PM EST
Because the features of concentrated smoke are hidden and thus largely unknown to the user, AEROstich will be launching the "Insmell Inside" campaign to promote the benefits of reconcentrated smoke. Business has also myseriously spiked in Oregon and Washington recently.
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Frank Eory
1/28/2013 4:18 PM EST
For many years, engineers have made jokes about letting the smoke out of an IC, and how you'll never get it all back in there. I'm glad to see an enterprising company has finally addressed this problem, and at only $1,111.12, it sounds like a bargain!
I love the last sentence of their product description: "A must-have item for any shop, especially if you’re an idiot."
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Rcurl
1/28/2013 6:07 PM EST
Here's what I'm wondering-
Would it be possible to perhaps take some smoke from a Cray supercomputer and inject it back into an 8-bit microcontroller? In addition to adding incredible speed, you might even be able to add some features!
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Max the Magnificent
1/28/2013 6:14 PM EST
It's ideas like this that separate the men from the boys. Of course the seals on the old Cray chips weren't all that good -- it may be that the smoke has leaked out by now...
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LiketoBike
1/31/2013 11:29 AM EST
So that's what they mean by overclocking... :-)
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BigTech
2/1/2013 3:29 PM EST
It's a little known feature of the Cray supercomputers that the fluorinert coolant also served to capture any leaking smoke and cycle it through large filter units around the base of the machine. The smoke was then recompressed by motor-generators (usually located in an adjacent room) and fed back into the chips. This system required special, soluble smoke which greatly increased the price of the machines, but allowed them to operate at clock rates that would have diffused ordinary smoke in seconds. Truly a groundbreaking design.
I'm flabbergasted that technology has advanced to the point that a similar effect can be had with a simple $1,111.12 benchtop device. Amazing.
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David Ashton
1/28/2013 8:56 PM EST
You couldn't wait till April 1 to post this Max?
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Max the Magnificent
1/30/2013 4:24 PM EST
Obviously not :-)
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AlPothoof
1/29/2013 11:29 AM EST
"out of stock" as is all the good stuff, like the "gear expander wash" (I could really use that, motorcycle gear never did fit me properly).
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ndancer01
1/29/2013 1:40 PM EST
To do this properly, you have to use mirrors. To our non-geek friends, electronics is all smoke and mirrors anyway.
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bobzz
1/30/2013 1:56 AM EST
The old timers at my first company had one of the technicians trained to hold the eprom upside down after programming to be sure the bits did not leak out. That joke is so old that it no longer has to shave.
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Max the Magnificent
1/30/2013 4:25 PM EST
In engineering companies they used to send the new apprentice to the store room and tell him to ask for "A Long Weight" ... of course what he got was a long WAIT :-)
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Navelpluis
1/30/2013 6:21 AM EST
Can somebody create such a device to repair broken companies due to bad management? A management multiple layer unbuilding device?
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Max the Magnificent
1/30/2013 4:26 PM EST
We live in hopes...
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jeremybirch
1/31/2013 11:25 AM EST
similar to there being smoke inside all chips (and a powerful spring too if you judge by the effect of plugging a 5v chip into a 12v rail has in terms of flinging small bits of plastic around) there is also a red LED inside every green LED if you forget to put a series resistor in (admittedly once you've seen the red one the likelihood is the green one will cease working forthwith)
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Max the Magnificent
2/1/2013 4:10 PM EST
LOL
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BobZ
1/31/2013 5:05 PM EST
At a summer job in college I was in my supervisor's office when another student came in and proudly proclaimed that he had found the faulty chip, holding it in the air. "Good job!" the supervisor told him. When the student walked out the supervisor started laughing and I heard the engineer in the next cubicle also laughing. The engineer stood up with a cigarette in hand (it was legal back then) and one end of a tube that had been snaked under the bottom of the circuit board under test. That was one of the many initiations we went through that summer. If we'd had a smoke re-concentrator back then, he would have been sent to find the user's manual no doubt.
My own initiation was nontechnical for some reason, and not suitable for print.
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Max the Magnificent
2/1/2013 4:10 PM EST
Are you going to Design West? If so, you can tell me there over a beer or three
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Brad Cox
1/31/2013 8:30 PM EST
We had a young tech at a place I worked who was told that "you have to use the high-temperature solder for those" and was handed a roll of buss wire...
"No, just keep heating it, it'll melt.."
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Max the Magnificent
2/1/2013 4:09 PM EST
LOL
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seaEE
1/31/2013 11:21 PM EST
It seems that by purposely blowing up chips, you could use this clever device to create some really cool SOC devices, and also repackage things like putting (er I mean vapor depositing) an Ivy Bridge into a TO-92 package.
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ost
2/1/2013 6:28 AM EST
Im not a smoker, but some followups pops into mind...
If I inhale the smoke from a memory chip, can I fix my loss of memory?
Can this be tweaked to rebuild cigars and cigarettes?
:Þ
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BigTech
2/1/2013 3:39 PM EST
In my workplace, we like to joke about computers getting slow because the megahertz is leaking out. PCs come with a certain amount of megahertz inside, but over time, as you add software, it tends to leak, and the computer slows down. That's where all that dust inside your computer comes from: evaporated megahertz. Repair shops which promise to speed up your computer have a megahertz pump which can refill it to some extent, the same way you refill an empty ink cartridge. Large PC stores have a big tank of megahertz in the back. Once a week a tanker truck comes by to deliver more.... Maybe I can find some mobile megahertz on e-bay for my phone...
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BobsUrUncle
2/5/2013 11:56 AM EST
I ordered mine two weeks ago and I'm still weighting!
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mike_m
2/6/2013 5:37 PM EST
Ah the tricks some people will play on the new inexperienced guy.
I just heard about a new inducty to RF power who needed to place an attenuator between his Lab/benche tops driver amp and the input to a transceivers RF power amplifier stage.
He needed to sweep the transceivers PA stage and there was a possibilty that his benchtop/lab amps RF output could spike up due to slow AGC action during startup and drive the PA to 6 db overdive which could blow out his final RF amp stage.
Instead of listening to this advice another individual told him to lower the transceivers receive volume during transmit which would lower his drive to the transmitter.
The poor kid was just about to do this, and possibly blow out the drivers and final PA stage, when another seasoned RF guru caught wind of this and set him straight.
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IDontUseTheForumSoWhyAmIForcedToMakeANickname
2/7/2013 8:58 AM EST
Ah the fun of messing with the young engineers.
One of favourites is to ask for the metric adjustable wrench ... after the initial look of confusion they hand me the adjustable wrench. Of course I always reply with, 'I said the METRIC adjustable NOT the SAE adjustable'
And then there's always the left handed screwdriver :)
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tglo
4/2/2013 12:20 PM EDT
my adjustable wrench say 8 inch on one side and 200 mm on the other. same with the 10 inch / 250 mm and 12 inch / 300 mm. they took away all the fun.
mike
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