The Hall of Shame - Badcaps Photo Montage

[RukyCon]

Originally Posted by Per Hansson

They got the letters reversed, it should be: SCRAP!

It was a typo on the company's half.

[Behemot]

What meter you have? Anyway, why it has so short leads? New caps usually have long leads

[Wester547]

Originally Posted by ruky con

The capacitor is still good [in my opinion] testing at 5000uf with an ESR of .18Ω.

That would depend on its Vloss measurements (leakage current). Capacitors can measure in-spec for capacitance and ESR but still out-of-spec for leakage current. I suppose it isn't difficult even for dodgy brands to manufacture "okay" general purpose capacitors (85ºC or otherwise). Manufacturing high quality low impedance capacitors, on the other hand, is a much more demanding practice. It requires very special additives and oxidizers, extreme purity of materials, exceptional QA, and precise manufacturing methods in order to make a stable and long-lasting end product. Low impedance capacitors is the "area" where most Chinese and Taiwanese brands just aren't very good.

Also, for a 16mmx25mm general purpose capacitor, 0.18Ω is a bit on the high side. Ideally it would not measure much higher than 0.10Ω.

[Behemot]

Oh man, wait for that german fool, he'll explain ya how great them Chinese and Taiwanese are Cause some random who-knows-if-real guy in TDK Lambda told him, so it's true, ya know?

[RukyCon]

Originally Posted by Behemot

What meter you have? Anyway, why it has so short leads? New caps usually have long leads

The leads are pre cut by either the manufacturer or the seller.

Originally Posted by Wester547

That would depend on its Vloss measurements (leakage current). Capacitors can measure in-spec for capacitance and ESR but still out-of-spec for leakage current. I suppose it isn't difficult even for dodgy brands to manufacture "okay" general purpose capacitors (85ºC or otherwise). Manufacturing high quality low impedance capacitors, on the other hand, is a much more demanding practice. It requires very special additives and oxidizers, extreme purity of materials, exceptional QA, and precise manufacturing methods in order to make a stable and long-lasting end product. Low impedance capacitors is the "area" where most Chinese and Taiwanese brands just aren't very good.

The Vloss on the capacitor is about 3% which i think is ok because i was told by a badcaps user that if it's below 4% then i should be good.

Originally Posted by Wester547

Also, for a 16mmx25mm general purpose capacitor, 0.18Ω is a bit on the high side. Ideally it would not measure much higher than 0.10Ω.

I've seen general purpose capacitors with an ESR as high as 5Ω, i'm guessing that's bad, right?

[Wester547]

The Vloss on the capacitor is about 3% which i think is ok because i was told by a badcaps user that if it's below 4% then i should be good.

It would be interesting to see if that capacitor could handle its rated voltage (16V) applied to the terminals. If the leakage current exceeds 752µA after 2 minutes at 20ºC-25ºC (or 0.01CV, in adherence to the YEC SM datasheet), then it's out-of-spec.

I've seen general purpose capacitors with an ESR as high as 5Ω, i'm guessing that's bad, right?

That would depend on the case size.

[Behemot]

And capacity. The lower the rated cap, the higher the ESR, brand new 0.1uF lytics are in the range of tens of ohms.

[RukyCon]

Dead 1000uf 16v capacitor on a capacitor dropper power supply.

Though there was a zener diode next to the capacitor and the PCB under the diode was burnt making me think the zener killed it.

[Behemot]

Incredible ripple spikes when the cap feiled killed the zener.

[RukyCon]

I may have spotted a panasonic capacitor in it's first stages of failure.
I tried to take a photo of it but it's really challenging to face the camera at the right angle to show the the bulging vent.
Here are two of the photos i took.


Here's a close up on the cap.

The one next to the NCC cap is the one that has the bulging vent.
I will try to desolder it sometime soon.

[Wester547]

That capacitor is definitely starting to bulge. The board is just about eight years old judging by the date codes on the components. That negative polarity stripe (on the failed 820µF 6.3V Panasonic FJS) looks suspiciously fuzzy, but I don't think it's a counterfeit, because... it looks like it was polarized the wrong way around! There always exists the chance that Panasonic sleeved it the wrong way around from the factory, though.

Carefully look at which way the other capacitor's negative stripe faces, then look at that one Panasonic. This looks to be an ASUS or Pegatron board, and those boards are known to have the shaded side of the polarity circle denote the anode side of the capacitor.

[RukyCon]

Ok.
The motherboard came from a HP machine with a power supply fully capped with dying capxons.

[Per Hansson]

Good eye Wester!
Time to take out the DMM and verify ruky con

[Behemot]

Oh yeah ASUS, always has to be special. They're the only in the universe having reversed polarity marking…how many caps I've only killed with these idiots and how many times I had to correct half of the already installed caps even if I've noticed on time SInce than I double or tripple check the polarity is normal each time I'm on a MoBo or VGA…

[RukyCon]

Dying nichicon VX capacitor from an audio amp.



And here are the dying CapXon capacitors from the HP PSU.

[momaka]

Originally Posted by Wester547

That negative polarity stripe (on the failed 820µF 6.3V Panasonic FJS) looks suspiciously fuzzy, but I don't think it's a counterfeit, because... it looks like it was polarized the wrong way around! There always exists the chance that Panasonic sleeved it the wrong way around from the factory, though.

Good catch!

I'd say someone probably has reworked the board before and placed that cap in backwards. I see all the other caps have their stripes facing the non-shaded half-circle on the board. So this is probably an ASUS motherboard.

Originally Posted by ruky con

The motherboard came from a HP machine with a power supply fully capped with dying capxons.

HP has been known to use ASUS boards quite a bit.

For non-OEM boards, some of the older AsRock boards were also built by ASUS, so beware when recapping one of those.

Originally Posted by Behemot

Oh yeah ASUS, always has to be special. They're the only in the universe having reversed polarity marking…how many caps I've only killed with these idiots and how many times I had to correct half of the already installed caps even if I've noticed on time SInce than I double or tripple check the polarity is normal each time I'm on a MoBo or VGA…

Well, in my case, I've recapped more ASUS boards than non-ASUS boards. After doing a small batch a few years back, I almost put the caps in backwards on a non-ASUS motherboard , due to being so used putting the caps with the anode facing the shaded semi-circle.

[RukyCon]

Found this listing for Rubycon KZG capacitors.
http://www.ebay.com/itm/10PCS-16V-47...4AAOSwjL5ZB9Dk
Something about them seems a bit off.

[PeteS in CA]

Originally Posted by ruky con

Found this listing for Rubycon KZG capacitors.
http://www.ebay.com/itm/10PCS-16V-47...4AAOSwjL5ZB9Dk
Something about them seems a bit off.

They aren't swollen?

[delaware74b]

....considering they're Chemicon, not Rubycon.

Some fool not knowing any better will buy them

[eccerr0r]

Dang... I stuck in some crappy chongx caps thinking that running 10V caps at 1.2V should last a while, but I was wrong... they bulged up and need to be replaced again after 6 months
I had one of the caps off the board a bit because I screwed up a via, and could access the pins from the top side of the board. I soldered another cap in parallel to that bulged cap (this probably would be a great picture for the "ghetto mods" thread) and verified that the board once again works as it should without removing the board from the case...

Maybe I should just leave it now and search for good deals on good caps...