VOGONS


First post, by keropi

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... well you should!
This is what I faced when I opened the SC-55 I received today:

7g4dhZ7.jpg

A leaking CR-2032 battery! 😲 Fortunately the plastic holder prevented the acid from reaching the pcb...
Might worth to check your units, it would be a shame if they developed faults because of the battery. The situation is not as serious as the NiCad batteries that have killed countless mobos/amigas/etc , but still! Better safe than sorry 😊

Last edited by keropi on 2020-11-04, 09:54. Edited 1 time in total.

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Reply 1 of 416, by d1stortion

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Good point, thanks for mentioning. Thought about this as well. These batteries can be 20+ years old now so they can definitely cause problems. Sucks that opening the SC-88 is a bit more complicated due to the multiple boards and PSU inside but I should take a look at opening mine 😀

Reply 2 of 416, by Great Hierophant

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For this reason I replaced my battery in my SC-55 last month. If you aren't planning on using the battery functionality, you should just be able to remove it and leave it empty.

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Reply 3 of 416, by keropi

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Great Hierophant wrote:

For this reason I replaced my battery in my SC-55 last month. If you aren't planning on using the battery functionality, you should just be able to remove it and leave it empty.

aha! I think I'll do just that, all I want to use the sc-55 is for some "serious" gaming sessions 😊 😊 😊

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Reply 4 of 416, by Shagittarius

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Thanks, I just checked mine 5 minutes ago, it was fine but I removed it for safety. In the mkII the battery holder is horizontal.

Reply 5 of 416, by d1stortion

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Well, the battery was doing fine but there was something else wrong... two caps on the power board are leaking quite badly 🙁

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Reply 8 of 416, by 5u3

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Do the other caps also have these strange crescent-shaped white markings on the PCB around their bases? To me it looks like they deliberately applied some glue in order to stop vibrations or something like that. I could be wrong though...

Reply 9 of 416, by keropi

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this is just glue to hold the cap into place, no idea why (maybe to solder underneath?) but it's a know tactic on older stuff... if it was cap asid then you would see corrosion and white fungus-like damage similar to the battery image I posted above

Last edited by keropi on 2013-08-02, 12:39. Edited 1 time in total.

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Reply 11 of 416, by keropi

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touch it! you'll see it's glue 😉
it's the same as this pic of an official PS1 psu I have opened:

15yazhh.jpg

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Reply 12 of 416, by Mau1wurf1977

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Yea the LA modules have the same thing.

Will check my SC units as well. Hope it's all good...

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Reply 14 of 416, by keropi

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Mau1wurf1977 wrote:

Yea the LA modules have the same thing.

[...]

yep, you can see it in the pics posted here: http://queststudios.com/smf/index.php?topic=3394.0 , seems to be power filter-cap related

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Reply 16 of 416, by RacoonRider

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5u3 wrote:

Do the other caps also have these strange crescent-shaped white markings on the PCB around their bases? To me it looks like they deliberately applied some glue in order to stop vibrations or something like that. I could be wrong though...

They all do. The marks indicate polarity.

Reply 17 of 416, by keropi

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h-a-l-9000 wrote:

I've seen some glue on old monitor PCBs that started eating through traces...

glue eating traces? never seen that... maybe the cap leaked and caused this...

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Reply 18 of 416, by Old Thrashbarg

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glue eating traces? never seen that... maybe the cap leaked and caused this...

No, there is indeed a glue that'll turn corrosive. I'm not sure exactly what sort of substance it is, but I've seen it a couple times myself in some '80s stereo equipment. And I know it wasn't a leaky cap, because it happened in some places that weren't near a cap.

There's also sort of glue that eventually carbonizes and goes conductive after prolonged exposure to heat. I've seen a fair number of PC PSUs that have failed because of that... and I imagine it made for quite a light show in cases where it shorted stuff on the primary side.

Reply 19 of 416, by keropi

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^ really?... never actually seen it but a wrong choice of materials is known to cause disasters 😀

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