I have no power led on the board… I have a voltage between the ground and +ve pins for the servos, but nothing across the led.
Is there a surface mount fuse etc somewhere?
I could be wrong, but I believe that there is no power LED on the SSC-32. I believe the LED may blink when power is first applied and then it blinks when it receives inputs on it’s RXD input line.
Yeah, when the board is powered up, the LED lights up until it receives it’s first commando. Then it blinks whenever it receives a new commando.
Could it perhaps just be the LED that is broken. Have you tested the board with any servos connected and tried sending commands to it?
You are not using the proper terminology.
VS is where you apply 6.0vdc for the servos. This will not power up the controller unless you have the VS1=VL jumper installed. This borrows some power from the servos to power the microcontroller and logic chips on the SSC-32. You can also power the VL with a 9vdc battery directly (remove the VS1=VL jumper!) then see if the LED is lit.
I have a 9v battery connected to the board, with the jumpers set to share power with vs1 and vs2.
When I apply power I can light an led placed bewteen vs1 and ground on the servo connection showing power flows around the board.
If I connect an led across the surface mount led to see if the led is faulty, I get nothing showing there is no power to the surface mount led.
When connected to a pc there are problems communicating.
If servos connected and then power applied, the servos make a jump showing that they are powered but the pulse line may not be working correctly…
Where is the 9vdc battery connected? VL? VS1 or 2? Do you have the VS1=VL jumper installed?
Also if you orient the board so you can read SSC-32 are all of the jumpers vertical?
You can not connect servos with only a 9vdc battery providing power. It is not powerful enough to power servos.
Lets get the LED lit before we do anything else. Please do not try to connect LEDs or other things to the circuit board. You could accidentally short something out and make it worse.
If the jumpers are not installed correctly then the power to the board may not get to the places it needs to be. Answer these questions and we will have it up and running in no time.
Yes all jumpers set to share power to both servo lines and to the main chip.
No LED on board.
Please answer all of the questions. 
Sigh… Remove all servos. apply only the 9vdc battery to VL and see if the LED will light. Make sure the battery is fully charged.
Only fully charged 9v supplying only vl, No LED…
Can you measure the output of the 5vdc regulator? You will need a volt meter to do this.
Which chip and pin please?
Measure the voltage across a + pin and a - pin. Review the board manual if you are not familiar with these pins.
Yep I think that’s it. I have a feed voltage but nothing on the other two pins…
It is a LM2937 -5v regulator
I have a soare:
7905C which is also a -5v reg
I am checking datasheets and hoping it will be compatible…
Whoa, its a +5v reg
solarbotics.com/products/lm2937/resources/
This page shows the pin out
sparkfun.com/tutorial/BeginningEmbedded/1-PowerSupply/LM7805-Pinout.jpg
You need to measure the voltage from pin 2 (0v) to pin 1 which should be your input voltage. Then from pin 2 to pin 3 which should be +5v
I wouldn’t tamper with the board without the LM’s consent if its still in warranty 
Yeah got that from datasheets, I saw -50 on the casing and thought it was -5v… I’ll look around for another one that is+5v
As far as warranty goes, I was given the board 6 months ago as a present… no receipts etc… 
We have a pretty liberal replacement policy, but a blown regulator can only be caused by the dreaded reverse polarity power application syndrome. It’s the only situation where I just can’t replace a board for free. Hopefully replacing the regulator will resurrect the failed board.
I have got a TS78M05CZ
This should be OK… just double checking things… you guys think it ight be OK?
RD should be able to answer that one, but a quick search of the forums revealed this post which may help.
Any regulator with the pins reading from right to left (Input, Ground, Output) will fit, but some regulators need more capacitance on the input and some need more on the output. Don’t have time to look up the specs, but the schematic for the SSC-32 is in the manual. Best to replace it with the same device if possible. Before going to the trouble you should apply a regulated 5vdc to the + and ground to the - by the ABCD inputs to see if the guy is still alive.