Good old Mistral issues

[Cabletwitch]

Howdy!

Got some on-going fun with a Mistral Plus, insofar as its working, but it isn't. Its an 8596N model, and is just giving me a headache trying to pinpoint the cause of the fun.

One morning, the fridge was discovered to be rather warm, and the freezer was slowly increasing in temperature as well. Display was fine, but the compressor had seemingly decided to no longer work, for whatever reason. Subsequent testing and powering up has found that the comp still works, but only for short periods. No errors are displayed on the LCD, and the thermistors after testing seem to work fine (resistance shown to drop when warming, and rising when cooling). All connections are fine and nothing is or was loose. The fan in the freezer spins freely by hand, but doesn't appear to spin up when the compressor actually decides to run.

So... I'm baffled. The control board seems fine, although I'm unsure what connection leads to what from looking at it, so I haven't been able to run continuity tests on various circuits. I just don't know what it could be.

Any ideas, chaps?

[monkey spanners]

Sounds like its broken. When the compressor stops, does it do so off its own accord? (power still being supplied) or does the circuit board decide the compressor has done enough and remove its supply of electric?

This info will point you in the right direction, other wise you'll just be guessing.

[Cabletwitch]

Sounds like its broken. When the compressor stops, does it do so off its own accord? (power still being supplied) or does the circuit board decide the compressor has done enough and remove its supply of electric?

This info will point you in the right direction, other wise you'll just be guessing.

It seems to stop when it wants to, but given that thus far getting it to actually start is completely random, I couldn't guess if it was a compressor issue or the board. I suppose the advantage I have is that there are two of these units, one next to the other. It might be possible to swap the boards over to see if there is an issue with one, if darling mother will agree to it. Power is maintained to the whole unit all the time, but if the board has an issue, then it may not be evident immediately. Ill see what I can do, and report back.

[Cabletwitch]

And the board transplant has shown that the broken one has indeed a fried controller. Working board in the supposed duff unit fired everything up perfectly fine, while the duff board in the working unit tried to FF the already -22 freezer, and subsequently went mental with an ER. So now I'm off to look at the cost of new boards.

Hurrah!

[Cabletwitch]

Aaaand anyone know of where I might actually find a replacement board? Bloody things are like hens teeth, it seems.

[install monkey]

http://shop.ukwhitegoods.co.uk/catal...ult/?q=mistral
try here- comfirm the number on the pcb is correct
gonna go on e bay to search for hens teeth!

[Cabletwitch]

Hmm, so far, no dice with finding a board available. There IS a repair service on ebay which might be a possibility, but I'd prefer to just drop in a known working board.

So now, I'm wondering if there are any similar models which use the same board. Any ideas, gentlemen?

[monkey spanners]

Fit a programmable stat from the likes of Eliwell, Dixell, Carel,LAE. You'll need to alter the wiring, maybe fit new probes, and sort out a suitable set of parameters.