Garage door opener automatic light no longer works

[panorain]

I have a very old Chamberlin garage door opener here at home that still works fine except the automatic light no longer works when opening the door so it's not the easiest to see at night time after I pull into the garage and turn off the vehicles headlights. There are no sensors on the side of the door frames. I was wondering about possibly reflowing the circuit board of the opener in the oven because I have seen some videos on youtube about reflowing being done on computer motherboards and such to repair video cards that have failed etc.

What are your thought on this?

Thank you,

 

[inetdog]

The power wiring for the light should be confined to a relatively small area of the circuit board and will almost certainly include a small relay and maybe a time delay circuit. I would rather look carefully at the visible traces and try to repair with a soldering iron.
Trying to reflow the board in an oven risks damaging mounted components and is, IMHO not likely to be successful.
Listen to see if the relay clicks and check for voltage on its coil terminals.
It is also likely that the old opener does not incorporate the current stop and reverse behavior mandates, so that would be another reason to replace the unit.

 

[panorain]

The power wiring for the light should be confined to a relatively small area of the circuit board and will almost certainly include a small relay and maybe a time delay circuit. I would rather look carefully at the visible traces and try to repair with a soldering iron.
Trying to reflow the board in an oven risks damaging mounted components and is, IMHO not likely to be successful.
Listen to see if the relay clicks and check for voltage on its coil terminals.
It is also likely that the old opener does not incorporate the current stop and reverse behavior mandates, so that would be another reason to replace the unit.

Thank you for responding. I actually just today unpluged the cord and plugged the cord back into the AC/socket and I did in fact hear the relay click. I have checked the sockets and used a small 90 degrees to pick out the back of the socket and 'make sure the tab is seating to the light bulb'. Would you consider removing the sheet casing of the opener and blowing it out with 40 psi+ of compressed air a possible solution by any means?

 

[FlashKat]

Did you try a new light bulb?

 

[panorain]

Did you try a new light bulb?

Yes, I tried a new light bulb.

 

[Steve K]

I don't know if there are any statistics on this, but my observation on the failed electronics that get returned to my employer is that components are more likely to fail than solder joints. Depending on how old the garage door opener is, there may be some solder joints that were done by humans, and that is a place that is more prone to failure.

If it was me, I'd open it up, look inside, and look for any signs of damage, excess heat (i.e. circuit board turning dark brown), etc. Maybe take some pictures of both sides of the board and post them here??

 

[panorain]

Thank you for your message, I think that could be a good idea to take some pictures. I will work on that. I did neglect to also say that the openers bulbs do work when I pull the drawstring cord. This opener was made in 1984 + - a couple years. So it does have some use on it but the motor still works fine. i'll look into getting some pictures of it on here.

Thanks for your help with it so far.