HELP urgent! Flex 3401 stop working

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fabz

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Dear Autogeek forum friends,

I bought my flex from autogeek about 1 year and 8 months ago. I've been using on 3 or 4 jobs jobs every week, I like it.

A few weeks ago I started to have what seemed to be an electrical problem. It would stop working and if i unplug and plug it back and twist the cable a bit it would start working again. It started to become more frequent and quite annoying and two days ago it seemed to have finally died so I changed the power plug last night and it seemed to be back to life....

until this morning when it worked on half of the panel and died again, playing with the cable it would work for a couple of seconds and die again so I had to polish the car by hand, it was a nightmare..

Im in Australia, what would you guys suggest, Ive got a few hundred dollars in jobs lined up and dont want to miss it.

Thanks a lot!
 
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fabz said:
Dear Autogeek forum friends,

I bought my flex from autogeek about 1 year and 8 months ago. I've been using on 3 or 4 jobs jobs every week, I like it.

A few weeks ago I started to have what seemed to be an electrical problem. It would stop working and if i unplug and plug it back and twist the cable a bit it would start working again. It started to become more frequent and quite annoying and two days ago it seemed to have finally died so I changed the power plug last night and it seemed to be back to life....

until this morning when it worked on half of the panel and died again, playing with the cable it would work for a couple of seconds and die again so I had to polish the car by hand, it was a nightmare..

Im in Australia, what would you guys suggest, Ive got a few hundred dollars in jobs lined up and dont want to miss it.

Thanks a lot!
Click to expand...

Hi fabz are you on 230volt in australia ? Me and many other users of flex xc3401 and G110v2 got similar problem after using the units with step down adapter...I never got it resolved as well...May have to contact flex for this...
 
Yes 230v around here, but my flex is 230v. I use the simple adaptor to the aussie power point. I changed to the local one yesterday and problem persists.

Problem seems to be in the power cord...?
 
QUOTE=fabz;586347]Dear Autogeek forum friends,

It would stop working and if i unplug and plug it back and twist the cable a bit it would start working again. It started to become more frequent and quite annoying and two days ago it seemed to have finally died so I changed the power plug last night and it seemed to be back to life....

until this morning when it worked on half of the panel and died again, playing with the cable it would work for a couple of seconds and die again so I had to polish the car by hand, it was a nightmare..[/QUOTE]

There's a problem with the power cord itself or where it connects inside the handle. By your description it's not the plug on the end and these seldom become problematic.

You'll have to ope the case and replace the cord and plug as a unit. It's a standard cored so it shouldn't be a major problem to replace. If your uncomfortable doing this any electrician should be able to do this for you in less than 20 minutes...
 
Thanks Bobby

Yes I just chopped the power cord in half and opened the back of the unit. I cleaned it up and rechecked all connections, put it all together and now it works if the top of the cord that exits the unit is bending downwards, if I put it up my shoulder the cord will bend upwards and it stops working.

I guess a complete change of the whole cord would do the trick. I hope so! If I have to buy one of those here it costs almost AU$700!
 
Man, thats rough!! I hope you get it fixed soon and easily. I'd love to hear what Flex says and I hope they will be prompt and courteous in any exchanges you have. I would call AG as well and ask them to get involved with Flex if needed.

When you pay this price for a machine using it a few times before it stops working is unacceptable.
 
I had this same problem with my Griot's 6". It turned out that my extension cord was bad. Idk if you are using an extension cord or not, but that is what I would check.
 
TLMitchell said:
Gonna have to include a speel checker in the Forum software before you end up the subject of one of Mike's threads. :D

TL
Click to expand...

What????

I was compearing the condition if the cords insides with a fruit..... :laughing: :laughing:

"The hard or fibrous central part of certain fruits, such as the apple or pear, containing the seeds"

My fingers operate at speeds faster than my internal processor......aka my brain... :laughing:
 
Thanks everyone.

Yes the extension one was my first try.

I will take it to an electrician tomoro to replace the whole cord and I hope that would do.

Cheers.
 
BobbyG said:
What????

I was compearing the condition if the cords insides with a fruit..... :laughing: :laughing:

"The hard or fibrous central part of certain fruits, such as the apple or pear, containing the seeds"
Click to expand...

:laughing: 10/10
 
You might consider installing a longer cord when replacing. That is what I did with my old Makita. A lot of the time I don't need a extension cord.
 
Oh great! After not finding any eletctrician ready to do it straight away (drop the tool and pick it up in five days!?) I decided to do it myself.

I stuffed up :-( The blue and brown wires that come uff the trigger unit plus this grey wire all came off after I unscrew those two little ones and now there's what seems to be five little holes and 3 wires and Ive got no idea where to fit them... only if I was more careful and took a good look before (idiot) I guess I should be fine.

I thought that those two little screws would open that little black box, so I unscrew them and tried to take the "lid" off. Duh! The whole thing came up and those three wires came loose.

S*#t sometimes it is better to leave it to a professional. Today's job is lost.
 
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Found an electrician that replaced the whole power cord and she's alive back in business! :xyxthumbs:
 
I actually took a picture of mine as I was taking it apart so I knew where the wires went. Send me a pm and ill upload the picture tonight (im using my phone now).
 
Yes thanks I think its a good idea to put the pic up here so it may help ppl that search for this info in the future.
 
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