View new posts | View your posts MATTEL GHOST TRAP TROUBLESHOOTING THREAD

---

With all these reports of people's traps not working, instead of a 12 page thread of people talking about shipping problems or that there's is broken, there are some spearheaded individuals out there that attempted to fix their boo boo traps sprinkled into all that mess and it's becoming increasingly difficult to find how they repaired their traps with the problems I thought I read that were happening to mine.

Because I am an "Independent not relying on anyone else but my own resources unless I absolutely have to" kind of guy; I would prefer to not call Mattel unless I am absolutely certain that these traps that have issues cant be quickly and easily remedied.

Which Im positive you resourceful fellas wanted to do first also. I'm sure there's a window to call about problems, the clock's ticking (and it brings me to this next point:).


I would also prefer, that if you're going to complain about your trap in any fashion, critique the trap, say you got it, or it works(unless followed by how you made it work); NOT to post in this thread.



We dont want to sift through your complaints, because "simple fix time" is running out and you'll slow us down.





On to my traps:

I purchased 4 traps (Im not dumping them on ebay.), right out of the box I can get 2 complete traps to work and 1 cartridge. Part of the problem was swapping around the cartridge to other traps until the doors opened all the way. I also figured out my mismatched batteries had to have a certain pattern with what may be the "newer" ones towards the handle end of the trap. I took a trip to the grocery store to get new batteries because I wanted to make absolutely sure it wasnt the fault of the trap.

As I have no need for a prop mode, I tested in movie mode here's what I found using the copper top Duracell batteries:
First thing I noticed was that New batteries makes ALL the difference.

I started by testing each trap body, with all 4 cartridges. This helped me figure out which trap was going to be my movie trap, my game trap, and my "Maybe I shouldnt have let that jerk off hold my 130 dollar toy." trap and the one my buddy's getting from our buy in we do every time there's a thing like this from mattel now(dont worry cole, it's fine)

In all 4 traps, all 4 cartridges worked. it's a relief they do and Im estatic Im not blowing up Mattel's phone lines and email accounts, but there's still more useful information being I had 4 traps to work with. The argument I had this morning over these things, had they NOT worked I can only try not imagine. Anyway.

Every door was grinding in some way as they closed. This may be because they're brand new batteries at full power,I havent played with them enough, or something else.
Since, I tried them earlier on batteries I had laying around, and only a couple were grinding, Im betting it on full juiced batteries making the gear slip or something from too much power.

This is the status of the cartridges:
One cartridge grinds like it's in pain.(That's going to be my game trap because i think the grinding will add to the effects of being upgraded.)

Two cartridges open all the way, but the right door is just a hair from straight up and down. This is not a major issue. because it's literally the width of a hair from straight up and down. It is absolutely not necessary to call Mattel over a pubic hair's width distance. Do not be one of "those people", I dont want to hear it. (one's my back up, the other's my buddy's)

One cartridge opens all the way. (My regular trap)


So, now that we have my traps squared away, I know a few of you enterprising fellas have some very helpful information you figured out with your trap to fix it and are willing to share, SO PLEASE DO!

Again:


I would also prefer, that if you're going to complain about your trap in any fashion, critique the trap, say you got it, or it works(unless followed by how you made it work); NOT to post in this thread.

I had a chance to use my trap at an event last night, it was stupendous! Although I almost had a heart attack at one point.
I was holding the trap by the handle in one hand and the pedal in the other hand. I opened the trap with the pedal and my stupid finger blocked the door from opening all the way, the door popped off! It was dark and I couldn't tell if there were any broken pieces. My heart was racing. I got to a better lit area, took a risk and popped it back in. It worked (thank god) and is still functioning well. I'm thinking Matty might have designed them this way so they don't totally break off. After that I started holding it by the cord (like in the movies) that worked well, it holds pretty securely.

Though I was not able to fix mine, I thought I'd share my findings of troubleshooting mine.

The Problem:

A) Out of the box and with brand new Energizer batteries, when the trap was turned on (with pedal attached) in either mode it would play the Movie mode trap sound and then opened the trap doors by itself. The pedal has no effect on operation. In Movie Mode it played the startup sound twice before opening the doors. When you turned off power it closed the doors.

If I disconnected the pedal, the trap itself powered on fine.

B) The doors had a gear grounding sound. It seemed louder and lasted a little longer that what I saw on other youtube videos.

Here's a video:



What I found:

A) After testing several components internally I narrowed it down to being a short between 2 of the 3 pins on the trap's cable connector. The tip and middle contact where showing a short with a multimeter. Visually there was nothing showing why this was happening like a bad solder job or anything. Further digging for the cause would've required really tearing up the plastic on the backside of connector so I went no further. A replacement from Matty is in progress.

B) The source of the grinding sound on the trap is from a spring loaded gear inside the trap door's motor.



There's also two physical sensors on the door mechanism that tells the motor when to stop. It appears a short burst of noise is normal, especially with new batteries, as the motor spins down when those sensors are tripped and the spring loaded gear spins a few times more before stopping.

When I got my trap, i installed the batteries and turned it on but the pedal didn't light up or open the doors when pushed. After some experimenting i flipped the cord and everything worked flawlessly. Just wanted to let people know in case it happened to them so they don't scare the crap out of themselves and the people in line at walgreens. lol

When I tried mine the first time (new batteries) the trap went through the whole sequence but the doors did not open. I powered off the trap, then manually operated the doors open and shut a few times. Then I powered on and found that the doors now work. The next two times I did a sequence, the doors made the grinding sound on close. Now there is no grinding sound.

When we got our traps, my buddy and me used Rechargeable Batteries to test the traps and they both malfunctioned severely. To no opening the doors in full to resetting when the ghost bumped the trap walls etc. at some point the doors started going all the way and NO grinding noise was present.

We twitched the pedal activation cables, removed and placed the cartridge back on and nothing. I noticed that mine was either resetting or going possessed when the bump happened and that the motorized clip responsible for moving the wheel pin (that rocks the trap) was not moving. Trying yes, but unsuccessfully.
My buddy surmised that perhaps the rechargeable Batteries EVEN WHEN FULLY CHARGED do not deliver the power payload the trap requires for the trap´s rocking motor to move.

That sounded logical so we ran to the market and bought new Alkaline Batteries (Not Rech of course) and tried the traps again.

Everything was fine now. except for the grinding noise that NOW it does sound. So yeah. USE Fresh Batts and Do NOT use rechargeable Batts as they don´t hold the same Payload as Alkaline Batts do.

The Trap, rocking Motor requires a lot of power to move properly and if the batteries are halfway down the motor will get stuck and the trap won´t know what to do... most probably it will reset to the first stage again or it may just have a stroke as mine did.

Overall I´m REALLY happy with my purchase and I commend Matty for making this available!

One interesting bit to find out is if the trap is making a door grinding noise and then after some use it stops, how long after the grinding stops will the trap´s rocking motor will start malfunctioning indicating that you need to replace the batteries because they´re not delivering enough energy.