It has occurred to me I now should describe the world of
eBay, so nobody gets burned. The Narco COM 120 I bought was
actually funny. Very good cosmetic condition; tested great
on the bench. The seller said "working when removed for
upgrade." They love that last word, because it implies no
other reason to replace. Well, it had a thermal fault.
Showed up after 45 minutes, like Old Faithful. So "upgrade"
can really mean just replacing a bad box.. He wasn't
fibbing; because it was removed "cold" and of
course...worked when removed!
A crazy one was a nav receiver. According to several
repairs tags stuffed inside, in Spanish, it spent much of
its life in Mexico. Well, there's a licensed repair guy
down there named Pancho, who must rip stuff out of old
Emerson table radios for parts. Wrong value, but circuit
operation would be unaffected, and probably he knew that.
But an oversized part, requiring a horrid installation
method.
So this radio winds up north over the border in Texas,
offered by a guy who eBay resells a lot of this stuff. You
can tell when such a guy knows avionics, by the wording in
his eBay offerings. Most everything is "AS IS," but when a
guy like this says "working when removed," it means the guy
who sold it to him said it did, like maybe even a Pancho.
This guy only occasionally says "unknown condition." If no
one told him OK when removed, well a guy who knows avionics
can check this box in minutes for basic function, so
"unknown condition" means...it doesn't work! It didn't; but
for $25 I gambled a circuit board I needed would be OK, and
was after repairing old Pancho's handiwork.
Have four other eBay items that don't work; two that do.
Only takes enough other eBay bidders to be suspicious enough
I won on a very low bid. Only one seller described exactly
what was wrong with it.
Reg,
Fred F.
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