CH Pro Throttle losing power; need help with repair

[Ninthmessiah]

I've posted this at the CH Hangar forum.  No one has replied so I'll try here.

Every so often, I will hear the windows "dung dung" sound as if a USB device was unplugged, see the LED on my pro throttle flicker to yellow and back to green, and all my CH gear goes from mapped mode to direct mode.  Sometimes, my throttle will just stop working completely, yet the red LED will stay lit.  After researching the CH Hangar forum, it seems the most likely culprit is an interruption of power or a short of some kind.  So I open up my throttle and find an exposed wire where the USB cable passes through the case.





I believe this is what is causing the intermittent malfunctions in my throttle, so I cut away some rubber to see the extent of the damage...





At this point, I stop cutting.  To all you pros out there, how do you recommend repairing this wire?? A preemptive thank you for your help.

[MrRiplEy[H]]

I'm not an electrician by any means but I would say that before cutting any more try to plug in your stick and move that wire around to see if its really the problem. The problematic connection may be at the circuit board side, a bad solder for example. That wire is so heavy gauge that you should be able to see visually if it's broken.

[Drano]

^this.

The ones around the circuit board would be a better suspect. Make sure things look clear with the stick apart sitting in a fairly stable place. Not easy I know. Wiggle the connections with a pencil eraser and see if one makes the ding. That's how I'd troubleshoot it. If you're lucky it's not a broken wire inside the insulation. The wires are probably 20 gauge--tiny. If it's a solder joint that's much easier to fix.

On a related note---why doesn't your stick ever come unglued when you're fighting me? ye bastid!

[Bizman]

Neither am I any electrician, but for what I know about electricity and wires I can't figure out a reason to strip a wire inside the twist eliminator. I suppose the black wire is insulated inside the cable all the way through.

The wiggle method described above is sound advice. If you find the problematic wire, the next step might be splicing the cover of the thick cable until you find the broken part. It looks like the cable goes through the thick part. You might be able to slide the part somewhat upper along the cable. That would let you do all the splicing inside the throttle.

[The Fugitive]

It looks like a shield wire to me. All of the wires in the cable are shielded by a woven wire. At the end of a cable they twist the weave together and use a shrink wrap type of insulation to keep the exposed wire from shorting anything. This wire is usually used as a ground. Just wrap some electrical tape around it.

Two possible issues to look at, the modes are switched buy a button on the controllers. Push the mini joystick in on the throttle and 8 think it's the red button on the right side of the joystick. If you are using the CH program to program the stick hitting these switches will cause issues.

The second thing to look for is to be sure your USB ports are not set the energy saver. They will shut down after a certain time and restart after the controllers call for activation. Alway set the USB ports to always on.

[Ack-Ack]

CH still might sell replacement cables for the Pro Throttle or fix it if still under warranty.

ack-ack

[Ninthmessiah]

... try to plug in your stick and move that wire around to see if its really the problem.

Will try this over the holidays when I have time.

I can't figure out a reason to strip a wire inside the twist eliminator.

I didn't strip it.  I found the wire exposed when I opened the case.  I suspect that years of pulling the throttle to idle and stressing a wire that's almost too short has pulled off the insulation.

I'm gonna trouble shoot the wire first since that's easy, then I'll crack open the handle and start messin with the buttons with a pencil eraser.

[Chalenge]

On one of mine (now my backup) a wire on the Throttle grip had worked lose at the primary connector from the base area. I fixed it by cutting it lose of the connector and soldering to the PCB directly. However, that has nothing to do with what you have going on in your images. That looks like something has been brushing up against the wire outside of the throttle case itself. I would just cut a small section of the wire and splice it back together with a new grommet.

[Bizman]

I didn't strip it.  I found the wire exposed when I opened the case.  I suspect that years of pulling the throttle to idle and stressing a wire that's almost too short has pulled off the insulation.

Oh, sorry for my English, I meant that I can't figure out a reason why the factory would have a bare wire inside a cable. As you said the wire seems almost too short, which can mean that the insulation hasn't actually pulled off, it has broken. If you opened the cable you might find out that the insulation continues at some point, probably quite close to where you've already shortened the cable cover.

After taking another look into your pictures and comparing them to a USB cable whose other end I have cut off, I came to think to another thing: USB needs four cables, Red, Green, White and Black. Yours has a second thicker black one, the one that's exposed. In my cable there's a braid covering the four wires as a shield for electromagnetic interference. The shield should be grounded to take effect. It looks like the thick black wire is connected to the shield, which is bare. Leaving it visible is not good craftmanship, but if there's no possibility for it to shortcut it's no big deal.

You can easily get a new cable, since all USB2 cables are basically similar. Only their quality varies. Simply get a good quality USB A to B cable like used for e.g. printers and cut the other end off, soldering the wires similarly to how they are now.

[Bizman]

Before you do anything drastic, I'd suggest you to do this simple check: Do you have Power management of your USB Root Hubs enabled? Because you shouldn't but it's enabled by default. Windows will shut off the power for any "unused" USB port quite soon, and I suppose you don't use your throttle every other second. You should disable Power management also for your gaming devices if enabled.

You'll find the setting in Control Panel->Device Manager->Universal Serial Bus Controllers/Properties/Power Management tab. For gaming controllers look at Human Interface Devices/HID compliant game controllers.