Warning... my generic K-DCAN cable burned out...

[geargrinder]

Little warning for those using the K-DCAN cables that it seems some of them can burn out if left plugged in for too long... For some time I had begun using one of those generic K-DCAN cable as my #1 scanning/coding cable. Since I've been doing a ton of stuff w/ E39 & E46 speedo cluster investigation and adjustment, as well as tweaks from the S54 DME project, it's gotten a lot of time lately.

Well yesterday it seemed to burn out after being left plugged into the E46 for an extended time after a DME flash. When I pulled it out it was quite warm, especially around a large transistor you can see through the housing (see below). I surmise that is a BJT that burned up but haven't opened the case to find out. If so it should be an easy fix, and maybe I can mod to reduce the current draw and not burn up.

FWIW, the LED still lights, but EDIABAS tools don't recognize it. At first Windows didn't recognize it but seems now Windows sees it as a FT232 USB serial cable like it should but still doesn't work. I'll poke around inside it when I have time.

Luckily my homebrew VAG-COM w/ true ignition sense mod is still going strong so I'm not high & dry...

HTH somebody...

[TerraPhantm]

Little warning for those using the K-DCAN cables that it seems some of them can burn out if left plugged in for too long... For some time I had begun using one of those generic K-DCAN cable as my #1 scanning/coding cable. Since I've been doing a ton of stuff w/ E39 & E46 speedo cluster investigation and adjustment, as well as tweaks from the S54 DME project, it's gotten a lot of time lately.

Well yesterday it seemed to burn out after being left plugged into the E46 for an extended time after a DME flash. When I pulled it out it was quite warm, especially around a large transistor you can see through the housing (see below). I surmise that is a BJT that burned up but haven't opened the case to find out. If so it should be an easy fix, and maybe I can mod to reduce the current draw and not burn up.

FWIW, the LED still lights, but EDIABAS tools don't recognize it. At first Windows didn't recognize it but seems now Windows sees it as a FT232 USB serial cable like it should but still doesn't work. I'll poke around inside it when I have time.

Luckily my homebrew VAG-COM w/ true ignition sense mod is still going strong so I'm not high & dry...

HTH somebody...

Thanks for the info -- I've also been using mine as my "one stop" coding cable.

Just FYI, if you have a Galetto cable, that can also be used if you solder pins 7 and 8

[StudieJP]

That cable is not from one-stop-electronics, that is why it burned out!

[TerraPhantm]

At 3-4x the price of everyone else, their cable better be more reliable. I suspect in reality they're all made in the same shop

[geargrinder]

That cable is not from one-stop-electronics, that is why it burned out!

At 3-4x the price of everyone else, their cable better be more reliable. I suspect in reality they're all made in the same shop

Yeah hard to say w/o opening them. I buy a lotta kooky electronics crap from guangzhou/hongkong and sometimes indeed the higher priced guys stuff is identical to the $8 ebay guys stuff. Sometimes there are differences.

I am betting this is a case of that transistor either being under spec'd, or even more likely, being biased super hot at idle because of a resistor that's too small. Both are the kind of goofy elementary substitution mistakes you see w/ the cheap chinese knock offs of stuff. Sometimes super easily fixed. Will see when I get it open.

[StudieJP]

At 3-4x the price of everyone else, their cable better be more reliable. I suspect in reality they're all made in the same shop

One-stop-electronics's cable is not made in the same shop. The cable has gone through revisions and improvement throughout the years.

I know the owner of One-Stop, I can guarantee you his cable is much better quality made and improved then the mass produced ones in China.

He is German

I do a little bit of work in China too, and trust me. Even though everything may "look" like it came from the same factory, in reality it isn't.
There are countless and endless amounts of manufactures all throughout China. To find something that comes from the same factory is rarely ever the case.

[geargrinder]

One-stop-electronics's cable is not made in the same shop. The cable has gone through revisions and improvement throughout the years.

I know the owner of One-Stop, I can guarantee you his cable is much better quality made and improved then the mass produced ones in China.

He is German

I do a little bit of work in China too, and trust me. Even though everything may "look" like it came from the same factory, in reality it isn't.
There are countless and endless amounts of manufactures all throughout China. To find something that comes from the same factory is rarely ever the case.

Yeah, sure, agreed I know there's lotsa factories. I assume his cables are still made in china. Certainly you can get good stuff made in China as long as you keep on top of it (they like to sneak in cheap substitutions without mentioning it...) I'm not interested in talking down his products, just in the warning that some of these cables seem to burn out and then eventually I'll be interested in why as soon as I get a chance to pop it open and check some components...

[TerraPhantm]

Yeah hard to say w/o opening them. I buy a lotta kooky electronics crap from guangzhou/hongkong and sometimes indeed the higher priced guys stuff is identical to the $8 ebay guys stuff. Sometimes there are differences.

I am betting this is a case of that transistor either being under spec'd, or even more likely, being biased super hot at idle because of a resistor that's too small. Both are the kind of goofy elementary substitution mistakes you see w/ the cheap chinese knock offs of stuff. Sometimes super easily fixed. Will see when I get it open.

Let me know if you find any better components. I'm willing to spend a few bucks to make my cable more reliable.

One-stop-electronics's cable is not made in the same shop. The cable has gone through revisions and improvement throughout the years.

I know the owner of One-Stop, I can guarantee you his cable is much better quality made and improved then the mass produced ones in China.

He is German

I do a little bit of work in China too, and trust me. Even though everything may "look" like it came from the same factory, in reality it isn't.
There are countless and endless amounts of manufactures all throughout China. To find something that comes from the same factory is rarely ever the case.

If you say so. Can't know without being able to see the board and components on their cable. And as geargrinder said, probably not literally the same factory, but I would be surprised if it's not made in China

[tinkerman]

I must say I am also a fan of the ‘One Stop Electronics’ cable. I had purchased a $25 dollar cable(there are even cheaper ones now!) and it was ‘dead on arrival’ but I did not realize it until like 2 weeks of mind frazzling trouble shooting (a big freakin’ waste of time).

Then I got the OSE cable. It just worked, and keeps working. The internal electronics, cable, and general materials are just higher quality with ‘craftsmanship’(which shows in the soldering of the OBD pins to their base PCB). See for yourself.

Below is the One Stop Electronics' internal details. Very fine work.
One Stop Elec-side A.JPG
One Stop Elec-side B.JPG

Fine SMT job. The one section with bridged soldering of 2 pins is intentional.
One Stop Elec-close up.JPG

Below, note the dirty solder job(on the left PCB where the OBD pins are soldered). Turned out 2 OBD pins were NOT soldered properly to their base PCB and were detached.
Dead On Arrival-side B.JPG
The internal PCB looks nice and tidy, but again, this was 'Dead On Arrival'. The main FTDI chip's SMT job was also sloppy. Actually the FTDI chip's plastic housing has been partially melted, due to heat from soldering the horribly placed LED pins right up against the main processor.
Dead On Arrival-side A.JPG

Regarding the OSE cable, at first, I thought, " What?! $99! What a rip-off!" Then after 2-3 weeks of hair pulling/red buggy eyes/trouble shooting into oblivion etc.(due to the crap cable), and another 1-2 weeks or so of waiting(for shipping of the OSE cable), I thought, " What a relief!"

[StudieJP]

Thank you Tinkerman, I was going to post this but I didn't get around to doing it.
OSE cable is the best one on the market coming from China.

[David Mc]

The differences between the 2 interfaces also extend to their programming - I had a look at both the OSE and my generic K+DCAN interfaces using MPROG - they do not use identical programming of the FTDi chip.

[se93]

Hello to all

My generic K+DCAN also died on me yesterday. I was trying to scan an E39 and the red LED would start to flicker on and off causing a communication error in GT1. I changed to a different usb port and the same thing happened

I would touch the cable in different areas to get the led on and the cable would just play around with not enanling the led to stay on

I closed up the software and managed to read the problem codes of the DME trough INPA. Strange though since i used the same cable and INPA was able to read the trouble codes

Regards
Mark

[rich123321]

I have OSE but it is starting to fail on me.. Constant disconnects etc. Got a 35$ one from ebay and so far so good. It has a green board so that is good as well. I remember seeing that white board works sometimes, blue board is completely dead, and a green board should be good to go!

[geargrinder]

Dead On Arrival-side B.JPG
The internal PCB looks nice and tidy, but again, this was 'Dead On Arrival'. The main FTDI chip's SMT job was also sloppy. Actually the FTDI chip's plastic housing has been partially melted, due to heat from soldering the horribly placed LED pins right up against the main processor.
Dead On Arrival-side A.JPG

Regarding the OSE cable, at first, I thought, " What?! $99! What a rip-off!" Then after 2-3 weeks of hair pulling/red buggy eyes/trouble shooting into oblivion etc.(due to the crap cable), and another 1-2 weeks or so of waiting(for shipping of the OSE cable), I thought, " What a relief!"

Tinkerman - thanks for the side-by-side. I will immediately acknowledge the OSE looks good from the pix.

I'll also second your correct observation on the cheapo version of the large LED pin proximity to the FT232 chip which is identical to mine. Typical terrible Chinese layout PCB design. In fact mine has fresh burn marks on it making me pretty sure an arc from those is what took out the cable. If I end up with another one I will cut those back and cover in hot glue or something to isolate from the FT232 chip. Pic below doesn't quite do justice to how burned that thing looks in person.

The big device they use turns out to be an L7805V voltage regulator. Without getting into reverse engineering their schematic I'm guessing they have something setup very inefficiently so it is shunting tons of current to generate the 5V but I dunno.



- - - Updated - - -

Here's (not much but a little) better shot of how burnt the poor FT232 chip is... blurry but you can see the discoloration...

[C5257BZ]

Hi everyone, does somebody find out how to solve a dead k dcan?