Any more info on counterfeit Nichicons?

[AleXis6]

Originally Posted by theOracle

Web Site: www.digikey.by

thank you I will try to order.
unfortunately that Digikey far from me and will take time and extra money for shipping and custom fee

[stj]

contact Behemot
https://www.badcaps.net/forum/member.php?u=15285
he sells good caps in your region

http://www.hwworld.cz/

[theOracle]

Originally Posted by stj

contact Behemot
https://www.badcaps.net/forum/member.php?u=15285
he sells good caps in your region

http://www.hwworld.cz/

No, do NOT do this - in 2021, if you are not buying your capacitors DIRECTLY from the manufacturer's authorized dealer (as specified on the capacitor manufacturer's website) then you are buying cheap Chinese counterfeit fake caps, made to look exactly like high quality Japanese.

this applies to caps on ebay, on amazon, on some website, from some guy in Belarus, from a your friendly local electronics store, wherever!!

There are TWO TYPES of capacitors in 2021, those at the manufacturer's authorized dealer, and FAKE COUNTERFEIT caps, simple as that!

[AleXis6]

Originally Posted by theOracle

TWO TYPES of capacitors in 2021

thank you. I will try to order from digikey
unfortunately the direct parcel will cost more than my purchase, but I will try to use an alternative post service.

[stj]

Originally Posted by theOracle

No, do NOT do this - in 2021, if you are not buying your capacitors DIRECTLY from the manufacturer's authorized dealer (as specified on the capacitor manufacturer's website) then you are buying cheap Chinese counterfeit fake caps, made to look exactly like high quality Japanese.

this applies to caps on ebay, on amazon, on some website, from some guy in Belarus, from a your friendly local electronics store, wherever!!

There are TWO TYPES of capacitors in 2021, those at the manufacturer's authorized dealer, and FAKE COUNTERFEIT caps, simple as that!

the guy i mentioned has original caps from authorised wholesale distributors.
if you had been around a while you would know that!

[theOracle]

Originally Posted by stj

the guy i mentioned has original caps from authorised wholesale distributors.
if you had been around a while you would know that!

You have no chain of custody, everyone on ebay selling fakes always says theirs are from authorized distributors, maybe authorized Chinese fake cap distributors!

[theOracle]

Originally Posted by AleXis6

thank you. I will try to order from digikey
unfortunately the direct parcel will cost more than my purchase, but I will try to use an alternative post service.

The trick to low cost shipping is to order in bulk, that way you can split the shipping cost across hundreds of capacitors - round up everything you own that needs to be recapped, and everything your buddies own, and put together a big order, and shipping will be not much more than a tiny order! - and very small amount per capacitor!

[AleXis6]

Originally Posted by theOracle

The trick to low cost shipping

shipping cost from digiket is starting from 150$ + 15% customs fee for retail package.
if I order hundredts of capacitors it might be evaluated as commercial shipment and confiscated.
So I will try to order to my US friend address and He will resend the parcel to me without invoice. And I will conpare the paraneters with all new capacitors I have.
I surprised that capacity and ESR of fake version are totally correspond to the relevant datasheet.
but I do not know how to check ripple current and hours of service

[mockingbird]

Originally Posted by theOracle

You have no chain of custody, everyone on ebay selling fakes always says theirs are from authorized distributors, maybe authorized Chinese fake cap distributors!

I ran a PSU with Behemot's caps for several years, 24/7. They were his custom-ordered 16V 3300uF UCC KZN series. Quite genuine sir.

If you want proof, then that's not a problem (pics, esr measurement). I can't give you leakage current measurements yet though, still working on building that tester.

[AleXis6]

Originally Posted by mockingbird

esr measurement)..

I was surprised recently that ESR meter can not show the ESR difference for non genuine nichicon.
I bougt recently 500gram of capacitors from aliexpress (shorturl.at/prJ36
it was cheap abour 9$ for bulk 500g "nichicons".
you can see that feedbacks has score 4.9 from 5.0.
all of them fully compatible by capacity and ESR to the relevant datasheets!
before my order I third that it was factory defected capacitors and it was my mistake. expensive esr meter showed that capacity and ESR are OK,
after that
I compared with couple original Nichicons which I also have and macro pictures showed me the difference (print quality, different letter's style, and quality of metall). but some of them look very good as original and only zoomed pictures show some differences



an example of ESR / impedance measurement- I do not see the problem with fake Nichicon:

[s675]

Originally Posted by AleXis6

I was surprised recently that ESR meter can not show the ESR difference for non genuine nichicon.

I think the problem generally isn't ESR, it is lifespan and reliability. The fake would probably last far less time.

Originally Posted by AleXis6

I bougt recently 500gram of capacitors from aliexpress (shorturl.at/prJ36
it was cheap abour 9$ for bulk 500g "nichicons".

The short URL doesn't work. At least use a short URL provider that allows preview (e.g. by adding + at end).

Originally Posted by AleXis6

you can see that feedbacks has score 4.9 from 5.0.

I take some notice of bad feedback but generally ignore the good feedback. I have found sites like AliExpress strange with reviews. Many of the (positive) reviews that I have left have disappeared. I imagine that negatives can also conveniently disappear somehow.

Originally Posted by AleXis6

expensive esr meter showed that capacity and ESR are OK

At least it is usable. Some have lower capacity but I think that "trick" is so obvious these days (with wide availability of capacitance measurement) that only the extreme scammer manufacturers do it.

I suppose that you can think of these as equivalent to the budget Chinese capacitors such as ChongX etc. That said, I think I would actually trust ChongX more than fake Nichicon because at least the seller and/or manufacturer are not being dishonest.

Originally Posted by AleXis6

I compared with couple original Nichicons which I also have and macro pictures showed me the difference (print quality, different letter's style, and quality of metall). but some of them look very good as original and only zoomed pictures show some differences

As mentioned in the thread that is generally a good way to help to check whether they are genuine, but the fakers can easily upgrade the quality if they want.

Likewise, maybe one day Nichicon has to use a different printing supplier or different printing machines and their genuine print quality gets lower.



Are there any stores in your country with the "intermediate" brands such as SamXon, SamYoung etc? They would certainly be better than these fakes or low grade capacitors. These brands are also probably less likely to be fakes.

[stj]

nice meter!

[AleXis6]

The short URL doesn't work. At least use a short URL provider that allows preview (e.g. by adding + at end).

I bought 500g fake Nichicons here.

https://rb.gy/ac41wi

rb.gy/ac41wi
now the link seems ok.
You are right that Aliexpress feedbacks mostly about shipment and some times just with common pictures but details are important.
Unfortunately the reliability for these fakes is unpredictable and these capacitors may be could be usefull for some nonimportant repairments.
I will try to do some voltage tests I wonder how the ESR will change when the voltage is to high. So I think half of that 500g is just for experimentation :-)
there were several polymer fujitsu caps in this parcel with outstanding parameters: ESR 7mOhm! https://rb.gy/g7lpyv and it seems ok but with shortl legs.
I have about thousand new capacitors from LCSC.com and they seems as genuine (mainly Rubycon) but I will order several series from digikey to compare.

Are there any stores in your country with the "intermediate" brands such as SamXon, SamYoung etc

some parameters (mainly lifetime) will be unknown, I saw pdf data only for main brand in our shops

[momaka]

Originally Posted by theOracle

No, do NOT do this - in 2021, if you are not buying your capacitors DIRECTLY from the manufacturer's authorized dealer (as specified on the capacitor manufacturer's website) then you are buying cheap Chinese counterfeit fake caps, made to look exactly like high quality Japanese.

this applies to caps on ebay, on amazon, on some website, from some guy in Belarus, from a your friendly local electronics store, wherever!!

There are TWO TYPES of capacitors in 2021, those at the manufacturer's authorized dealer, and FAKE COUNTERFEIT caps, simple as that!

Not entirely true.

Yes, one should be very cautious and recognize how big the counterfeit cap issue is. But that doesn't mean the absolutely every online seller that's not Digikey or Mouser (or insert other authorized dealer's name/website here) us selling fake caps. I'm pretty sure the major Japanese cap manufacturer's don't recognize badcaps.net cap store as an official "authorized dealer". But clearly the caps sold here are not genuine. Same goes for member Behemot who sells caps purchased directly from the Japanese manufacturer's websites. In fact, there was a thread about it here made by him if anyone else wanted to do a group-buy large quantities, as the big Japanese companies like Nichicon, UCC, and Rubycon tend to have a rather large minimum order quantity (MOQ) - usually in the thousands for smaller caps.

That said, there are many PCB and electronics manufacturers who also purchase caps in large quantities for production. Of course, when the production ends or if cap reels are changed on a schedule to keep production machine schedules to run smoothly, then some of these manufacturers end up with a lot of reel "scraps" - i.e. partially used reels that aren't going to be used for the production any more. The manufacturer could scrap these (and they usually do.) But smaller and more lean-running facilities may collect these "scrap" parts and sell them in bulk in an auction. And from there, these part "scraps" could end up for sale online. I've seen now at least a few eBay sellers who have genuine Japanese capacitors for sale. One can tell by looking at the seller's "Other Items for Sale". Obviously, if the seller has all kinds of cheap Chinese garbage and is based from China, you can bet your shoes the caps will be fake. But if the seller has very specific selection of components - especially new-old-stock (NOS) parts, then the caps are actually likely to be genuine. Of course, one has to do this kind of research before purchasing parts online and use a bit of "common sense" (which isn't actually common. )

So with that said, don't discredit all non-authorized dealers as selling fake crap. There are quite a few sellers who have genuine parts, but one just has to carefully look. On that note, I do prefer/suggest to people to use eBay over Amazon and AliExpress, as it's a bit easier to do this kind of research on the parts. Also, I find the item picture quality to be better on eBay than on other online websites. On Amazon, you almost always get a tiny stock image... and I just dislike shopping for anything on Amazon, TBH. I also don't like Ali too much, as they tend to leave their return policies in the mercy of the seller... which means the seller may be forced to do nothing if you get fakes. eBay lets a lot of fake/counterfeit shit sling by. But if you do buy something fake (knowingly or not) and raise a case with eBay, chances are they will step in and on your side.

Originally Posted by mockingbird

I ran a PSU with Behemot's caps for several years, 24/7. They were his custom-ordered 16V 3300uF UCC KZN series. Quite genuine sir.

+1

Originally Posted by mockingbird

If you want proof, then that's not a problem (pics, esr measurement). I can't give you leakage current measurements yet though, still working on building that tester.

Originally Posted by AleXis6

I was surprised recently that ESR meter can not show the ESR difference for non genuine nichicon.
I bougt recently 500gram of capacitors from aliexpress (shorturl.at/prJ36
it was cheap abour 9$ for bulk 500g "nichicons".
you can see that feedbacks has score 4.9 from 5.0.
all of them fully compatible by capacity and ESR to the relevant datasheets!

This is exactly it.

Indeed, leakage current and ESR measurements are NOT a good way to determine if caps are genuine or not. In fact, even plain-straight garbage like Cheng/Chang/Chong/X can show good ESR and leakage current when new. The problem is when the caps age. Good brand caps tend to hold up their specs well over time, whereas the cheap/fakes almost always don't. I suspect this has to do with two things: aluminum foil purity and electrolyte compound stabilizers. Both of these add to the costs of making a cap. So more than likely, the cheap cap manufacturers (be it counterfeits or just plain no-name Hong-Kong-Fly-Apart LLC brand) cut corners with these two items. And as such, we get cheap caps that look good in terms of specs when new, but quickly deteriorate with age/use.

Originally Posted by s675

I suppose that you can think of these as equivalent to the budget Chinese capacitors such as ChongX etc. That said, I think I would actually trust ChongX more than fake Nichicon because at least the seller and/or manufacturer are not being dishonest.

That's true.

But using cheap crap caps is still like playing Russian roullete, though. In the case of counterfeit capacitors vs. craps like ChongX, that's would be the analog of playing with 2 real bullets in the chamber instead of just one.
i.e. you will still likely end up getting screwed - just a bit less likely with the cheap cap brands that aren't counterfeit. On that note, I've seen so many variations of the Cheng/Chang/ChongX caps that I'm starting to feel as if these are generic garbage caps made by literally everyone in China. Kind of like Kingbo flux.

[AleXis6]

Originally Posted by momaka

Ebay.

could you please share the link of such reliable seller who sell genuine brand capacitors on EBAY?

[stj]

lol

contact Behemot and stay away from ebay!
it's no different to aliexpress.

[AleXis6]

Originally Posted by stj

lol

contact Behemot and stay away from ebay!
it's no different to aliexpress.

it seems for me the same also

[momaka]

Originally Posted by AleXis6

could you please share the link of such reliable seller who sell genuine brand capacitors on EBAY?

No problems.

A few months ago, I bought a bunch of Chemicon LXV capacitors from seller huskerfan42011. Seller is based in the same State as me (Virginia), so the shipping was low and I got a good deal on some caps I needed but forgot to put down with my last Digikey order last year... and I didn't want to do another Digikey order just for those. The Chemicon LXV caps he/she sent me are 100% genuine (can size, sleeve, vent, and bung all match the datasheet) and the caps actually look identical to other genuine UCC LXV caps I have... which wasn't a surprise, because on most of the seller's listings, he also has a picture of the box that the caps came from, showing that they are indeed genuine. Not only that, but look here:
https://www.ebay.com/itm/QTY-48-1500.../111458712430?
^ Those are the dreaded United Chemicon KZG series that bulge and go bad in storage... or at least the older ones did. The fact that there are some on the seller's listing that are also starting to bulge confirms those are 100% genuine KZG series (and failing just like the KZG series would.) Now it may not be a good thing that the seller is offering such caps that are known to be defective series... but it does show he has genuine caps, at least. And here is a more interesting listing from the same seller:
https://www.ebay.com/itm/QTY-100-100.../111070951488?
^ Those are Nichicon PE series (the predecessor of Nichicon PW series, which are RoHS, if I remember correctly) - so truly New Old Stock (NOS) capacitors there. Both the box and the cap dates match too, showing production to have been from 1995.

Basically, the above are the types of clues I use to determine if a seller on eBay has genuine caps or not. If the seller has any NOS caps and they look the way they should on the pictures, chances are all of that seller's stock is legit.

Here are a few cap listings from the same seller (click on Seller's Other Items to see other different caps):
https://www.ebay.com/itm/QTY-50-680u.../121666392160?
https://www.ebay.com/itm/QTY-200-680.../111486237812?

Now, here are also a few cap listings from different sellers that I haven't bought from before, but that appear to have genuine capacitors as well:

https://www.ebay.com/itm/680uF-16V-N...5/401011429492
^ For those, we actually had a thread here on BCN, where someone bought caps from this seller and confirmed in there they are genuine. Thread can be found here:
https://www.badcaps.net/forum/showthread.php?t=89641

And here is another seller based from Texas, USA:
https://www.ebay.com/itm/12099170636...UAAMXQcWVRE6i3
https://www.ebay.com/itm/20079391452...UAAMXQU6tQ~V3Y
As mentioned, I haven't bought from this seller before, so I can't personally confirm how genuine the caps are. However, note the green-sleeved Chemicon KZE 10V, 2200 uF caps above. UCC used green sleeves on the KZE series very early in their production years. So those are quite possibly NOS caps from the early 2000's and may need reforming. As such, I think the other caps from this seller are likely genuine as well.

On that note, here is another US seller with NOS caps (and even denotes so in the listings):
https://www.ebay.com/itm/10-Nippon-C.../201908185163?

Next, two sellers from China... which obviously should be a little more suspicious, given that they are based in China. But from what I've found through their listings, they also appear to have NOS caps, which means they are probably selling leftover components from production too.
https://www.ebay.com/itm/141663956494?

https://www.ebay.com/itm/60pc-XBOX-3.../362111464473?
https://www.ebay.com/itm/20-Rubycon-.../192314513633?

That said, just because as seller is based from China or HK doesn't mean they are selling fake stuff. Seller egekecu was based off of HK, if I remember correctly. It was one of the biggest stores for small quantities of caps on eBay and known to sell genuine motherboard and PSU grade capacitors. However, it looks like this seller is longer in business, judging by the lack of items in the store... which is strange, as he/she has been on eBay for 10+ years selling caps.

Anyways, I'm sure I can find more sellers if I look through my bookmarks. Also pretty sure there should be some eBay sellers based off in Europe too. I simply didn't look there because I live in the US, and usually US and China/HK sellers are the only ones that offer reasonable shipping costs.

Originally Posted by stj

it's no different to aliexpress.

No, it's very different from AliExpress.

As I mentioned, the return policies on AliExpress are virtually null and AliExpress will rarely step in on the buyers side if something goes wrong with a transaction (be it counterfeit item or wrong item sent or whatever.) eBay puts a lot of pressure on sellers... and probably even too much sometimes, especially for small-time ones that don't make a lot of money selling used items.

[AleXis6]

Originally Posted by momaka

No problems.

thank you very much!

As I mentioned, the return policies on AliExpress are virtually null and AliExpress will rarely step in on the buyers side

it depends (for example Paypal practically does not work with Belarus).
As for me Ali is more loyal for buyers at the moment.

[stj]

yes, i have never had a problem getting instant refunds from ali