Emag 911!

[shadow462]

I'll try to be as brief as possible. My Emag isn't working, and I'm clueless at the moment.

I've had it for about 3 years. Last season, my battery went bad and I ordered a new one. I charged it once, then I blew my knee out at work. I was forced to take a season off, and so was my Emag. Last week I got my things together for this season. I charged my battery, put the gun together, the board turns on. When I pull the trigger, the counter is registering the shots. The solenoid is not responding. I've been told by a few people that, if left to sit for a long time (like a year), the board can "go dumb." I'm assuming that either this is the problem, or the solenoid has gone bad for some reason. I have a multimeter, I just dont know what and where I need to check to find out where the problem lies. Thanks in advance for your time and attention, I hope to get this thing working for a tournament next weekend. I'd like to show all the little Ion kids what a REAL American paintball company can make, and that ramping doesnt make you a paintball player.

John

EM00365
ULE WL Body
ULE Rail
Kila Detents
Level X
TL63 Trigger (first one ever made, I'm told)
Warp Feed
Smoke Panels
HaloB with a perpetually broken shell... ::sigh::
1.37 Software (flash me, PLEASE)

Freeflow Millenium Autococker
RaceFrame

68/45 Armageddon

[flyingpootang]

John, It dosen't say in your post, but I'm assuming that you are dry firing the marker (no air) If thats the case push the safety to ON and the solenoid should click.

[BigEvil]

- A couple things;

Can you fire the gun in MECH mode?
Will the board remember the settings when you change them?
Check the little oring inside the on/off. If they get real dry or swollen, the on/off pin can stick. Oil is a mag's best friend.
Is the gun registering your trigger pulls in E mode?

If your interested in a flash, hit me up with a PM.

[shadow462]

Flyingpootang- Yes, sir, I'm doing this with no air. Tried the safety in both positions, and no click. The 'click' is what I was referring to when I said the solenoid is not responding, so I think we're talking about the same thing here. Any idea what's wrong, or how I can figure out where the problem starts?

BigEvil
- No air, so I don't KNOW if it will fire in mech, but I assume so as all the mechanical components are clean, oiled, and seem to be flawless. The trouble seems to lie in my grip frame.
- Yes, the board appears to retain settings when I change them.
- Oiled up like a swimsuit model.
- Yes, registering shots on the board in E-mode.

Thank you both for your time and help!!

John

[BigEvil]

Next step is to get some air and see what it does, then let us know.

[athomas]

The solenoid won't click after the first shot without air. There is no force to reset the solenoid plunger. Without movement, there is no click.

You can take the valve off and manually hold the sear down (where it protrudes through for the on-off). By providing the manual reset, you can fire the gun and tell if the solenoid is working.

[flyingpootang]

Flyingpootang- Yes, sir, I'm doing this with no air. Tried the safety in both positions, and no click. The 'click' is what I was referring to when I said the solenoid is not responding, so I think we're talking about the same thing here. Any idea what's wrong, or how I can figure out where the problem starts?

BigEvil
- No air, so I don't KNOW if it will fire in mech, but I assume so as all the mechanical components are clean, oiled, and seem to be flawless. The trouble seems to lie in my grip frame.
- Yes, the board appears to retain settings when I change them.
- Oiled up like a swimsuit model.
- Yes, registering shots on the board in E-mode.

Thank you both for your time and help!!

John

John, first check your solenoid plunger hasn't screwd off and the wires are not pinched to the noid/HES. Remove the grip pannels and inspect it. If you need to take the marker apart make shure to dry fire it in M mode and remove the axle pin before taking it apart. To remove the sear after the halves are seperated remove the C clip on the plunger (right side of the grip).

Another cause can be: 1)check your ground/board mounting screw is snug, 2) HES magnet is not in upside down (if removed recently) and it travels far enough back to activate the HES. The best way is to fire it in M with the marker powered on (Hybrid).

[shadow462]

The solenoid won't click after the first shot without air. There is no force to reset the solenoid plunger. Without movement, there is no click.

You can take the valve off and manually hold the sear down (where it protrudes through for the on-off). By providing the manual reset, you can fire the gun and tell if the solenoid is working

Correct, that's what I did. No response. Thanks for helping, though. Any idea WHY it might not be responding?

UPDATE: On a whim, I popped my Warp Feed on, put in a fresh battery, tested that, and set the jumpers to Emag Intellifeed. I plugged the Emag Intelli-cable in to the warp, pulled the trigger AND... nothing. The Warp reacts when I tap it, and when I push the force-feed button on it, and I have jumpers in the middle and bottom positions (for Emag intelli). I'm surmising that this means the problem is on the board, or that I'm a moron and am missing something obvious. Thanks for your continuing assistance!!

John

PS: Going to try to get an air fill this afternoon, but I live pretty far from any shop or field. Also depends if my pregnant better half is in the kind of mood to let me go on a paintball adventure, as she's pretty sick of hearing about this tournament already.

[BigEvil]

Is your magnet out too far away from the HES? (OR too close?)

[shadow462]

John, first check your solenoid plunger hasn't screwd off and the wires are not pinched to the noid/HES. Remove the grip pannels and inspect it. If you need to take the marker apart make shure to dry fire it in M mode and remove the axle pin before taking it apart. To remove the sear after the halves are seperated remove the C clip on the plunger (right side of the grip).

Another cause can be: 1)check your ground/board mounting screw is snug, 2) HES magnet is not in upside down (if removed recently) and it travels far enough back to activate the HES. The best way is to fire it in M with the marker powered on (Hybrid).

OK. Took the gun apart all the way down. Solenoid plunger is secure, wires seem to be fine to Solenoid and HES. Mounting screw is as tight as it's gonna get. HES magnet can't be upside down, because it's glued in to the trigger (I have a TL63 Blade).

Is your magnet out too far away from the HES? (OR too close?)

Non-adjustable due to my trigger.

[flyingpootang]

John, did you try it in Hybrid (power on and in M mode)? You might want to try remove the HES cover and see of the wires are intact and no gunk is in side. If you have a multi meter i can tell you what wire dose what. (Red) constant voltage even when fired, (Yellow) signal wire voltage when your finger are off the trigger and goes to ground when the trigger is pulled, (Black) ground wire at all times check continuity against the board mounting screw. This will let you know if your board is working or not.

Another thing to try take out your HES and use both sides of any magnet to see if your solenoid will click. MAKE SHURE THE PLUNGER IS NOT SEATED IN THE HOUSING LIFT IT UP SLIGHTLY....

[shadow462]

John, did you try it in Hybrid (power on and in M mode)? You might want to try remove the HES cover and see of the wires are intact and no gunk is in side. If you have a multi meter i can tell you what wire dose what. (Red) constant voltage even when fired, (Yellow) signal wire voltage when your finger are off the trigger and goes to ground when the trigger is pulled, (Black) ground wire at all times check continuity against the board mounting screw. This will let you know if your board is working or not.

Another thing to try take out your HES and use both sides of any magnet to see if your solenoid will click. MAKE SHURE THE PLUNGER IS NOT SEATED IN THE HOUSING LIFT IT UP SLIGHTLY....

- Tried it in hybrid, same issue.
-Removed HES cover, all is squeaky clean.
-Red wire giving me about 4.9v, same with yellow when not pulling trigger, then to 0 with trigger pulled.
- With battery disconnected, per directions with my multimeter, placed black contact to ground screw and red contact to black HES wire. Multimeter beeps and reads "Shrt" which according to manual means the circuit resistance is less them 50ohms (circuit has low ohmage or is shorted).
- Tried a spare AGD magnet, after taking HES out. Both sides restuled in no reaction from the solenoid, which I made sure was not fully seated.

I feel like this is a weird riddle game where I know the answer and you guys are trying to guess it... but the trick is... I really don't know.

Thanks again!!

[flyingpootang]

Since you verified the HES and board is working correctly by having the yellow (signal wire) is going to ground, I think the next step is to verify the soleinoid. You need to make jumper wires and a 5 volt power source (2) 3volt lithium camera batteries in series should work. Jump the noid and see if it clicks. Again make shure the noid is not seated. Be shure to post here no matter what happens to see what cured it or not. Good Luck....

[shadow462]

Since you verified the HES and board is working correctly by having the yellow (signal wire) is going to ground, I think the next step is to verify the soleinoid. You need to make jumper wires and a 5 volt power source (2) 3volt lithium camera batteries in series should work. Jump the noid and see if it clicks. Again make shure the noid is not seated. Be shure to post here no matter what happens to see what cured it or not. Good Luck....

... it clicked. A clear, resounding click. Now I'm totally confused.

[flyingpootang]

Ok now we verified the noid and board. All that is left is the battery. Have you checked the voltage on a full charged battery (I assume you did this already)? It should be 16.8volts. Check the positive and ground for a clean/good connection. (2) 9volts in series should be able to work the board and noid. You could try and use the jumper wires and see what happens or if you know anyone with a good AGD battery try and swap yours with it. If it works then your battery is cooked. Let me know what happens......

[shadow462]

Ok now we verified the noid and board. All that is left is the battery. Have you checked the voltage on a full charged battery (I assume you did this already)? It should be 16.8volts. Check the positive and ground for a clean/good connection. (2) 9volts in series should be able to work the board and noid. You could try and use the jumper wires and see what happens or if you know anyone with a good AGD battery try and swap yours with it. If it works then your battery is cooked. Let me know what happens......

18.2 volts from the battery. ::

[flyingpootang]

Let me think about it

[flyingpootang]

Check the noid wires continuity from the board to the noid and the amount of voltage to the noid. I'll verify iot against my XMag values........

[IcantBelieveit]

check your grounds and your power wire....checke the tightness of the power wire under the body. and also check the ground uder the board. ....did you also happen to re-anno

[flyingpootang]

John, I know you tried all the stuff I told you and all the readings on your meter are where they are supposed to be, so Im stumped. Call Roman at AGD tech support and ask him about the board going dumb after sitting for a year question. Maybe re-flashing your board is what you need. If so you have a couple of options: Tunaman can put on the 3.2, you can by the xmod flash/programed off of ebay (under x-mag) for 100.00, or you can get a Pred 5.0 board from tagsportz.com I think the drop in replacements boards are supposed to be comming soon from tag. I did a Do It Yourself board in my XMag and it rips even in semi. With a L10 bolt you don't need to install eyes. If you decide to sell it drop me an email at flyingpootang@netzero.com....Richard

[shadow462]

check your grounds and your power wire....checke the tightness of the power wire under the body. and also check the ground uder the board. ....did you also happen to re-anno

Thanks as usual to everyone. Yes, I did happen to re-anno. Any chance that has something to do with it? Got all my gear put away today, had a tournament, but I'll check continuity and voltages either tonight or tomorrow afternoon. If the board is no good, I may have to consider selling. My paintall budget is pretty slim with a baby due in October. I'll get back as soon as I can with the update.

John

[dsrkd]

I had a similar issue going on with one of my emags. Turned out the ground wasn't grounding. I had to 'scrape' away some anno for a better contact and problem solved. My bet is that IcantBelieveit is on the right track.

[flyingpootang]

John, try stripping away a little of the anno where the board/ground wire connects, run a tap of the propper pitch through the grounding hole a couple of times by hand and where the negative wires connects to the body from the battery. I think this should cure your problem if the ground path is being blocked back to the battery by the anno.

[athomas]

Yes, the ground may have gotten annodized and is making a poor connection. Tap it out as mentioned.

[shadow462]

John, try stripping away a little of the anno where the board/ground wire connects, run a tap of the propper pitch through the grounding hole a couple of times by hand and where the negative wires connects to the body from the battery. I think this should cure your problem if the ground path is being blocked back to the battery by the anno.

A swing... and a miss. I got my hopes up for nothing. Yet another great idea that yields no more information. Tried tapping the hole, as well as taking my dremel to the top where the board sits, to make sure it's raw aluminum. Got no love there, so I tried bypassing the gun body completely and running wires from the battery to the board, one to the existing power wire and one to the contact where the ground screw goes. Still no click. I'm really grateful that you're all toughing this out with me.

[flyingpootang]

Mike,
Is your battery installed correctly in the housing? it may be 180 degrees out of phase. Take the battery out of the housing and see that its not in backwards. The positive shoud be closest to the trigger while the negative is near towards the front battery housing field strip screw.

After you annoed it did it work? If not follow the connections starting at the battery to the post screw (make shure the plastic spacer is in place) see if the voltage dosen't drop at every connection point to the board. You can also do a continuity check with the ground to the battery at every point. We'll get this thing figured out. Get those ill thoughts of tradding it for an Ion out of your head.....

[shadow462]

Mike,
Is your battery installed correctly in the housing? it may be 180 degrees out of phase. Take the battery out of the housing and see that its not in backwards. The positive shoud be closest to the trigger while the negative is near towards the front battery housing field strip screw.

After you annoed it did it work? If not follow the connections starting at the battery to the post screw (make shure the plastic spacer is in place) see if the voltage dosen't drop at every connection point to the board. You can also do a continuity check with the ground to the battery at every point. We'll get this thing figured out. Get those ill thoughts of tradding it for an Ion out of your head.....

I spent about the last hour typing up a comprehensive review and a reply to this latest entry. Then, AOL **** its pants and I lost it before I clicked 'post.' I'm starting to think I was very, very bad in a previous life.

-Battery is installed correctly.
-Voltage is a steady 18.3V all around

That's for today's idea. Now to review:

John, It dosen't say in your post, but I'm assuming that you are dry firing the marker (no air) If thats the case push the safety to ON and the solenoid should click.

-Testing with no air.
-Tried safety in LIVE position, and totally removed.

- A couple things;

Can you fire the gun in MECH mode?
Will the board remember the settings when you change them?
Check the little oring inside the on/off. If they get real dry or swollen, the on/off pin can stick. Oil is a mag's best friend.
Is the gun registering your trigger pulls in E mode?

If your interested in a flash, hit me up with a PM.

- No air, so I don't KNOW if it will fire in mech, but I assume so as all the mechanical components are clean, oiled, and seem to be flawless. The trouble seems to lie in my grip frame.
- Yes, the board appears to retain settings when I change them.
- Oiled up like a swimsuit model.
- Yes, registering shots on the board in E-mode.

John, first check your solenoid plunger hasn't screwd off and the wires are not pinched to the noid/HES. Remove the grip pannels and inspect it. If you need to take the marker apart make shure to dry fire it in M mode and remove the axle pin before taking it apart. To remove the sear after the halves are seperated remove the C clip on the plunger (right side of the grip).

Another cause can be: 1)check your ground/board mounting screw is snug, 2) HES magnet is not in upside down (if removed recently) and it travels far enough back to activate the HES. The best way is to fire it in M with the marker powered on (Hybrid).

- Took the gun apart all the way down.
- Solenoid plunger is secure, wires seem to be fine to Solenoid and HES.
- Mounting screw is as tight as it's gonna get.
- HES magnet can't be upside down, because it's glued in to the trigger (I have a TL63 Blade).

John, did you try it in Hybrid (power on and in M mode)? You might want to try remove the HES cover and see of the wires are intact and no gunk is in side. If you have a multi meter i can tell you what wire dose what. (Red) constant voltage even when fired, (Yellow) signal wire voltage when your finger are off the trigger and goes to ground when the trigger is pulled, (Black) ground wire at all times check continuity against the board mounting screw. This will let you know if your board is working or not.

Another thing to try take out your HES and use both sides of any magnet to see if your solenoid will click. MAKE SHURE THE PLUNGER IS NOT SEATED IN THE HOUSING LIFT IT UP SLIGHTLY....

- Tried it in hybrid, same issue.
-Removed HES cover, all is squeaky clean.
-Red wire giving me about 4.9v, same with yellow when not pulling trigger, then to 0 with trigger pulled.
- With battery disconnected, per directions with my multimeter, placed black contact to ground screw and red contact to black HES wire. Multimeter beeps and reads "Shrt" which according to manual means the circuit resistance is less them 50ohms (circuit has low ohmage or is shorted).
- Tried a spare AGD magnet, after taking HES out. Both sides resulted in no reaction from the solenoid, which I made sure was not fully seated, but registered shots on the counter.

Since you verified the HES and board is working correctly by having the yellow (signal wire) is going to ground, I think the next step is to verify the soleinoid. You need to make jumper wires and a 5 volt power source (2) 3volt lithium camera batteries in series should work. Jump the noid and see if it clicks. Again make shure the noid is not seated. Be shure to post here no matter what happens to see what cured it or not. Good Luck....

- 4.5V jumper (3 AAAs in series) yielded a perfect click. Solenoid is functioning as it should when jumped.

Ok now we verified the noid and board. All that is left is the battery. Have you checked the voltage on a full charged battery (I assume you did this already)? It should be 16.8volts. Check the positive and ground for a clean/good connection. (2) 9volts in series should be able to work the board and noid. You could try and use the jumper wires and see what happens or if you know anyone with a good AGD battery try and swap yours with it. If it works then your battery is cooked. Let me know what happens......

- Battery, fresh off the charger, reads 18.4V.
- Set up 2X9V with jumpers as instructed. Everything functions the same as with AGD battery.

Check the noid wires continuity from the board to the noid and the amount of voltage to the noid. I'll verify iot against my XMag values........

- Positive battery terminal to Solenoid/board contacts yields no Voltage.
- Negative (ground) to Solenoid/board contacts yields 18V.
- Solenoid contacts checked for continuity to eachother: 'Shrt'
- Solenoid contacts checked for continuity to POSITIVE: 'Shrt'
- Solenoid contacts checked for continuity to NEGATIVE (ground): 'OPEN'

check your grounds and your power wire....checke the tightness of the power wire under the body. and also check the ground uder the board. ....did you also happen to re-anno

- Wires and connections are good.
- Yes, I re-annoed.

John, try stripping away a little of the anno where the board/ground wire connects, run a tap of the propper pitch through the grounding hole a couple of times by hand and where the negative wires connects to the body from the battery. I think this should cure your problem if the ground path is being blocked back to the battery by the anno.

- Tapped ground hole and dremeled the face of it, where the board sits, to raw aluminum.
- No change in problem.
- Tried bypassing the gun body completely and running wires from the battery to the board, one to the existing power wire and one to the contact where the ground screw goes, in case the ano was somehow still hindering the connection.. Still no click.

That brings us to the most current effort, at the top of this reply.

In Summary:

- The battery is fully charged.
- The battery is delivering 18.3V to the gun.

Thus, the battery is doing its job.

- The Trigger is moving freely.
- The Trigger Magnet is permanently in place, so it is not backwards.
- The HES is clean and undamaged.
- When the trigger is pulled, the HES is sending the information to the board, because the shots are registering on the counter.

Thus, the Trigger and HES are doing their job.

- The Solenoid is clean, undamaged, and securely assembled.
- When jumped with 4.5V, the Solenoid cycles as it should.
- The two solenoid contacts on the board are contiguous to eachother.
- Power is continuous to one contact of the solenoid, and not to the other. This, I assume, would change when the board tells the solenoid to fire by allowing the power to the other contact, closing the circuit.

Thus, the Solenoid is doing its job.

In closing, I hypothesize that the board is not opening the door for the power to travel through the solenoid and allow the firing cycle to occur. The power circuit seems to be as follows:

+ Battery > + Board > + Solenoid > :: Solenoid fires:: > - Solenoid > - Board > - Battery

The HES is telling the Board that the Trigger has been pulled. The Board does not seem to be passing that information along to the Solenoid.

I'm starting to feel like Captain Ahab.

Oh, and on a side note:

Get those ill thoughts of tradding it for an Ion out of your head.....

I live in Pittsburgh, PA, near Loyalhanna, where Smart Parts is headquartered. I've been in this game a long time. I was around for the PVI Shocker, and how hard Smart Parts screwed that company out of what was rightfully theirs. I have been very vocal about the 'patent lawsuits' that those theives have used to bludgeon this industry into the shattered mess it's now become. The thought of trading my baby for one of their tainted, plastic pieces of trash turns my insides to knots. I'll stop my rant here, but I could go for days. Have no fear about me ever shooting a SP gun. 'Nuff said.

John

[shadow462]

Mike,
Is your battery installed correctly in the housing? it may be 180 degrees out of phase. Take the battery out of the housing and see that its not in backwards. The positive shoud be closest to the trigger while the negative is near towards the front battery housing field strip screw.

After you annoed it did it work? If not follow the connections starting at the battery to the post screw (make shure the plastic spacer is in place) see if the voltage dosen't drop at every connection point to the board. You can also do a continuity check with the ground to the battery at every point. We'll get this thing figured out. Get those ill thoughts of tradding it for an Ion out of your head.....

BTW, who the hell is Mike?

[flyingpootang]

John,
I have the final solution to your problem. Since you verified the Battery, HES, noid, ground etc it has to be in your board. If you want a competitive tourney marker you should do what I did. It will get you up and running in a couple of days and the cost wouldn't be much more than to have your marker looked at, shipping cost to and from, and board re-flashed if its not fried. I did a MiniMorlock w/5.0 code from tagsportz mod on my Xmag and it rips. Check out the links below to make your decision. I will personally walk you through each step to complete this mod. Check TagSportz to see if they will flash the board from Exarin since Tag no longer carries the MiniMorlock. The Exarin board doesn't have the PSP/NXL mods on it, but the are still supplying boards to TAG and their tourney legal.

https://automags.org/forums/showthread.php?t=193084
tagsportz.com
http://exarin.com/

On one note from me a snot nosed kid toting an ION approached me after playing AirBall and said WOW what kinda Shocker is that it rips ? I looked at the kid and said "this ain't no Shocker kid it's an XMAg". I then educated him on AGD and their cutting edge technology and sent him off with AO's & AGD's web site. While Ions are like belly buttons and every ones got one mentality it's up to all of us to keep AGD going and show players they produces a cutting edge marker that is one of paintball's best kept secret......

[shadow462]

John,
I have the final solution to your problem. Since you verified the Battery, HES, noid, ground etc it has to be in your board. If you want a competitive tourney marker you should do what I did. It will get you up and running in a couple of days and the cost wouldn't be much more than to have your marker looked at, shipping cost to and from, and board re-flashed if its not fried. I did a MiniMorlock w/5.0 code from tagsportz mod on my Xmag and it rips. Check out the links below to make your decision. I will personally walk you through each step to complete this mod. Check TagSportz to see if they will flash the board from Exarin since Tag no longer carries the MiniMorlock. The Exarin board doesn't have the PSP/NXL mods on it, but the are still supplying boards to TAG and their tourney legal.

https://automags.org/forums/showthread.php?t=193084
tagsportz.com
http://exarin.com/

On one note from me a snot nosed kid toting an ION approached me after playing AirBall and said WOW what kinda Shocker is that it rips ? I looked at the kid and said "this ain't no Shocker kid it's an XMAg". I then educated him on AGD and their cutting edge technology and sent him off with AO's & AGD's web site. While Ions are like belly buttons and every ones got one mentality it's up to all of us to keep AGD going and show players they produces a cutting edge marker that is one of paintball's best kept secret......

I think that's the way I'm going to go. I'm certainly not afraid of a little soldering, and I'd kill someone if I spent the money to get this thing flashed and I ended up needing a new board anyway. Would the board work straight from Exarin, or does it NEED TAG's Predator software? I'm not remarkably concerned with getting PSP and NXL modes. I suppose if I'm going to this much effort I might as well talk to TAG about getting 5.0. Thanks again, as usual. I'm sure I'll be bugging you soon to get me through the board setup.

John