Quick Yard Sale Ryobi 40V 300W Power Source Repair

Picked up this Ryobi 40V 300W Power Source at a yard sale for a buck (they had it for $2 but it hadn't sold yet, so...) The seller said it did't work, that his son had fixed it but then it didn't work. Who knows. They sell for $119 at Home Depot so I have incentive to make it work. I have two 40V ryobi batteries for my lawnmower and blower.

Two screws. All screws except for the PCB screws are various Torx.

Two more screws hidden by the swinging handle.

Two more screws by the fan.

And I'm in.

Removing the fan screws.

Removed the bottom 4 screws and the bottom comes off.

Nothing looks bad. Two phillips screws retain the PCB.

There's a soldered in blade type 15A fuse on the other side. I couldn't read any continuity between the two terminals. I quickly bodged on a fuse holder.

And it's alive!

122.1VAC with no load looks good to me.

Bad fuse removed. You can see the link is blown. It's smaller in footprint than a standard automotive type fuse. Ryobi could have designed this better.

Soldered in an automotive type fuse after nibbling down the leads to fit.

Plenty of space for a standard fuse...they could have put in a socket, or even better a resettable circuit breaker.

Charged up a running laptop from 50% to 100%. I'll call this repair good and see about ordering a proper spare next time I get components in. Who knows why it blew, probably powering too big of a load for too long.

Since the last time...

 Just catching up.

I sold a Radio Shack Mini Color Computer on Ebay, played around with it some.

Made a probe to determine the depth of the water in our well.

Went to the coast on a lovely day.

I bought some seeds at the end of February. I grew the King Ka Ae Hobak last year and it's delicious.

Set up a PC to wipe a bunch of old drives before recycling.

Printed an adapter plate that allows manual use of a CNC ready Sherline lathe. 

The cat likes the catnip in the garden.

Made a cold frame for hardening off plants. This has been a cold spring.

Went to Lumos for a friend's birthday at the end of April.

Repaired an old folding stool by making a new steel clip.

Apple blossoms and walking onions.

February Catchall

 Just some pics from the last 3 months.

I made Sriracha from peppers from the garden.

I smoked some tofu, peppers and cheese in this smoker I got from a friend. The cheese got a bit melty but still tasted great.

I built the latest CHA/V 3.0 and VGA4EVA Video synth.

Henry and I desoldered and then soldered in new mechanical switches for his keyboard.

 

I 3D printed a terminal cover for a RT65-b power supply (used on the Eurorack synth)

Made a fun noise module from scratch.

 

Some dongles I found as I was going through stuff to sell on Ebay.

Anyway, that's what I've been up to.

Ryobi 40V Jet Fan Blower Fan Coupler Fix

My Ryobi 40V leaf blower stopped blowing yesterday. The motor sounded like it was spinning but the visible fan blade would only rotate slowly. A quick consult with Dr. Google turned up a few youtube videos of people who had had this problem. One solved it by using a small R/C motor coupling, which also had a well done teardown. The other gooped in a bunch of JB Weld as a fix. Both worked. So I tore mine down to see what was what. I didn't do a detailed teardown, it's trivial to disassemble, but watch that first video I linked to.

All the screws are the same size which is nice.

Ryobi uses these weird offset silicone pieces to retain bearings and springs. I don't like it.

Square shaft for the blower end.

The only other screws are these long motor screws.

The coupler is a 1" long piece of plastic. One end has a square hole for the fan, the other a D shaped hole for the motor shaft. Ryobi does not sell this part, which I consider immoral.

The D hole has been wallowed out round, which is why it's not working. Thankfully the square hole was fine.

I made a bunch of measurements and will be drawing it up in CAD for 3D printing a replacement should it be needed. In the meantime (hopefully it will last forever) I simply tapped in the side of the coupling for a #8-32 setscrew. I used a form tap which should snugly hold the screw and keep it from backing out. This should work for any coupling which just had the D hole rounded out. If the square hole is wallowed out you would probably need 2-4 setscrews that were adjusted so you could just slip it onto the square shaft. This would be a lot harder to get to work well.

It went back together and now it blows again.