Quote:
Originally Posted by MediaJones  Im not sure how subzero weather affects electronics... Im sure its not good- |
Actual semiconductors and materials in passive devices can survive temeperatures that would kill humans. In fact, great majority of semi devices are designed to
operate normaly down to 0 deg celsius, and tranport/storage temp is way below freezing.
What could actualy go wrong is that some solder joint could have cracked beacuse of different expansion/contraction coeff. of different materials, or something could have shorted. If temeperature of device is -10, and you bring it in warm room, water vapour will condense on cold surfaces of device. That water shouldn't actally harm (newer) device beacuse all modern PCBs are made with transparent protective top layer (so called solder mask), so only exposed conducors are device pins and solder pads on PCB. But some vintage pedals could've actually been made with low grade noncoated PCBs, so condensaton could be a problem. Water itself doesn't cause shorts, problem is conductive impurities in water. So even if water has actually dried off, conductive path on pcb surface would be left behind. Solution is to clean whole PCB and conectors inside device and dry it, shorts shouldn't harm device because in 9V pedals there aren't potential sources of large currents in case of shorts that could kill some component on PCB (average 9V battery is not capable of large enough currents to kill typical semi devices).
My advice, take it to reliable tech, most probably for cleaning only (old pedals need cleaning anyway), chances are 99.9% that it is very fixable. And in future, when forzen device arrives, open it up and stuff it with copious amount of silka gell bags and leave it for 24-48 hours. You can clean by yourself of course, but do it at your own risk (most cleaning stuff is actually harmful to open potentiometers and 1/4" connectors, so a bit of care is required).
