I recently learned that my brother-in-law was about to dispose of an Acer monitor. When I asked him what was wrong with it, he told me that the monitor worked fine most of the time, but it would intermittently stop working. I suggested that if it worked well "sometimes," it might just be a filter that was misbehaving or a component that stopped functioning when it started heating up. He couldn’t really detect a trend, and he didn’t want to deal with electronics troubleshooting.
Since I’m a manufacturing engineer, I don’t know a lot about electronics, either, but I decided to lug it home. If I couldn’t find the flaw, I figured I could at least find good use for some of the components.
I opened up the monitor, and as soon as I had all the guts out, I noticed that a few electrolytic capacitors had blown. When an electrolytic capacitor blows, you can see the damage -- its top bulges out, much like a dome. That obviously was an issue, but I also had to find out whether the capacitors had blown because they were bad or because there was a failure upstream that caused the components to self-destruct.
I researched the issue on the Internet and found that this was a common problem with Acer monitors. The capacitors they used were inferior; replacing a handful of them solved the issue. In fact, the issue was so rampant among the owners of Acer monitors, there were sites online offering capacitor kits specifically for Acer monitors. A couple of days later, I bought some decent capacitors, soldered them into the boards, and hoped that the monitor worked. It did, and it is still working a year later.
I wonder how many monitors ended up thrown in the trash just because of a few inferior capacitors that the company decided to use in order to save a few cents.
This entry was submitted by Nauzad Tantra and edited by Rob Spiegel.
Nauzad Tantra has received a bachelor's degree, a master's degree, and a PhD in manufacturing engineering. He has worked in various industries in India, China, the UK, and the US, and he has helped various companies with turnkey low-cost automation and mechatronics projects. Tantra is passionate about innovation, green technologies, and disruptive technologies.
Tell us your experience in solving a knotty engineering problem. Send stories to Rob Spiegel for Sherlock Ohms.
Good point on the legitimacy question, Larry M. Now that I think about it, what you describe actually is a form of counterfeit components -- when technology is stolen and used to manufacture parts.
Rob, not sure I would use the term "legitimate" given the provenance of the formula. This trade secret formula was stolen twice.
I cannot post a link to the IEEE Spectrum article, but I recommend you track it down. It's fascinating. My memory wasn't so bad. The article appears in the February 2003 edition, pp. 16-17.
Yes, Gsmith120, there's just something about the story -- and the resulting comments -- that rings of counterfeit components. The counterfeits are disguised very well these days and they can show up even in non-gray markets in the form of returns.
Does it really make sense that there are counterfeit electrolytics in the field? Seems to me that the bulk cost of such small parts isn't worth the effort to get them into mainstream distribution. Sort of akin to counterfeiting $1 bills. You need quite a bucket full to make a dent. But, $20 bills ..... now that's a different story!
I can see disreputable types counterfeiting processor chips, since the margins are greater.
In the words a a famous "philosopher / songstress", 'And the beat goes on ......'
I replaced bad caps in my Mitsubishi TV and on my daughters Intel motherboard. Those are both "big name" brands. There's no excuse for such poor component sourcing.
Rob Spiegel wrote: "This makes me wonder whether the components that failed were counterfeit."
Not counterfeits. The following is from an IEEE Spectrum article published around 2003 describing events that happened in around 2000, as I recall it. A Chinese engineer was working at a Japanese capacitor manufacturer, stole the secret formula for the electrolyte in electrolytic capacitors and started a factory in China. A second engineer, working at the Chinese factory, stole the formula and opened a second factory and underbid everyone else on capacitors.
However, in one of the transfers, some of the ingredients were omitted from the formula. There didn't seem to be any reason for their inclusion and the capacitors seemed to test just as well without them. Unfortunately, one of the ingredients was a stabilizer which prevented aging and degradation of the electrolyte.
These bad capacitors got into all kinds of electronics-- VCRs, TVs, computer motherboards, and monitors. Nearly all the computer motherboards failed, about 24 months out. The problem manifested itself in failures to boot, reboots in mid-stream, hangs, and crashes. All of the manufacturers but one refused to fix or replace the failed computers, in spite of the clearly inferior parts, arguing that they were out of warranty. Only IBM replaced every one. In fact, if you were having difficulty replacing the motherboard, they would send a suit-and-tie customer engineer to your house to do the job.
Your right, Nancy. The internet used to be my last resort for troubleshooting - now it's my first resort. You can't imagine the time it saves. Like they say - no sin is strange to man. If you have the problem, someone else already did, too.
It always boils down to money and bad days at the factory.
I don't think I have ever replaced a Nichicon in 20 years. When I find a bad part, I always go looking for other parts of the same value. Nearly always they are bad too. Since manufacturers buy in bulk lots, a bad day at the cap factory is a bad day for the end user.
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