[time-nuts] Thunderbolt repair - serial port

Mike Naruta AA8K aa8k at comcast.net
Mon Nov 1 20:27:47 UTC 2010


I bought two TAPR ThunderBolts and on one of them
the serial port would quit communicating after a
while.  There was no response to any command, only
removing the power and then restoring power would
get it talking again.  My power supply was okay.
I opened the T-Bolt and inspected the solder
connections but didn't see anything suspicious.  I
didn't do any further troubleshooting because my
third T-Bolt from Fluke.L arrived and the Fluke.L
T-Bolt has been working fine.

NOTE:  If you boot Windows with your ThunderBolt
connected to the Com port, Windows will think it
is a serial mouse and grab the port.  It can lead
to some interesting Windows behavior as the T-Bolt
outputs data.


Mike - AA8K


On 11/01/2010 08:36 AM, Adam Feigin wrote:
> Has anyone ever repaired a Tbolt which exhibits the "dead serial port"
> phenomenon? I've seen a couple of people post about their Tbolts being
> "dead" in this manner, ie the serial port gives no output, and doesn't
> respond to any input, but the 10Mhz and 1pps outputs work. Seems a shame
> to pitch it. Just wondering if anyone has managed to bring theirs back
> to life, and if they did, how.
>



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