We all know that eBay is notorious for facilitating the sale of scam products, but this one here takes it to new levels of scamminess to the point that they've been so intended making a scam product that they've actually probably spent as much making the scam product as they could make in the real one. Oddly, this one comes with a California Proposition 65 warning on it. They've had a label instant as well there, and they've stuck another one over the top. so I'm going to take this out.

It comes with a presumably cloned instruction manual and it Bears a strong resemblance to the power saver plugs that you plug in and they save you electricity. Or it could be one of these plugs that you plug in that repels the insects and rodents. Things like that. It's one of those styles of products, but this one is an ionizer and it does contain the classic two LEDs that are required by those things.

Gonna be careful not to touch these prongs here, because, well, this one contains an extra surprise. So, nine eyes are normally steps of voltage up inside to a higher voltage at low current. Uh, and child puts electrostatic charging Or that does two things. It helps precipitate dust out of there and it also creates an absolutely minute Trace level of ozone that helps freshen the air.

it's a natural outdoor element. Watch What Happens When I put this on the live pin though, and I touch the carbon bristles here. Oh my. God Continuity from the live pin directly to these conductive carbon bristles and it's like what? And there's definitely no ionization going on.

Nothing I should touch. in which case, it's you who will be ionized. Let's open it up so there's a single screw at the bottom holding this shut. This is so scummy.

it's unbelievable. It's like it's good because it's so scummy. And there is the uh, Well, for a start, they've got the wires mixed up here. not that, uh, red and black actually indicates live in neutral these days.

But there's the the seemingly the Potted ionizer module that you'd expect in these. Let's get this circuit board out here. and the circuit board seems to have quite a few components on it, though it's got a very odd layout. Also, it's got a big splash of solder across some pins here, not that that's really going to stop operating.

so let's get the circuit board out and take a look. So I shall Zoom down for this just so you can actually see and it's a very classic. It's got a diode coming in, then it's got two current limiting resistors, one in series with each of the cheap Gallium phosphide LEDs and then bizarrely, just one connection. Uh, the black connection here, which is live, comes to the rest of the circuitry and there's just clusters of resistors.

There's a chip which appears to be uh, um, four, five, five, eight, D or pump but this is not a normal configuration. Just to try the pin scale like this. I Have drawn the circuit diagram out. Give one moment I shall grab the schematic for this.

Not that it's a terribly exciting schematic. Well, it is, Say, an exciting schematic in a way. Um, so here's the activate the circuitry. It's two.

LEDs They could have missed a trick here. They could have used one resistor and put two LEDs in the series. Strange, but they've got Diode, two resistors, two LEDs that is the active bit the circuitry. There's only one connection.

they've mixed this up here. they've actually got because of the way they've wired it. They've got live going here and neutral going here and it then goes to this circuitry which is just gibberish. It's nonsensical, uh, before it goes out to the ion module.

and unfortunately, maybe that's where they've actually got that soda Bridge across here? It doesn't really. You know that's the direct connection. but it's not going to really help that much because this chip is not designed to accommodate 240 volts, particularly when it's just randomly. They've just connect.

They've got the cheapest chip possible, and they've just randomly connected the pins just to make it look like it's active in circuit. and it's odd. Anyway, next thing, let's get the ion module out. This is going to have to crack out here and I think I'm going to try and repot this I have a feeling and what's inside because someone, uh, reminded me that these exist.

Let's just try. Let's try. and get this party on that. Loosen up.

These uh, carbon fiber emitters which are real carbon fiber emitters with real wires connected to a real ionizer light module. Ah, so they've gone to that extent I thought maybe maybe they've just Hot Melt glued these wires and filled it with resin because that is a common enough thing. Let's say I get this out the way. but when you're attached with the probe, you find out that uh, the black one are going in is connected to hold on? Hold on.

Let's see if I can get a good connection here. Maybe it's not connected to anything in there? Well, it is. It's connected. uh, to that emitter and does it connect to another? and that one and then the other connector is just connected to the other ones directly.

There's no high voltage structure in their hole. Is it actually even connected to anything? Oh, it might not be. Oh no. I've got continuity there and no continuation that when it's not doing anything right, tell you what.

I'm going to see if I can open this and we'll see what's inside one moment, please. Well, I wish everything was as easy to depart as that. It was helped greatly by the complete lack of components inside because it is just a circuit board with two strips. The red is connected to two of the meters, the blackest connect to other.

There are two positions for resistors, but they're They're just on the same. They've got their pins linked, almost as if they felt that they should add extra components in here just in case someone depotted it so they could might think they were special ion resistors. And so here's the bizarre thing. They've got the case.

They've parted the circuit board. They could have bought a potted module from the many specialists in China to sell them, but they've got the iron Azure emitters, which are real ionizer emitters and they've gone to the effort of sorting them onto the circuit board and the wires. They've got this circuit board made with all these useless components. The only bits needed are the two resistors here.

The I mean they could have saved our resistor. Maybe they just want more components, make it more realer. But uh, they were so close to actually having an actual ionizer, especially given that they had to mount these into the case and of the case in the first place. It's so bizarre.

It's just like they said, let's deliberately just spend lots of time making a scam product. How devious! So I'd like to thank ADI ADI ADI for reminding me that these things exist because sadly, I've come across these in the past. They've been around a very, very long time. It's obviously a lucrative industry making fake products and it does have that logo.

His was different. Is it the ionizer emitter sticking down? mine is a different. case, but it's got the same logo. the green square of the house with the Leafs inside it, and uh, yeah, it's a nice enough case.

The pins are almost compliant. The Earth pin is just normal pin size. It should actually be a bit bigger, but it still goes into a sucker. Okay, and um, yeah.

perplexing. Super flexing and made so much worse. That is part of their elaborate scan to make things look connected. They have actually connected the live in this instance directly via that sorta.

Bridge although it would have just shorted straight through the chip anyway if you touch the front, but they've effectively connected all the way through to the point that the actual carbon fiber emitters were connected directly to that leg. And depending on their this, the polarity is such. It depends if this black wire here actually gets connected to live or not, whichever one ends that track. Um, if you had a just unpolarized plug, it's a 50 50 chance.

If you're having live emitters in the UK as it's wired, it's going to be live emitters every time at full means voltage with no significant current limiting. So Splendid Yes, that is perplexing. So there we have it. Uh, if you see cases like this: I Hope this isn't someone's actual logo they've stolen as well, because that'd be a shame.

But if you see a case with this logo on it and it's the generic Power Saver insect repelling ionizer case, then there's a good chance that it's going to be fake, but pleasingly faken away. I Actually quite enjoyed taking that apart.