ACTUAL FIX for the INSTAX Mini FLASHING ORANGE Lights?

I recently tried to fix up a few of these FujiFilm Instax Mini 9's and Mini 11's, and found that the orange flashing lights problem was VERY common!
Most of the "fixes" online tell you to change the batteries, and yet there are still loads of people where the problem persists.
#spoiler it's nothing to do with the batteries...
Hope you enjoy!
Steve
PS. I'm not an expert in repairs at all. I do this for fun, and it may not be the best or safest way to go about repairing broken stuff. I'm pretty good at melting plastic though. Please don't copy me - I'm an idiot.
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[@MrMarkyMarkMark]

I fixed my battery charger. Couldn’t have done it without your inspiration. I even said solid in a deep voice when I poked the terminals. So proud of myself. I ruined one pair of jeans, but it’s okay they were only new.

[@matthewmaidment8464]

I remember dismantling a disposable camera years ago to see how they are made up and learnt the hard way they give one hell of a shock 😂

[@rotary_turbo99]

i remember seeing a video online of a guy converting one into a taser, so that taught me not to play with them lol

[@GridNoDC]

1000s of us! Same

[@jeroenkanis9429]

Same here

[@timehunter9467]

Damn, I was harvesting them for coil gun components and got shocked. Fully charged capacitor left a huge blister on my fingertip, honestly don’t know how I even did it because I wasn’t near the cap.

[@coondogtheman]

I found out it was possible to charge up a photo flash capacitor with one of those electric fly swatters. I arced it on a pair of nail clippers and it left two burn marks. Gnarly.

[@markbendall9534]

The 2nd (faulty) chip that you removed is the same type of layout as many of the chips I see at work in the repair department, because of the world chip shortage, the chips are being dragged out of all sorts of places and these in particular are prone to oxidised pads leading to the solder joints not flowing correctly onto the chip pads,. You can see how brown the pads are before you removed it, I'd take a guess that the chip could be OK but just needs reflowing properly.

[@RobSchofield]

I'm of the same opinion - some sort of contamination on either the PCB (not as likely) or the IC pads (more likely), especially on the centre ground/heatsink pad. Given that it's a pre-programmed MCU, there's going to be no off-the-shelf replacement from common stock - it can only come from Fuji or another PCB, as only they have the binaries for it.

[@flibble666]

I love your dedication and research people like you are what make engineers proud if enough people see this video you could save 1000s of items from landfill awesome achievement so many engineers don't have the time or patience to do this keep up the amazing work.

[@stefanegger]

What is the use of your comment? This is a microcontroller, as you can read, it needs to be programmed and it has flash storage inside, do you know the code that they flash? Do you have access to that? Will "1000s of people" have a programming device for this chip and a soldering skills to repair it? I guess: NO. It just worked because he took it out of another camera, so where is the point to make one work and the other one is dead then, it's not a repair, it just shows what causes them to fail without showing a proper solution to really fix it.

[@flibble666]

some ones a grumpy little solider today to cure you must first understand some one may have the knowledge and equipment to read and or flash these chips now its a know source of the issue also even if it needs to be removed from a device with other parts damaged or broken and this chip is harvestable it could still save 100s of products.@@stefanegger as for the use of the comment its to congratulate some one I've watch and spoken to may a time to keep working on devices and learning and helping others understand its called being a nice person.

[@rimmersbryggeri]

@@stefanegger And will 1000's of people have a use for this camera? I wonder though wether just reflowing the the chip would be enough. Has the wiff of a product that would bought the first "film" used up and the camera subsequently being put in a drawer never to see the light of day again other than pssibly in a video like this or a Techmoan video about failed and obsolete formats.

[@MrCalldean]

@@stefanegger Why are you so angry? Strange.

[@--Animal--]

@@MrCalldean There's a lot of these comments from angry "experts" on techie videos, people just love believing their right in a war they make themselves.

[@Jesselovespinball]

I live for hearing you say “Get In” . I’m in the US and it’s not really a thing here but I’ve been saying it for months ! Lmao 🤣 😂. As a matter a fact I work on pinball machines and I was able to diagnose and fix a shorted board the other day and I waved my fist in the air and yelled “Get In” across the house . Thanks for pushing through and figuring it out ! Well done sir !

[@uripomerantz6858]

My daughter has one of these and it was orange blinking just like this one. I assumed it may be the micro controller looking chip but had no way to check or replace it. Your analysis convinced me that this is the issue but I could not imagine what will damage the chip and have very few options, so I used a pointy tip soldering iron, touching the solder joints one by one trying to get the solder a little higher up the chip to the exposed copper leads, while the batteries are installed and everything is still wired up and at one point it just came to life and now it works. Thanks!

[@gudmundureinarsson497]

Maybe the IC is OK. Maybe you just need to reflow the chip (bad soldering). You could try it on another camera that doesn't work

[@Charlie_Crown]

Good idea

[@juliom6260]

Was thinking the same. To try the "bad" chip on the purple's board

[@NowInAus]

Yes, could be faulty device or faulty installation. Send in more Instax!

[@phazonclash]

Yup very possible. Good thinking

[@canaldigitalmente]

I tried reflowing, but all the lights keep flashing. Did not work.

[@bryanmceneaney]

Your skills and patience are next level. Fascinating to watch you work. Nice

[@shadanzar]

Thank you for your dedication in finding the whys !!

[@coondogtheman]

Taking pictures of where all the wires go is an excellent trick. It also works for when changing caps on something. Wish I thought of that when changing caps on my old flat screen computer monitor. It's been at least two years since I tried fixing it and it's still in pieces in the garage. One day I'll get around to fixing it and I'll have an extra monitor.

[@TsiolkovskySportingLocks]

Superb bit of detective work there mate. Seriously well done!

[@PeteArmstrong]

Merry Christmas and a happy new year to you. Keep up the vids. I look forward for you dropping a new one.

[@_RETROFIX_]

Thank you for this solution! This will be very helpfull for a lot of people! This is the kind of things that make the youtube repair comunity awesome!

[@MyRegardsToTheDodo]

I doubt it will be helpful, because you can't get the chip as a replacement part. It's good to know why it failed, but it's very likely not fixable, if you don't manage to get your hands on a camera with a broken lens or something as a donor.

[@user-ws3wg7pu2n]

Thanks Steve I actually had one of these a couple of years ago and it failed for the exact same reason. Don't have the skills to open and troubleshoot it though so unfortunately had to dispose of it. Nice to know it's literally one tiny chip that caused it.

[@thomasodonnell2191]

Quite the saga. What I like about you is the drive to fix stuff just for the joy of solving the problem.

[@DamienCooley]

The Instax Mini saga is my favorite of Homer's writings.

[@jonathanmartin3375]

Cheers for continuing on with the research

[@lanceeverts1070]

To be fair, you may not know everything about everything when it comes to electronics, but you know just enough to make you dangerous and your personality makes every single video precious to my viewing Pleasure!!¡!!!keep it up!!! please and thank you!!! Well done!!

[@rmck6830]

Helpful tip for you. When working with small components (surface mount) try holding down the components with a toothpick and then tape the toothpick in place. Cheers

[@ThomasToSpace]

But the components flying away is an important part of these videos!

[@Mymatevince]

Nicely done Steve

[@wisher21uk]

Brilliant I knew you would crack it well done Steve 😊

[@randelcross]

omg Steve!! did you just solve half the worlds problems??!! NIIIce.... Cheers

[@Ra-zor]

I wonder if the micro you have is the RENESAS R5F10278ANA#45, if it is then they are £1.40 each at Farnell and look like they are programmed over standard UART, so you just need to dump the 8k code and program a bunch of replacements.

[@hugegamer5988]

You could get a target board and use something like CS+ to connect to the device and read most of the memory, the exception being the flash sectors that are reserved by the debugger. They likely set security bits to prevent that, but you never know. Then you could buy some replacements and program them.

[@SHUPIRATE1991]

Awesome

[@infin1ty850]

This camera journey has been fascinating

[@ChrisTallant]

Nicely done bud!!!

[@Spyd77]

Note that the faulty chip is a SoC that has flash memory with software in it. Even if you buy one new, without being flashed with the proper software it won't work, as it would be the same as a computer with an empty hard disk: no operating system, no computer. Having a donor is the easiest way to replace this chip, but if no donor is found, there may be a way to produce new chips: If the flash memory in the SoC is not marked as read-only, it can be dumped. With a dump, you can flash a brand-new SoC. For dumping you should find a JTAG on the board and connect to a computer. To flash, the usual is doing it with a development kit for the chip.

[@Eric_G65]

Steve, great job!

[@garymucher4082]

I get the feeling this repair was more for your sanity than mere repair. Bad part is, that small microcontroller (processor) is probably a priority part made just for the company. So may be really hard to find if you even can... But thumbs up for isolating the defective chip...

[@michaelthomsen8771]

It seems to be genetic, but it still doesnt matter, as it has built in flash, and it's likely protected so you can't read it out to program a new one

[@whompronnie]

I think you mean 'proprietary' not 'priority' but yeah, there's a good chance that, while it may be an off-the-shelf chip, it probably has custom code written to it.

[@xsgt_silverx]

Holy crapnuggets with kale, awesome job - I hope that you can source that part and repair the other remaining doomed ones!

[@zaprodk]

1:13 The IGBT does /not/ charge the flash. It discharges the flash capacitor into the trigger transformer and disconnects the flash tube when the camera deems that it has got enough light.

[@wesleybilly8097]

good find and good fix. Your videos are greatly entertaining im almost done the last few years worth.

[@cerd6292]

A picture of Dave next to DAVE? So "meta" Steve. Brilliant!!!

[@MrEriksweet]

Great find!

[@Gandalf22476]

Get in! Good job Stez. The forum people will have something to talk about. Maybe resurrect a few threads.

[@Apocrypha303]

Great job!

[@MyTubeSVp]

You really got to the bottom of this one. Great work!

[@proesterchen]

Nicely done! 👍🍾

[@red_geist9741]

Nice job!

[@proaudiorestore8926]

Well done!

[@RetroJack]

Brilliant stuff as always - any chance of a link to that cap discharger?

[@John-uc6gb]

Great job. Good video

[@chrisrobson8540]

i think dave is now officially the most photographed woodlouse in the world.....im getting on the phone to norris mcwhirter! 😂😂 good job on sussing the fault out!

[@theawfulgambler]

Congrats!!🎉🎉

[@Rosi0874]

I really enjoyed your Video, thank you for sharing. I also bought an malfunctioning instax mini 9 two days ago and tried to fix it. When I saw your video I got sad because I don't have the tools like you do but I wanted to fix this Thing so badly. The good thing is: I had a different Problem :D It had no flashing lights when i started it, but when i tried to take a picture it made a werid sound (like a chicken or something) and the lights began to blink. I bought like 5 different types of batteries, didn't work. I screwed it open but everything seemed in the right position an was fine. I even heard the flash loading when i started it. Then I discovered like 5 sand corns above the batterie pocket where the gearwheels are and cleaned them up but that was not enough. But when I pushed the weels slightly to the bottom while taking a picture it works! I also can take like 10 Pictures before it gets stuck again. Now i try to clean them good so it won't happen anymore :)

[@LHSlash]

It is a crap product when new and working perfectly. Your determination is incredible - I would just save it for more worthwhile items

[@Alex-hn4we]

As other have said try reflowing the chip. As these things use lead free solder theyre prone to bad solder joints

[@NastassiaYa]

Thank you for this video! Where I can buy this motherboard or microcircuit?

[@RichHarrisThatBaldGuy]

Kept you up, niggling in the back of your mind, eh? You're a hero, sir! Keep up the awesome work!!! (And give Dave a 'hi' from me, eh?)

[@CrayCRussain]

I believe your 91c ic is the motor ic for the shutter and also the power controller for the flash.

[@tumbles8350]

I worked in a jessops printing lab as teen, had to break apart the disposable cameras to get the film, nobody warned me about the capacitors. The whole shop heard my learning experience.

[@MightySquirrel724]

Way to go! I bet you're excited that the mystery has been solved.

[@hoffmannolsen]

Another internet mystery solved, that’s interesting - or is it?

[@LM-wq4fe]

I suspect a firmware problem not a chip problem. Probably batteries ran low on voltage and locked up the chip. There might be a way to reset it.

[@zaprodk]

Nah It's a Flash MCU with no source available and the security bits locked. No one is talking to that chip.

[@Tubtim3468]

Thank you very much for your efforts 🥰 I am in Thailand and have been trying to fix this problem for about 2-3 years, but I can't fix it. My best way is to use the old motherboard from the instax Mini 8 camera and replace it. It works very well. Even though the film is stuck, the flickering light will not come back. And I have modified the spring used to squeeze the liquid so that it is not too tight to reduce the chance of the first film getting stuck.

[@Wenlocktvdx]

Nice one!

[@ytguy2010]

You showed the wrong chip on your fingertip at the end. It was supposed to be the square chip, not the rectangular chip. Otherwise, good job solving the problem. This will help others.

[@nullbyt]

The gift that keeps on giving 😂

[@JamesUK-je4ew]

Great stuff! Regards

[@charlesmott8863]

Excellent discovery :)

[@MacCraiger]

Thanks for this, great find! I'm wondering if anyone has had success buying the microcontroller and replacing it (not taking it from another board). I assume it would need to be programmed to work. Right?

[@KONAKA95]

STEZSTIX FIX!!!!!

[@michaelcook1923]

Well-done.👍📸📸📸

[@17bootlegger]

Love the galaxians audio at 1:20 😁

[@nheather]

Unfortunately, as it is a microcontroller it may not be possible to replace because it will contain program code - even if you can buy the same microcontroller chip you would need to program it. I guess it may be possible to extract the code from the working chip but you will need a programming environment for that particular microcontroller.

[@blueskies792]

!AWESOME!

[@benben9794]

I mean… anybody else remember that time he found a fault in certain gameboy cartridges that some of the legs on some of the chips weren’t properly attached and just needed to be reflowed?

[@benben9794]

@repairwins he’s kinda scarily good at finding these things

[@snapverse]

Yes!

[@kristianshaw8265]

hey Steve and comment section, I've got an instax mini 9 with the film eject slot cover thing missing, any ideas on getting a replacement? tried to find parts online but no joy

[@maillouski]

What was the flux you used in this video? It seems very transparent.

[@franckozon]

Nice

[@Alsund]

New video, woooho!

[@joncurtis199]

Always makes me wince seeing you take those things apart knowing theres a 300v cap behind it. Stready hands required not to brush the contact as you take the housing off...

[@Martyn-ey9lw]

How do you decide the correct temperature and air flow to set your your hot air tool to.

[@MikesArcadeMonitorRepair]

1:24 Bad idea. Never remove a good component and put it on a suspected faulty board because if something damaged the component on the faulty board, you just damaged the good component too. Always take the suspected faulty component (EDIT: after verifying it’s not shorted) and put it in the good board. That's a much safer way of testing. That being said, great job finding the issue!

[@urglegurgle5807]

I’m not sure I understand the logic here. By putting a single known good component on a bad board, then you are risking just the one component. Whereas by putting a suspected bad component onto a good board is risking damage to multiple known good components/ damage to the good board. This will potentially ruin the usefulness of what was previously a known good board to be used for comparison against faulty board, or for a source of known good parts. Why is risking one component a less safe way of doing it, versus risking damage to a known good board and multiple other good components?

[@MikesArcadeMonitorRepair]

Let’s look at it this way. Say you have an airplane with a single Comm radio. It’s inop. You just happen to have another plane with the exact same Comm system on hand and you want to swap the Comm transceivers to figure out if it’s the transceiver or something else causing the issue. You would NOT want to put the transceiver from the working aircraft into the non-working aircraft because if there was a short or something that damaged the original transceiver, you will damage the other transceiver from the good aircraft by installing it in the bad aircraft. Then you end up with two bad transceivers and are no closer to the solution. You always want to put the suspected bad component in a good system to rule out. In this case, you’d want to put the suspected bad transceiver in the good airplane to see if it’s the transceiver or something else. Hope that makes more sense.

[@Tech_481]

​@@MikesArcadeMonitorRepairdon't worry your first explanation made perfect sense to me and I 100% agree lol. I never knew you watched stez as well haha

[@MikesArcadeMonitorRepair]

Yup!

[@CrayCRussain]

These cameras aren't worth much. Not to mention... he checked for shorts before hand.

[@caspianvonliechtenstein6517]

The video froze for a moment right when you said “This is now safe to work…” I was waiting for a jump cut of getting shocked. Took me a moment to realize it was just lagging.

[@TheGrapyl]

Nice ! 😁

[@cupidstunt22]

An epic saga

[@_BELMONT_]

where do you get that discharge tool?

[@Vondoodle]

Can you get more of those chips ?

[@erinbuck129]

I need a link for that capacitor discharger please 🙏🏼

[@SarahJane148]

Solid

[@dazer123]

The sweet smell of success

[@GameRaveTV]

You can't be stopped.

[@Tiz147]

Did you try the fission chips?

[@krahwinkel9503]

Yes, you found it. Now millions of disappointed users will send in their cameras to you to fix it...

[@73Mooner]

Yo Steve what was that jam in the middle

[@nilomyki]

@StezStix Fix? 10:10 Wasn't the Square Chip the one that failed and not the Rectangular one?

[@willrobinson7599]

The amount of time u put into these is unreal. I'd of given up and binned the lot lol. Well done for your patience trying to get as many fixed as u can , great that u narrowed it down to that little chip.

[@user-nd5oq3cr2b]

Hi could I just know where u could get the known board???

[@kennybacchus1488]

Actual. Fix. For. The. instax. Mini. Flashing. Orange. Lights. ?

[@Peter_A1466]

Did you notice if there is an external memory chip on the board with the firmware for that chip? Or is the chip programmed before being applied? And any chance new firmware can be uploaded over USB? (in case the chip is not faulty but the firmware developed a fault)

[@hugegamer5988]

Looks to me like it’s internal because I don’t see an external chip nearby. You can use something like CS+ to connect to the device and read most of the memory, the exception being the flash sectors that are reserved by the debugger And if they set security bits to prevent reading it.

[@colinboneham7387]

Seems to me that this issue is similar to the cheap 1p on Sony PlayStations that fail regularly.

[@barryhampson5147]

Im definitely no expert but if the chips have different numbers/letters does that mean different batches or newer versions of that chip?

[@djlancematthew]

I need to know what you used to drain the energy out of the flash! Can you please post what it is and where I can get it?

[@89Kritiker89]

You dont need to have a special tool for that, just short the cap out with a resistor.

[@bob81354]

Great job do you happen to have the numbers on the microcontroller chip I know you put it up on the screen but I can't tell what the numbers are it's a little bit too blurry I'm having the same problem with my camera thanks Bob

[@nikkopt]

It's possible the firmware on the micro controller is getting corrupted. Finding the firmware and flashing it will be near impossible. So will be finding new chips already flashed, making this unfixable unless one has a donor with a working ic.

[@peterfordham3562]

Might be able to dump the firmware from the working chip.

[@nikkopt]

@@peterfordham3562 not in this case from what i saw online. The RL78 programming interface does not allow reading the flash contents.

[@peterfordham3562]

@@nikkopt it's not a supported function so some extra work is probably required. If you can execute your own code you can dump and I'm sure there's a way. It's probably more work than it's worth unless someone has done a write up on doding on that mcu already.

[@nikkopt]

@@peterfordham3562 never said it's impossible. I'm sure someone skilled with enough time and resources would be able to do it eventually but since it's not something you can do right now, it's just not worth the hassle.

[@hugegamer5988]

@@nikkopt can’t you can use something like CS+ to connect to the device and read most of the memory, the exception being the flash sectors that are reserved by the debugger provided the security bits have not been set? I’d give it a 90% chance at being locked but with these products you never know.

[@jamesbonner692]

Only problem is even if you can get a replacement chip you still need the firmware inside of it. most chips are locked and the manufacturer won't give you the firmware. The only way to get a replacement is a donor. Still have to throw at least one away.

[@JVerschueren]

300V from a capacitor is fairly mild as far as "zaps" go... there is is far, far worse out there. I'm in the 10kV from an insulation tester club. The initiation is brutal.

[@lookitskazzy]

Yeah not something to really brag about. Had a friend who got zapped by a CRT anode cap, he was out cold for an hour before his wife found him passed out on the floor.

[@wimwiddershins]

I wonder if theres some (flash driver) high voltage leakage, taking out the micro in these things? If so thats a design flaw.

[@spankybear]

You spanked that right out of the park!