Batboard

I have older model XTL5000 radios, they have the W4 control head and they are dash mount radios. They have the ignition switch wire connected. I started having a few problem radios that basically start boot up mode when they are turned on. They end up going into a 01/90 Fail Code and I cannot for the life of me figure this problem out. I have a couple of radios that do it every time the radio is turned on, i have a few that do it at random and I have a few that don't have this problem. I work for the park service and most of our fleet of vehicles are newer, We also just did a large swap out of vehicles. This has happened on a few of the newer vehicles and it has also happened on a couple of our front end loaders and those are older vehicles. I have been researching this problem and I have not found a good solution. I was wondering if anyone had any ideas to what may be causing this.

Thank You

James Shearer
Death Valley National Park

I believe if my memory is correct that the error 01/90 is the radio and the control head is not communicating with each other. Being out in the hot dry climate there, the radio could have developed a poor connection.

The service manual shows in table 4-1, that the error is a general hardware error and trying to power up the radio again might solve the error. But it does mention replacing the control head or flex cable. It's been a while since I had an XTL with a W4 head on it. So I don't have one to go look at. There might be a ribbon cable or flex cable that plugs into those front panel pins and then goes to the main radio board. My memory is a little foggy on that area.

If you pull the 2 screws holding the control head to the radio, you can gently wiggle the control head off the radio. There should also be a flex cable between the head and the radio. I would gently pull it out and then push it back in on both ends. Then put the head back carefully back on the radio. A copy of the basic service manual would be of help to you in doing this. As it is a little over 24 megs in size. it is not one that you could have emailed to you. But if you have an MOL account, you could download it from Motorola.

You could make a bench test setup and have a good radio to work with. Need a 12 volt power supply and the DB15 accessory cable to power up the radio with. It should also have the speaker connector on it. Then you can play musical chairs with the control heads and make sure you don't have a bad one. The W4 heads could have some of the leaky electrolytic caps that have started to leak and causing problems. This first shows up generally as segments on the display not working correctly.

Let the group on here know what you find as the problem. Everyone is always interested in what problems develop on the different radios out in the field.

Jim

Jim,

I will do this, I have tried it on one radio, it was doing it all the time. I did check the cable and it was tight but I did reseat anyway. Is it possible that there may have been a thin layer of corrosion caused by this environment here? Thanks for the reply.

J. Shearer

When was the last time you did a firmware bump to the radio and head? A number of years ago there was an FSB and a seperate FW update to the heads.

I have an XTL1500 that had a similar issue even during power-up with the volume control, and it totally went away after I bumped up the FW.