Hi, my mystic powers tell me I have a capacitor about to blow in my Oscilloscope. How do I know? Well I havnt had the back off yet but plugged in a little smoke with that unmistakable smell of frying electrolytic capacitor floats up!
My problem is I have turned it on twice and both times it starts up fine and works, as its a Gould scope and well known for blown caps taking the entire scope out when they go I really loathed to plug it in again. I have a LCR meter but I dont know if the cap will show low ESR because some of the Gould caps I have replaced in the past have dried out gone OC or nearly OC and had low ESR.
I could take apart and plug in and see if I can spot smoke quickly, but thats a bit risky as Goulds have alot of Tant caps and if its a big power cap they tend to take out all the smd Tants when they go.
So am I likely to be looking for low ESR or as its likely to be a dry cap will the cap value be way off? I dont normally get to them before they go bang so I am unsure, obviously I might take the back off and its obvious but just case I wanted to ask
My problem is I have turned it on twice and both times it starts up fine and works, as its a Gould scope and well known for blown caps taking the entire scope out when they go I really loathed to plug it in again. I have a LCR meter but I dont know if the cap will show low ESR because some of the Gould caps I have replaced in the past have dried out gone OC or nearly OC and had low ESR.
I could take apart and plug in and see if I can spot smoke quickly, but thats a bit risky as Goulds have alot of Tant caps and if its a big power cap they tend to take out all the smd Tants when they go.
So am I likely to be looking for low ESR or as its likely to be a dry cap will the cap value be way off? I dont normally get to them before they go bang so I am unsure, obviously I might take the back off and its obvious but just case I wanted to ask