HP 32SII success and woes

[Geoff Quickfall]

Hello Sanjeev

Turn off the calc.

Now press down gently on the top of the metal bezel just below the screen window.

While maintaining the pressure on the bezel just under the screen turn the calc on.

Continuing to press on the bezel, test the calc with the self tests and keyboard and report back.

The twisty thing is a twist clamp that locks the PCA in position. It also serves to press the PCA contact points into the foam wich supports the keyboard contact ribbon. There are six of these twistees. I just repaired a 32SI with compressed foam pressure pad. These pads harden and deform over time and cause the keyboard contact ribbon to lose connectivity with the PCA. This has the effect of causing rows of keys to malfunction.

The twistees also hold the lcd panel in firm contact with the zebra strips and PCA. The garbage display could be that a twistee has failed (missing in your photo) and there is a failure at the LCD-zebra strip-PCA interface.

The only solution is to open it up.

Check out these URLs:

Click on calculator restorations:

http://h20331.www2.hp.com/hpsub/download...e_2010.pdf

And 32sii self tests:

http://www.rskey.org/~mwsebastian/selfte...tm#pioneer

So in conclusion, a missing twistee at your photos location would effect the top zebra strip contact for the LCD to PCA contact. Any others at the mid section would effect the key responses. The compressed foam pressure pad would exacerbate the problem at the keyboard to PCA interface.

If the twistee is missing it would appear someone has been in the calc. You only get a few attempts at repairs as these twistees will fatigue and break. The way they are designed they exude a large compression force and are under stress. Untwisting and re twisting numerous times will result in broken twistees.

Fingers crossed, geoff