Harmony Remotes - Hardware

[smariner]

Thanks Listener.

Does anyone know the exact make/model of the IR emitter that's used in the 880?

[mwentzel]

My Harmony 880 also died suddenly, and after reading through all of these threads about Infrared LEDs failing, I decided to pick up a couple at Radio Shack and give it a whirl. No one on any of the threads I viewed gave the part number. Well folks, I can happily tell you that I replaced the pair on my remote, and it is working beautifully once again. Here's what I used. Due to a lack of identifying marking on the Infrared LEDs, and the fruitless search for a schematic, I am not certain that this replacement part is an identical replacement part, but it did work for me. A $4.00 repair attempt seemed worth the risk to me, considering I had a $200+ dead out-of-warranty remote!!!

Radio Shack Catalog 276-143 $1.99 ea.

• Radiant Intensity (mw): 7.368
• Peak Wavelength (nm): 940
• Forward Voltage (V): 1.28
• Half View Angle (Degrees): 6.36

Link

Note: I am a computer technician with a degree in Electronics Engineering Technology so this was a simple task for me to perform. Use the following steps at your own peril. or have a qualified person do this rather simple repair for you. Unsoldering and soldering is required and the use of a magnifying lamp (if available) may help with the soldering process...

• Remove battery cover and battery.
• Remove 2 small Phillips head screws from rear of remote
• Gently pry apart the upper and lower casing. There are about 3 locking tabs on each side of the remote that make this a little difficult to pry apart, so be gentle as not to break the tabs, or gouge the seams along the sides of the remote. I used a small flat head screw driver to gently spread the casing, and then worked it down each side popping the tabs free. You are now looking at the keyboard membrane side of the circuit board.
• Remove 2 small Phillips screws holding the circuit board securely in the base. Gently lift the circuit board from the base, and carefully unplug the battery contact connector from the top of the circuit board.
• Turn the circuit board over and you will now be able to see the 2 infrared LEDs located on either side of the USB mini connector at the top/front of the circuit board.
• Caution: Infrared LEDs have 1 positive (anode) and 1 negative (cathode) lead and you MUST make sure you solder the leads to the correct contacts on the circuit board. The cathode is the short lead and there may be a slight flat on the body of round LEDs. If you can see inside the LED, the cathode is the larger electrode (but this is not an official identification method). The packaging of the Radio Shack Infrared LED describes how to identify the cathode lead.
• Unsolder one LED at a time, noting which side is anode, and which is cathode. You will notice that these LEDs are 'surface mounted' as opposed to through the board mounted. This means you will need to trim and bend (form) your leads on the replacement LEDs before soldering them onto the circuit board. Use the suspected bad LED as an example. Now replace the other LED as well.

That's it! Now reverse the disassembly instructions, to re-assemble your remote, and go try it out! I hope you have as much success as I did.

Good luck!

MPW

Message Edited by SirCrono on 08-17-2008 10:51 PM

[WannabeActuary]

you may want to edit the post (specifically the link) to eliminate the page stretching

if not, one of the mods will get to it at some point

[tky]

I just wanted to confirm that replacing the IR LEDs works fine.

I had a bizarre issue where the remote overheated while in the charger. Upon testing, LED output was very, very weak. I popped it open to find that both LEDs were blackened on the inside of the bulb.

$4.75 and a little time brought it back to life. Definitely worth the time versus buying new.

[spydrev]

Also confirming this solution works great with two FYI's:

1) the OLED's from radio shack have blue lens while the stock OLEDs in the 880 are clear. Do not be concerned about this.

2) when you replace the dark red translucent OLED cover on the remote after soldering in the OLEDs, be careful that you left enough room so that the cover does not put pressure on the OLEDs - i did not do this and the cover pressing on the OLED broke on of its leads and I had to re-solder it.

[Swervepf]

Mine just died overnight 2 days ago as well.  I've got an incident registered with Logitech right now and am waiting for a warranty email.  Mine's out of warranty but I think I'll be trying out this LED replacement.

[Swervepf]

so Logitech let me know they could repair my remote at a cost, so I decided to replace the IR LED emitters myself.  Went to a local electronics supply shop and got some emitters similar to the ones at radioshack in the link above and replaced them myself.  They were only $1.39 each. 

I notice that they don't work as well as the original ones before they went bad, so I figure they aren't the right spec. The repair was quite easy so I'll be trying some different spec emitters.  I read somewhere that someone swapped them out from some old remotes he had lying around and it worked out great, so I may even try that!  I asked Logitech by email for the exact spec so hopefully they let me know and I can get the right ones.

[Swervepf]

So Logitech wouldn't provide specs on the emitters they use.

I tried removing the IR LED emitters from some old remotes I had lying around, and swapped them in and this worked out PERFECTLY.

Here's some pics of the remote disassembled which was quite easy to do

http://i32.photobucket.com/albums/d17/swervepf/logitech%20harmony%20repair/CIMG0001.jpg

http://i32.photobucket.com/albums/d17/swervepf/logitech%20harmony%20repair/CIMG0003.jpg

http://i32.photobucket.com/albums/d17/swervepf/logitech%20harmony%20repair/CIMG0004.jpg

Message Edited by Swervepf on 11-26-2008 06:59 PM