Vince, is that piece of junk using the X2 capacitor as a capacitive dropper? If it is, check it's not dropped in value and causing low voltage problems with the power supply. It's very hard to tell from the mess of wiring inside.
This type of circuit is very common these days, to avoid using expensive copper/iron lumps for the power supply.
Also check the electrolytic cap, could be dried out from being stuck underneath a heat source.
David
Yep I am now aware that these freaking X2 dropper caps can fail, since I had them go bad in no less than 3 appliances in the last 12 months.... I used to think naively "it's a film cap, it never fails"... but yes they do in this type of application at least !
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I quite liked the video Dave Jones did on this very subject, which cleared thigns out... before, I was a bit confused by this cap/zener arrangement, wondering how it was supposed to work...
Well now that I am aware of it, I now go straight at them in case of power supply problems....
Next step was to test what this heater was doing so... despite the short wires, I managed to put the thing together in a way that the bowl would be sitting upright, sitting safely enough on its base, while at the same time having the PCB fully sticking out so I could probe whatever I wanted to probe, like the power supply to begin with.
Then I poured a couple glasses of water inside the bowl, making it half full. The red indicator light would tell me what the control loop was doing, and then I put a thermometer inside the bowl to see what was going on exactly. I don't even have thermometer but.... BU sent me one the other day when I was working on my fridge timer ! Thank you BU, see I make use of it today, glad I have it !!
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That said now I know the PT100/1000 probes that my DMM uses, are so cheap... I shall soon get one. Might also get one of those cheap ass IR thermometer guns, quite handy they are.
Then I spent probably 2 or 3 hours (time flies...), testing that thing for various pot inputs, watching patiently water warming up, cooling down, regulating... and well, looks to be working just fine to me !
So I think it's was indeed just a mechanical problem, the plastic arrangement holding the pot in place, being in a million pieces.
So I cleaned the area with acetone, then hot-glued the pot in place.... yes, it's the best this piece of filthy junk deserves, if even that !
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Result : pot is held in place just fine ! I have to say I am liking hot snot more and more !
![Evil >:D](https://www.eevblog.com/forum/Smileys/default/evil.gif)
So I put it all back together, and hopefully my friend can take this horrible, disgusting thing away from me real soon !