Blown Tantalum Capacitor Advice

[Adrian Graham]

On 08/10/2016 11:18, "Rob Jarratt" <robert.jarratt at ntlworld.com> wrote:

> I have an RD53 disk drive. When I plugged it in the other day something blew
> up, smoke etc. I found that it was a tantalum capacitor on the motor control
> board that had gone. I suppose I am wondering if just replacing it is a good
> idea, could the failure be a symptom of another problem, could it have
> damaged something else? I realise that without a schematic it may be
> difficult to comment, but I suppose it is more a question about what can
> cause these caps to fail?
> 

I plugged in the power supply from a NASCOM2 the other week and one of the
tants exploded but the supply still worked so I just replaced it and all was
well, similarly with the floppy drive in an IBM5150 a few years ago. I was
told they can go short-circuit when they fail so explode in a similar manner
to fitting one in reverse polarity. (*innocent whistle*).

-- 
Adrian/Witchy
Binary Dinosaurs creator/curator
Www.binarydinosaurs.co.uk - the UK's biggest private home computer
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