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twistedsymphony

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So I heard some discussion about Sharp Image repair recently in this forum
here: Nanao MS8-25FA-25FTB chassis
and here: The Obligatory "Post Your Recent Purchases" Thread

I'd never heard of these guys but I had 3 Nanao Chassis that were out of comission so I figured I'd try them out.

Their website is here: https://sharpimagerepair.wixsite.com/sharpimagerepair


I emailed them asking about my Nanao MS8-29 and got a quick reply back from Enrique:

We can deff service those chassis for you.
repair / rebuild is 135-145 for those boards and if it needs a new flyback we just add the price of that specific flyback to repair price.
all of our repairs have a 60 day warranty as well.
payment will be through a paypal invoice after the repair is complete.

if you do choose to send it in please include the neck card and control board so we can properly test it once the repair is done.
inside the box please include your contact information and return address.
I sent a follow up email asking if they had a specific form that they'd like me to include and what their turn-around time was. He said his current turn around time was 2-weeks and to just make sure I include a note with my contact info and the problem I'm having with the chassis. So I did just that.

I shipped out my Chassis on June 21st.
I just got a call from him a few minutes ago (June 28th) that my Chassis was done he cleaned it, he replaced the flyback and some other parts, did a recap, cleaned it, tuned it, and tested for a few hours and had already shipped it back UPS and to expect an email invoice. (yup he shipped it before I even paid). Was a pretty friendly guy on the phone too.

I checked my email and sure enough I had just received a paypal invoice... $218. A bit steep but After his quoted costs plus a flyback plus return shipping that sounds about right.

I will post an update once I receive the chassis back and install it.

-----

For comparison the only other shop I know of in the US that services Nanao CRTs is PNL in CA (http://www.pnlvideo.com).

I used them for a repair on another MS8-29 in November 2016. The process was similar; just ship it with a note. They had decent communication over email (though a bit more terse in their replies compared to Sharp Image) and were a little more difficult to communicate with on the phone (English was not the first language of the guy at PNL). With them I had sent my chassis out on November 11th and received it back on November 29th. This one also needed a new flyback and my invoice came to $169.40. They used a used replacement flyback (not unexpected as MS8-29 flybacks are no longer produced and no longer stocked anywhere). They didn't recap it or clean it, and while it was a completely dead chassis that I sent out and working when I got it back. There is a minor lingering geometry issue (left edge of the image isn't completely vertical) and a minor flickering issue when cold. I had emailed them back about these issues and they claimed they weren't present on their test setup and gave me some advice on how to resolve them, which helped slightly but not by much and I didn't push the issue further (though in hindsight I probably should have). Everything else about the monitor is perfect though and it's been going strong since then.
 
Looking forward to your notes once you get it back in! If I can't solve my MS-2933 buzzing maybe I'll send it their way.
 
So did you get just one chassis done at that price or did that price include all three? I have two MS8-25Fs that I need repaired and after an unsuccessful repair at PNL, I might have to send them to these guys.
 
So did you get just one chassis done at that price or did that price include all three? I have two MS8-25Fs that I need repaired and after an unsuccessful repair at PNL, I might have to send them to these guys.
That was the price for 1 chassis.

The others are backups, one of them I got working myself but still has flickering red, the other is in really rough shape and I'm considering it "for parts" only.

FWIW the chassis I sent him I went over myself and couldn't get working... it was completely dead.
 
I look forward to how your chassis turns out. PNL does ok work, but they fix the problem you're having and that's it. They don't reflow any of the solder joints or replace caps for preventive maintenance.
 
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I got the chassis back yesterday. I didn't have a chance to open it up until today.

He shipped back in a brand new box with really sturdy cardboard. Opened it up to find it was double boxed with a second brand new box and the second box was also brand new, fully taped and then inside of that my chassis was wrapped with heavy bubble wrap. Good first impression!

Chassis had been fully cleaned ,including all of the wiring, it looked like new; which is nice. Inspecting the chassis I noticed that he did indeed do a full cap kit (it didn't need it as I had already done a kit attempting to get it working but whatever). There are 3 plastic wire clips on the chassis, all 3 were good before I sent it and two of the 3 were snapped off. Maybe this happened in shipping? not a big deal. But then I noticed that while the wire on the flyback was clean it wasn't NEW, there was a little bit of dirt still around the gasket where the HV wire meets the flyback. Then I noticed that not only was the flyback not new, it's the same one that was installed when I sent it to him. I know this because there's a plastic post on the side that the heat-shield screws into and it had cracked in two spots and I had epoxied it back together... and this flyback had the same exact cracks and the same exact epoxy fix.

Having the same flyback is fine, but he did tell me he needed to replace it (I was skeptical when he told me because I WAS getting HV to the tube before I sent it in), and he did charge me for a flyback replacement... and I received no flyback replacement.

Moving on... I hooked it up to my tube and no picture... double checked that everything was connected, anode cup is indeed fully seated.... no picture. I can hear the HV kick on and the tube start to warm up and then a second later it the HV shuts down and I can hear the tube shutting down like the power had been cut... no neck glow.

I've emailed him to let him know I'm not getting any picture and the HV is shutting down; I didn't mention the flyback. I'll report back once I hear back from him.
 
I got the chassis back yesterday. I didn't have a chance to open it up until today.

He shipped back in a brand new box with really sturdy cardboard. Opened it up to find it was double boxed with a second brand new box and the second box was also brand new, fully taped and then inside of that my chassis was wrapped with heavy bubble wrap. Good first impression!

Chassis had been fully cleaned ,including all of the wiring, it looked like new; which is nice. Inspecting the chassis I noticed that he did indeed do a full cap kit (it didn't need it as I had already done a kit attempting to get it working but whatever). There are 3 plastic wire clips on the chassis, all 3 were good before I sent it and two of the 3 were snapped off. Maybe this happened in shipping? not a big deal. But then I noticed that while the wire on the flyback was clean it wasn't NEW, there was a little bit of dirt still around the gasket where the HV wire meets the flyback. Then I noticed that not only was the flyback not new, it's the same one that was installed when I sent it to him. I know this because there's a plastic post on the side that the heat-shield screws into and it had cracked in two spots and I had epoxied it back together... and this flyback had the same exact cracks and the same exact epoxy fix.

Having the same flyback is fine, but he did tell me he needed to replace it (I was skeptical when he told me because I WAS getting HV to the tube before I sent it in), and he did charge me for a flyback replacement... and I received no flyback replacement.

Moving on... I hooked it up to my tube and no picture... double checked that everything was connected, anode cup is indeed fully seated.... no picture. I can hear the HV kick on and the tube start to warm up and then a second later it the HV shuts down and I can hear the tube shutting down like the power had been cut... no neck glow.

I've emailed him to let him know I'm not getting any picture and the HV is shutting down; I didn't mention the flyback. I'll report back once I hear back from him.
Damn, that's disappointing. Keep us informed of how it goes.
 
Oh damn, say it aint so, I hope they get you fixed up, this is a bit disheartening, might as well just give up on crt cabs altogether.

But I did manage to pick up some 27" crt tv's just in case I have to pop one into a cab in the future.
 
I was really hoping for a successful outcome...

There's really no where else to send those nanao boards...
 
Semi Off Topic:
So since I had this cab all pulled apart to swap the chassis I decided to try fixing my other partially working chassis.
It was having issues with red flickering on and off. I had already replaced both the Red Gain and Red Bias pots to no effect, so I decided to map out everything on the red input section and just replace all of it... there was a sub-board with some SMD transistors, caps, and resistors that I just replaced wholesale from a parts chassis, I also swapped the neck board with the parts chassis. I tested this and there were no change; so at least I knew that the neck board and sub-board were good. Beyond that there were 2 diodes, 1 zener diode, and a resistor. So I swapped all of those out with the parts chassis as well. I had tested them in-circuit before and they tested good, testing them out of circuit I found that the zener diode (ZD101) was actually bad. And now my backup chassis is fully working! I have No idea what what value this diode is supposed to be. My multi meter read the good one at 0.58V both forward and backward but that doesn't seem right. I would like to get a replacement for the "parts" chassis in case I ever decided to get that one up and running.

On topic:
I do have some semi-good news on the Sharp Image Repair front.
Looking through some pictures I found that I took of the chassis before I sent it in, it seems that I did indeed get a "new" flyback. the epoxy blobs are slightly different so it seems that they installed a "new" used flyback that happened to have been cracked and was repaired in the exact same place. So that's a relief, as I was more upset over that then the fact that the chassis didn't work. I mean they still sent me a used flyback but hey a working flyback is a working flyback and from what I understand you can get get MS8-29 flybacks new anymore.

I also received a call from them earlier today. They re-iterated that they ran a 4+ hour test before they sent it back and They asked me to look over the chassis to see if anything appeared to have been physically damaged or disconnected in shipping and to send it back with a note about what it's doing now. I will have to pay to ship it out to them but they assured me they'd do any repairs for free and cover the return shipping.
 
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Ive used Sharp several times now with no issue, however my buddy has had a Hitachi chassis back there three times now, and they say all is well. Same "4 hour" test line as well. He puts it back in his Neo candy and the problem is never resolved. I really hope they are not going the way of ECA, because that would be disappointing.
 
After looking over my chassis to see if there was any physical damage I didn't see anything. though I noticed that the large metal part of the flyback is lose and can be moved around separate from the rest of the flyback. it isnt like this on my working chassis, but I don't know if it's normal or not. The lack of HV in my testing is indicative of a flyback issue.

In any case I sent it back and it should be arriving to them today. We'll see what they have to say.
 
My neo candy chassis, I sent to them 3 times. The first time it just needed a recap- colors were off. Upon returning, the colors were great but the horizontal picture wouldn't stay still, like it was jumping. I sent it back to them, then I get it back and I would get no picture, it would just whine loudly. Third time, looks like everything works, but it starts shaking again. In the past ive sent them nanao ms9 and they've knocked them out of the park.
 
Did your MS8 chassis issue get resolved? I have an MS8-29 that worked perfectly fine until I moved it in my car. After that, it does exactly what you described: powers on, you hear HV and deflection, but then seems to just go quiet 2-3 seconds later. It won't power up again unless I wait for a little bit.
 
It arrived at their shop last thursday, I sent them an email the day before saying to expect it and gave them the tracking number and they said they'd take a look one it arrived.

I hadn't heard anything and it's been a week so I sent them an email earlier today to see if they'd had a chance to look at at it and I haven't heard anything back yet.
 
I got a reply back this morning:
yes went ahead and checked it out, something odd is up with it. So we are sending you an exchange.
exactly same one except this one is in perfect conditions and shouldn't give you no problems at all.
we are still running it to make sure its good before we send it out, should go out on Monday headed your way.
I'm not too keen on the whole exchange thing since the chassis I sent them was the original one to the cabinet, but it doesn't do me much good if it doesn't work. I did ask them to please make sure that it's the exact same revision, because i had bought a replacement before that had an extra sub-board near the adjustment pots that prevented the chassis from fitting in the cab.
 
So I had a friend take a look at my Toei chassis and recap it himself; he found incorrect caps and lifted traces. He thinks maybe they don't have the same tech as they used to; he has also used sharp before and he said this work was not normal for them. Earlier this year they brought back two Nanao chassis back from the dead for me, a Nanao MC2000 and a MS9. It does seem like their work is beginning to slack.
 
I just received a call from Sharp Image repair. They said they found a problem in the power supply section of my chassis, they've fixed it and are running some additional test before they send it back out to me tomorrow.
 
I Received the chassis back today. A bit frustrating as I had my summer arcade party on Sunday the 29th and the whole reason I sent this chassis in was so that I would have this machine up and running in time for the party... but anyway...

I opened the box, and it is indeed my chassis, it looks like they swapped out the remote board though (my original had some minor corrosion around the switch and a crack near one of the mounting holes, nothing that effected it's function though).

Normally I test outside the cab because it's a real pain to mount the chassis inside the egret but I was feeling pretty confident that they'd finally fixed it. I had to clip and re-install some of the zip ties on the neck board harness because they way they were arranged it wouldn't reach.

triple checked all of the connections and then powered it on....


it started making this god awful high pitched ringing sound, easily 5x louder than the normal CRT whine. I gave it like 5 seconds and saw that I was getting neck glow but not picture so I shut it back down.

I check over all the connections again and nothing was out of place. I turned the brightness up on the remote board and powered it up again. The ringing came back but now I had a picture. I started to enter test mode on my game board so I could start adjusting the picture and the ringing stopped... as the picture when black and I heard the CRT cool down :(

Turned it off for a minute and tried to power it back on but it remained dead.

so yeah... still not working.
 
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