Know where your components come from!
Phil Pilgrim (PhiPi)
Posts: 23,514
http://i.imgur.com/MFipo.jpg
The outer can must be there to contain the explosion when its rated voltage is applied.
-Phil
The outer can must be there to contain the explosion when its rated voltage is applied.
-Phil
Comments
This just makes me want to hurl.. :eek:
there is SO much fail with that cap .
Decide what size you want, buy it , then put the stickers on.
OMG! Now that is something I wouldn't expect. Where in the heck did you find that???
For testing caps I ended up buying a used Sencore LC103 capacitor/inductor analyzer which would have shown that cap was way out of spec. I've gotten into the habit of testing new and unknown caps before installing replacements to make sure they are right. Something like this would have shown up right away.
I must say that this is a new low for the people trying to pawn off fakes. It's bad enough that the value isn't right but the fact that the rated voltage is a lot less makes that dangerous and that cap could pop!
Thanks for the picture and the warning!!
Robert
How would it know though? at a higher voltage, the effective capacitance would change, not?
http://www.sencore.com/products/In-Circuit-Capacitor-Inductor-Analyzer-LC103_183.html
When testing caps there are four main tests:
▪ Value from 1 pF to 20F
▪ Equivalent series resistance (ESR)
▪ Leakage with up to 1,000 volts applied
▪ Dielectric absorption (DA)
depending upon where/how the caps are used in your circuits all of these specs may be critical. For switching power supply circuits the ESR is often critical. In sample/hold circuits the dielectric absorption is important.
The value should should be about the same anywhere below the working voltage. Anything above that they can break down. Exceeding the voltage (or installing an electrolytic backwards) can turn it into a firecracker!
Sencore used to have an excellent set of app notes (in PDF form) online about testing capacitors that explained all the properties of them and which ones are important for each type of circuit.
Many meters will only show the value of a cap which doesn't always help if the other parameters will cause problems in your circuit.
Robert
I imagine there's a little old lady in a babushka.
-Phil
Do you really know what you are buying any more that is one reason why I take allot of thing apart to see what is inside
Rich H
The next time I get some bad caps I'm going to have to pull one apart!
The other bit of evidence in the photo itself is the professional riveting job, which the average joke photographer would not be able to pull off.
-Phil
Lots of links in this post.
Images here too.
Rich H
It wasn't cheap but it was worth every penny! I couldn't afford a new one so I took a chance on a used one on ebay that was missing the power supply. I sent it into Sencore to have it checked out and calibrated. They verified all the functions and upgraded the firmware to the latest code. When they were done I bought a new PS from them and when it came back I had a like new unit (with current calibration) for a fraction of the cost and less than I've seen some of the older LC102's go for.
There is a HUGE different between this and the inexpensive meters out there. For some general purpose testing to get an idea of a parts value the cheap ones may be ok. However when doing work on switching Power Supplies or other circuits where the other parameters really matter the cheap meters just don't cut it. As an example I was rebuilding/restoring some boards from the 80's which used a lot of tantalum caps. A regular tester would show most of them were ok. When testing with the Sencore at their rated voltage the marginal tantalum caps changed value dramatically and started acting more like low ohm resistors. When those things fail they tend to fail shorted and a couple would heat up during the test. It was easy to pick out problems that were hard to track down by other means. When you factor in that it helped repair many "un-repairable" boards that there are no replacements for it was worth the expense.......
But how do you know it is not a fake?
Oh good.:)
http://www.sparkfun.com/commerce/news.php?id=350
Regards,
Coley
So we worked with SCENIX, the supposed manufacturer, and they could not explain what was happening, and asked we send the some units to them, and returned the balance to our supplier. We later learned that there were bogus SXes circulating and unfortunately we got some. And this was almost 20 years ago! I imagine things have gotten worse; not better over that time.
Cheers,
Peter (pjv)
I recently built a top of the line system for a friend, and after many issues with the motherboard and its SATA 6.0gb/sec chip, I looked closely at the motherboard and the sata chip had visible signs of thermal stress, the bios would also lock up when attempting to enter into any one of the voltage/clocking areas to adjust the clocks for the ram we installed.
A bios update fixed the lockups, but the sata chip had already went thermal.
A motherboard replacement with a different brand did the trick.
Gigabyte, Creative, and Asus have now made my list of "cost down" companies, that are helping to destroy American jobs.
I also just purchased a creative xfi- fatal1ty extreme sound card.
After opening the package, and installing the "drive" part (a part that installs into the spot of a cdrom, I noticed one major flaw that caused me to return the entire product. The "drive" had no threads in the holes made to mount it. So i tried to just the screws it came with to "force" threading, which only succeeded in stripping the screw, and getting it stuck in the hole, forcing me to use a plyers to forcefully yank it out.
The "drive" has leds behind the buttons to select different modes on and off, not after 5 minutes of me using the thing, a LED behind one of the buttons died.
Not to mention the driver MESS that creative still has not fixed with windows 7.
I also purchased a brandname "mediaGear" allcardsII usb card reader, every time I connect it to any computer system, it fully locks up the system.
I was forced to return 3/4 products I purchased 5 days ago due to the epic failure of these products.
The motherboard was the highest end and most expensive line of motherboards from gigabyte.
The soundcard was the highest end, and most expensive consumer soundcard from creative.
The card reader was the most expensive with the most features the store had.
btw every single one of these products were "made in china"
Now is the time for an american company to pop onto the scene, advertise "made in america" and blow doors down on the consumer market, gaining our jobs back, due to pure Smile products coming from the china model of "cost down"
With the economy the way it is, this behavior of "cost down" will become epidemic, if it hasn't already, my recent experience says it had.
I would had paid TWICE the cost of every single one of those items that i purchased if the had just advertised (and were) made in america.
Im not saying american products are perfect, but we don't have the "cost down" model of business that is so prevalent in china today. Most places I worked at acutally CARED what the quality of their products were, they would never ship any units that skipped necessary steps in the production process to "make up" for lost shipped units due to loss of employees from economic stress. The necessary step of tapping holes for screws is just another "cost" that can be skipped temporarily, according to the model of "cost down"
Disgraceful.
Wonder what they would do if we kept returning the products "for exchange only" 10+ times in a row? Ya think they would get it? Perhaps we should include a message that says, STOP MAKING IT IN CHINA.
Im getting tired of making up for the lack of quality checking of our products.
I used to just deal with it, and compensate by doing the actual repair myself, i.e. repairing the circuit, tapping the holes myself, replacing the faulty led....
No more. Im going to return all my products if they say made in china and there is ANYTHING wrong with it... EVEN IF THE FRIGGIN MANUAL WAS CUT WRONG.
IM DONE.