I tired to visit the location again a few after changing the keypad membrane on the Crane GPL 474 4XX Series.
I was shocked to find out that the keypad is not working again.
I opened the vending machine and saw the smaller board that is connecting to the keypad membrance is a little bit burnt.
I took the smaller board and put the vending machine Out Of Service again for the 2nd time.
The residents are disgruntled and very angry and was shouting and at times cursing.
If you have been in the vending machine service industry, you have to be have a cold heart since people will never stop complaining and you jus have to be apologize all the time and just set aside your feelings.
I used to have a brick and mortar store recycling ink and toner from customers on their printing needs and everyday I have to absorb all the complaints of my customer especially living in a very big city when i was still in Manila.
There was an incident that i recalled, we had the Epson printer converted into a continuous printing printer and there was a slight problem on the resetting of the printer firmware and i recalled he was charged P 4,000 pesos and he got furious and tried to call the secutity and complained, screaming at the top of his voice demanding that the job done was a lemon since it stopped working.
When you are in the servce industry, this is normal and you just have to deal with it in a very calm and civil way.
Getting back to the vending machine.
Here are some of the helpful tips on how to diagnose vending machine keypad selection problems in case it is not the keypad membrane:
1. turn off vending machine
2. isolate the problem by disconnecting the cable to the keypad
3. turn on vending machine
4. if the smaller built in keypad inside the vending machine works then the problem lies on the smaller board, see the picture
I took out the board and i went to an electronics store in Burnaby.
I do not know which electronic part is not working on the board.
But upon visually checking the culprit, there is a burnt out resistor which is 1 Watt, I spent $2.58 for the parts.
So this is a long shot because this part might be working and it just seemed burnt on the board but it might be working.
In order to save $125 ( by calling a technician ) and another $85 ( to go back to your location ) + $? ( parts ) which im sure he will be overcharging, i figure that if you are not well versed in electronics, he may simply tell you that this resistor is worth $30 bucks!!!
Thats why vending machine technician’s make a fortune on easy work especially on electronics.
I got hold of my soldering iron as shown below and resolved the issues, when i got back to the location. Below are the pictures on how to replace the burnt resistor
5. Visual inspection will save you hundreds of Dollars!!!
Yesterday i went back to the location and everything seems to be working fine.
I have noticed that the keypad is erratic behavior, sometimes when you press the letter B, C will come come out the display, when you press 5, 4 will come out on display.
I made a visual inspection again and somehow the resistor is a lit burnt again.
My next visit is that i will bring the proper resistor and probably insert a Resistor Socket and everytime i notice when the keypad is misbehaving, i will just have to pull it out and insert a new one.
Replacing a resistor every 1 month will just cost me $0.50 cents, than replacing the smaller board and even saving me by changing the Main Board in case if it is the main problem that cause the resistor being burnt it every month.
I have a question for you.
Would you prefer to save $125+$85 + Parts by replacing a $0.50 resistor eveytime the keypad is not working?
Sometimes the advice of a technician might be changing the MAINBoard which is about $550 and Smaller Board which is $250!!!
In order to survive this vending machine business then you better learn how to make a visual inspection in case these things happen on your vending machine.
People think vending machine business is easy pessy but in truth it is :
1. Driving the whole day ( Gasoline )
2. Loading and unloading ( Your Back )
3. Customer Complains
4. Customer kicking you out not realizing that it will cost you: Moving $120 per machine, Warehouse Rent $30 per month on machines collecting dust and No Regard to small employed business people
5. Waking Up everyday and sometimes customer inserts SLUGs or Foreign coins and Jamms your machine and NO Sales when you visit the location after 1 week after parking and paying $3 and time ticking on parking meter
6. Compressor will cost $800 just to repair and the sales of the location is just $50 per month and it will take $800 / $30 = 80/3 months to recover
7. You got few locations and if something happens to one location then you are done for the month and end up having short on paying bills.
8. Vendor operator needs to visit chiropractors to adjust spine, back and joints for maintenance.
9. Most vendor have problems when walking because of foot pain from overwork.
