Nord User Forum

Hi! Need urgent help I'm not sure if I have damaged a circuit or just blown a fuse. I was playing my Nord (after about a year of inactivity) for about 5 minutes before it seemed to short circuit. Smoke came out from between the keys, the lights flickered then died, and I could hear electrical noises. There was a heavy stench of burnt electricity after. I have been using the same IEC for years so not sure if it was a random surge? What should I do?

Here are some photos:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1BIuXKt ... sp=sharing
https://drive.google.com/file/d/12WFYNi ... sp=sharing
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1zK_O1g ... sp=sharing
https://drive.google.com/file/d/15ajjCr ... sp=sharing
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1bFmWnh ... sp=sharing
https://drive.google.com/file/d/13ScUu9 ... sp=sharing
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1MjVifO ... sp=sharing

Definitely not a fuse. The smoke and smell would indicate you have blown at least one capacitor and possibly some other components.

You will need to send your keyboard in for servicing.

For a start, that's an out of warranty repair. Do you have insurance to protect your instrument? The main board will have been completely trashed based on your description and it's more than a capacitor. a major surge will have hit the internal PSU and fed the main board and associated rails with the same surge, this means that an entire PSU and board rebuild or replacement has to be undertaken and this is expensive. The internal boards themselves are expensive to replace if still available through Nord or your distributor. I've had this happen on a gig with another manufacturer's machine and rebuilding meant replacing the entire PSU, 6 boards and display, may as well have thrown it in the skip and purchased new.

I wish you good luck, but I doubt you'll get this repaired.

I would highly advise if you're prone to power spikes, to invest in a power conditioning unit which works as a rectifier and power factor smoothing unit, it has an internal breaker which will protect against a major failure. I would advise anyone to do this where investing in expensive equipment.

lew

LewTheKeysGuy wrote:For a start, that's an out of warranty repair. Do you have insurance to protect your instrument? The main board will have been completely trashed based on your description and it's more than a capacitor. a major surge will have hit the internal PSU and fed the main board and associated rails with the same surge, this means that an entire PSU and board rebuild or replacement has to be undertaken and this is expensive. The internal boards themselves are expensive to replace if still available through Nord or your distributor. I've had this happen on a gig with another manufacturer's machine and rebuilding meant replacing the entire PSU, 6 boards and display, may as well have thrown it in the skip and purchased new.

I wish you good luck, but I doubt you'll get this repaired.

I would highly advise if you're prone to power spikes, to invest in a power conditioning unit which works as a rectifier and power factor smoothing unit, it has an internal breaker which will protect against a major failure. I would advise anyone to do this where investing in expensive equipment.

lew

Thanks for the help, really appreciate it. Will definitely invest in a conditioner from here on out. Is anyone on here able to assess the damage based on the attached photos and advice me in the meantime? I can't find a helpful service shop in my area as of yet..

It is hard if not impossible to assess a damage on an electronic board just by visual inspection of a few photos, unfortunately; however, at least as far as the power supply section is concerned, any experienced electronics repair workshop (not necessary Nord official) should be able to do that for you. But before that: have you checked the fuse?

maxpiano wrote:It is hard if not impossible to assess a damage on an electronic board just by visual inspection of a few photos, unfortunately; however, at least as far as the power supply section is concerned, any experienced electronics repair workshop (not necessary Nord official) should be able to do that for you. But before that: have you checked the fuse?

Sorry for the dumb questions, but how do I check the fuse?

geremychua wrote:

maxpiano wrote:It is hard if not impossible to assess a damage on an electronic board just by visual inspection of a few photos, unfortunately; however, at least as far as the power supply section is concerned, any experienced electronics repair workshop (not necessary Nord official) should be able to do that for you. But before that: have you checked the fuse?

Sorry for the dumb questions, but how do I check the fuse?

Remove it then visually inspect it to see if the wire is still integer or (better) use a multimeter/multitester/VOM to test its electrical continuity

daft question, but are the plugs in singapore like a euro plug (2 pin, or an american style plug? if so, there's no fuse to them, the fuse would be inside the nord itself to the PSU / Rail? The fuse will have blown as a protection against further action, but before it's fuse failure, these symptoms would have occurred. hence a fuse blow, if the fuse hasn't blown, any further attempt of powering up would cause an electrical fire, therefore the product is unsafe.

Please DO NOT attempt to re-power this instrument for the following risks: 1: Electrical Fire Risk. 2: Electric Shock.

Please have this inspected by a qualified electrical technician / engineer (as rightly advised it doesn't need to be a Nord certified company as it's out of warranty). This is for your safety.

lew

LewTheKeysGuy wrote:For a start, that's an out of warranty repair. Do you have insurance to protect your instrument? The main board will have been completely trashed based on your description and it's more than a capacitor. a major surge will have hit the internal PSU and fed the main board and associated rails with the same surge, this means that an entire PSU and board rebuild or replacement has to be undertaken and this is expensive. The internal boards themselves are expensive to replace if still available through Nord or your distributor. I've had this happen on a gig with another manufacturer's machine and rebuilding meant replacing the entire PSU, 6 boards and display, may as well have thrown it in the skip and purchased new.

I wish you good luck, but I doubt you'll get this repaired.

I would highly advise if you're prone to power spikes, to invest in a power conditioning unit which works as a rectifier and power factor smoothing unit, it has an internal breaker which will protect against a major failure. I would advise anyone to do this where investing in expensive equipment.

lew

There is no way to know what specifically has happened and actually no reason to believe the some major power surge caused this problem. Its just as likely that one of the capacitors in the power supply has simply failed. This may or may not have caused any follow on damage. In most cases you will also lose a corresponding power regulator and sometimes some local resistors. I didn't see anything obvious from the photos. Either way you'll need to send/take the system into somebody for repair to assess the damage. In most cases these sorts of failures do NOT result in massive damage throughout the system.

Also don't bother looking for the fuse, its irrelevant. Don't replace the fuse, don't power up the unit. Get it serviced.

LewTheKeysGuy wrote:daft question, but are the plugs in singapore like a euro plug (2 pin, or an american style plug? if so, there's no fuse to them, the fuse would be inside the nord itself to the PSU / Rail? The fuse will have blown as a protection against further action, but before it's fuse failure, these symptoms would have occurred. hence a fuse blow, if the fuse hasn't blown, any further attempt of powering up would cause an electrical fire, therefore the product is unsafe.

Please DO NOT attempt to re-power this instrument for the following risks: 1: Electrical Fire Risk. 2: Electric Shock.

Please have this inspected by a qualified electrical technician / engineer (as rightly advised it doesn't need to be a Nord certified company as it's out of warranty). This is for your safety.

lew

Yes, I was talking about the fuse inside the Nord of course (but I didn't consider that also plugs in some countries have a fuse)