Bill acceptor not working

I’be owned a 4-bay self service car wash for almost 2 weeks and of course there are problems already :-( It’s pretty well maintained overall with recent updates, but those were mainly for the end result of selling.

I’ve got a guy coming tomorrow to look at why the foam brushes aren’t working, but I’d thought I’d see if anyone could point me in the right direction for fixing the bill validator. As best I can tell it is a CPI Talos unit and has a 2021 date on it.

Basically it acts like it has no power. When a bill is inserted, nothing happens. I see no LEDs on the front. I took the coin box off and pulled out the lower sensor mechanism, and I do see an LED which I’m pretty sure is just part of the sensor itself. It was flashing which tells me the unit is getting power, but wasn’t flashing in a sequence that could be matched to one of the trouble codes listed on the coin box. Educate me on what this LED is and what it could mean.

Any help is greatly appreciated! Thanks.

The Talos validators are good validators, but they are not made for a wet environment, like a car wash coin box. Customers will spray water into the bill validator thinking they are going to get addition time, but all it does is ruin the bill validator. There is nothing that you can do in the field to repair the validator. It's going to have to go in for a expensive repair. To get the correct flash code you need to have the bill box on the validator and you read the flash codes on the front of the validator.

@CaptnBuck, did your guy have any luck with your validator and foam brushes?

Randy said:

but they are made for a wet environment,

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Is that what you meant to say?

I.B. Washincars said:

Is that what you meant to say?

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That was a test to see if anyone would catch that. LOL

Fatboy769 said:

@CaptnBuck, did your guy have any luck with your validator and foam brushes?

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Yes, and it was painfully simple . The valve from the air compressor to brush controllers (and a few other systems) was closed. It was either turned off when the previous owner was showing me how to drain the compressor or when it was inspected the weekend or two prior. I have a lot to learn about how the systems function

And the validator was also an easy fix, fortunately. There was debris covering part of the sensor and he was able to clean it and run a few bills through just fine. I'll make cleaning them somewhat regularly part of my routine.

Lesson learned. First of many I'm sure. Thanks for all of your input .