[SOLVED] Red light flashes next to barrel-port

[FreeRangeRon]

>further suggestions.
Again, pg4&5, data sheet
2,3,4 = 5V
12 = 3.3V (reference)
18 = 0.5 to 1.6 V
These are  input, but not 12
My guess is that the short has damaged it (but only a guess),
too bad you didn't check if it was really shorted (continuity)
If 14 is out of 2.025-2.1 V range, charging is shut down (pg22)
If the battery is too low it may fault too, pin 15 (should be 3.6 or >),
may slow charge down to 3.0

Thanks for the info wdt. I agree I should've checked for continuity before 'fixing' the 'short'. I have since soldered some through-hole resistor legs onto my meter's probes so that I can make good contact with the ICs pins.

2,3,4 = 5.1v
12 = 3.3v
18 = 1.25v
15 = 3.75v (battery voltage)
10 = 2.02v

The readings from the other pins look fine, and should allow charging to happen. But not when pin 14 is only reading 1.8v.

I don't know if there's any action I can take to change the value of FB (14). There's a resistor network that sets the battery voltage (R49, R51) but I'd need to get them off the board to test them, and I don't have a rework station which makes that pretty challenging. The same goes for the resistors (R52, R54) that set the temperature limits on TS (10).

When I was taking some readings I managed to cause a short and break the trace between R43 and C122, so that's had a scrapy repair job done and will have nullified any chance of sending the unit back to Pine for repair/replace.

It might be time to call it quits. I can probably either:

1) Buy a rework station and replace the BQ24171 (expensive)
2) Try and buy only the PBP mainboard from Pine (Best option, for the right price)
3) Build another charging circuit and squeeze it into the case (whole new project)

Cheers,
Ron