Newbie. Capacitor in an inverter?

[gcretro]

I have a car inverter, 200W. Brand is some power line. Last time I plugged it in, something inside it "popped" with a beeep and slight foul smell.

So I opened it and found a capacitor bulging almost burst. It's 3300UF 16V 105 deg C. [Black in color and says E&K vent. I wanted to attempt swamping this to see if that was the issue.

Any idea where I could buy such a cap? And what brand should I buy? In ebay I found many brands Tecpo, Panasonic, Sanyo.

[Some are not black in color if that matters]

Any directions?

Thx

[mariushm]

Re: Newbie. Capacitor in an inverter?

You have digikey.com in US or even this site's store, which has quality capacitors for sale.

Use ebay or stores like Radioshack that sell general purpose capacitors as a last measure.

For example, this will work great if you get it from this site's store: https://www.badcaps.net/store/produc...products_id=56

On digikey.com, these will work:

http://search.digikey.com/us/en/prod...2373-ND/613734
http://search.digikey.com/us/en/prod...404-ND/2433538
http://search.digikey.com/us/en/prod...1670-ND/756186
http://search.digikey.com/us/en/prod...1536-ND/589277

There's more options but the diameter is higher than 12.5mm and as you didn't specify the diameter of your capacitor, can't just recommend anything.

[gcretro]

Re: Newbie. Capacitor in an inverter?

yes, the busted one is 12.5 mm. Should the replacement also be black in color? Does black mean anything?

I don't want to spent more than like 7 to 8 bucks since something else may be wrong that caused the cap to buldge/blow. Don't know newbie here to caps

[mariushm]

Re: Newbie. Capacitor in an inverter?

No, the color has no meaning.
Usually, there's a code on the capacitor saying the series in which it's part of, and the name of the company who made it.., in your case "E&K"

From this info, we would be able to find a datasheet and determine the technical characteristics and recommend specific brands and series that would match.

But as E&K is probably a Chinese no-name brand that's unlikely to publish datasheets, I recommended you a few that have excellent characteristics and are sure to work in place of the old one, but they're a bit more expensive.

The capacitors are 1-1.5$ each and you only need 1. Shipping on this site is 5$, I think ... on digikey.com I don't know,2-6$ or something like that. Shouldn't be a lot.

Look for other capacitors around that one that look odd, swollen or cracked or weird in some way, or post some clear pictures so we can see if something else looks odd there.

[gcretro]

Re: Newbie. Capacitor in an inverter?

Attached are 2 Pics. Red arrow shows the busted cap I removed. I misplaced the busted cap. But it was 3300UF, 16v 105C, E&K brand.

So what brand should I buy? I found the digi-key search overwhelming for a newbie. Anything up to 6 to 8 bucks is ok.

Thx again

[mariushm]

Re: Newbie. Capacitor in an inverter?

To me personally, everything looks good in the pictures, nothing obviously bad there.

Talk to Topcat (the owner of this site) : https://www.badcaps.net/forum/member.php?u=3

and ask him what he can do for you.

[japlytic]

Re: Newbie. Capacitor in an inverter?

Welcome, gcreto!

With the 3300uF 16V capacitor, I recommend a 3300uF 25V Chemi-Con KMQ (specify radial lead, since KMQ is also available in snap-in), along with replacing the 100uF 200V unit with a Chemi-Con KMQ (again, radial lead, or if you can get it, Chemi-Con KXJ).
I have seen KSC units bulge too.

[gcretro]

Re: Newbie. Capacitor in an inverter?

Thx. I didn't know I could go replace the 16V with 25v. What does that give?

Where can I buy the caps? Just 1 piece or 2. The inverter isn't worth more than 20 bucks itself (USD). Just want to fix it and feed good about it

[gcretro]

Re: Newbie. Capacitor in an inverter?

Bump. Where I can I buy these. 12.5 X 20mm 3300UF 16v? Space wise i can't fit in anything more than 25mm length.

I dunno if i can go with 3300UF 25V instead of 16V? (it's car power inverter)

[dmill89]

Re: Newbie. Capacitor in an inverter?

You can go with 25V. The voltage rating of a cap is the voltage that the cap is rated to handle, the other components in the circuit determine the actual voltage produced not the caps. However all the 3300uf 25v caps I have found are physically too large to fit in the space you have stated was available in the inverter. For 3300uf 16v caps these should fit Panasonic EEU-HD1C332 12.5mm X 22mm. This is a GP cap, I would prefer a low ERS, high ripple, long life cap in such an application however none will fit in the available space. The Panasonic should still be as good or better specs wise as the cap it is replacing, and much better reliability wise, although I can't find any data sheets on EK capacitors, I would suspect it is a rather low spec GP cap given the form factor (12.5mm X 20mm).

[selldoor]

Re: Newbie. Capacitor in an inverter?

I couldnt find any 25v ones either ,in that size . In fact the size is the main factor for you and limits the choice. http://search.digikey.com/us/en/prod...1298-ND/755814 which seem similar to the specs to the panny. Whatever you get is likely to be better than what was in. A problem you might hit is that if the other caps in the inverter are the same make as the one that popped, they may be about to.
Replacing one may put even more pressure on them.

[Agent24]

Re: Newbie. Capacitor in an inverter?

So I opened it and found a capacitor bulging almost burst. It's 3300UF 16V 105 deg C. [Black in color and says E&K vent. I wanted to attempt swamping this to see if that was the issue.

I can't find any data sheets on EK capacitors

Where is this bulging capacitor? The photos don't show a bulging capacitor nor a capacitor marked "E&K"

All I see is one marked "KSC" which I'm thinking might be from here? : http://www.king-sun.com

[selldoor]

Re: Newbie. Capacitor in an inverter?

Where is this bulging capacitor?

He has removed it - there is a thin red arrow in the first picture pointing to where I presume it was.

[Agent24]

Re: Newbie. Capacitor in an inverter?

Ahh right you are. The arrow is very thin, and it's easy to miss a hole when you're not looking for one!

[999999999]

Re: Newbie. Capacitor in an inverter?

Digikey no longer has a small order fee and will ship up to 8 oz via USPS for $2.80, though my last order there was very small (shipping box, padding and baggies were probably worth more than the components, lol) and USPS was closer to $2.00.

If you can't find 25V, go with 16V or even 35V, just make it a good low ESR Japanese brand that fits the available space (as others already stated).

Personally, I would replace every electrolytic cap on the board, they probably all ran hot especially if this inverter were passively cooled. The remaining tiny ones will be quite inexpensive.

However, was the smell more electrical /burning sort or chemical? Vented caps have a chemical component to the smell. You wrote something popped but the capacitor was about to, not that it exploded violently so I suspect you are looking at a transistor or IC that failed not just the cap, and Digikey might carry whatever that is too.

[Agent24]

Re: Newbie. Capacitor in an inverter?

Digikey no longer has a small order fee and will ship up to 8 oz via USPS for $2.80, though my last order there was very small (shipping box, padding and baggies were probably worth more than the components, lol) and USPS was closer to $2.00.

Is that true for international orders too? Last time I looked you had to pay $50 shipping for any order under $200.

[999999999]

Re: Newbie. Capacitor in an inverter?

^ I have no idea since I'm in the US. I clicked on Digikey's change-country link to point to NZ and all I can see regarding that is these links:

#7: http://dkc1.digikey.com/nz/en/mkt/Te...ipping#Shipchg

http://dkc1.digikey.com/nz/en/mkt/Terms_FreeShipHP.html

^ this 2nd link states NZ$39 shipping for orders under NZ$125, free for NZ$125 and greater.

[mariushm]

Re: Newbie. Capacitor in an inverter?

For me it was 30$ shipping for anything under 300$.

Now it's under 200$, not sure how much... so anything over 200$ is free shipping.

I'm starting to like Farnell ... charged me 20 RON (5$) for 2-3 day shipping and between the time i placed the order and the fulfillment (friday-monday) a few components were no longer available .. in the end got three packages ... one in 2 days, the second after a week and a half, the third two 1/2 weeks from the first.

[Agent24]

Re: Newbie. Capacitor in an inverter?

2nd link states NZ$39 shipping for orders under NZ$125, free for NZ$125 and greater.

Guess they have reduced it a bit, but they could still easily send via USPS for small orders and charge a very small shipping fee. Oh well.

I'm starting to like Farnell ... charged me 20 RON (5$) for 2-3 day shipping and between the time i placed the order and the fulfillment (friday-monday) a few components were no longer available .. in the end got three packages ... one in 2 days, the second after a week and a half, the third two 1/2 weeks from the first.

Farnell NZ used to have a minimum order of $10 and $15 shipping on everything under $80 but for the past few months they had free shipping on any order placed online (not via phone etc)

Now they've stopped that, but there is now no minimum order value (although you'll waste your money on shipping) and free shipping is for orders over $45.

They would often send multiple packages to me too (usually because stock was from another country) but I got sick of waiting for multiple deliveries so I now ask them to wait until they have the lot and send it as one package.