When did "re-capping" become a thing?

[Flojomojo]

Now you got me riled up .... no disrespect intended

 

As the OP of the topic are you asking good reasons why people do it or good reasons as to why you shouldn't care to do it?

It's not clear. Obviously if you don't care about old clunkers rot then the question seems a bit pointless, nobody replaces caps on a new contemporary item if it is not broken, that much is certain.

 

Nope, read it again. I wanted to know why the TOPIC seemed so much more popular than in the past. I don't have a stake in re-capping either way. I was interested in the uptick in talk about re-capping. Make sense?

[phoenixdownita]

 

Nope, read it again. I wanted to know why the TOPIC seemed so much more popular than in the past. I don't have a stake in re-capping either way. I was interested in the uptick in talk about re-capping. Make sense?

It does but then the statements you don't care either way seem out of place imho, or that likely it's a fad when there are instead cases in which it is not.

 

It's your topic, you manage it the way you see fit, just my .02$, it seems like that for every plausible reason to actually do recap you have a comment (albeit related to you alone) as to why you don't care about it, makes adding more valid reasons harder.

 

Also there was another topic opened yesterday, do you refer to that as the trigger?

http://atariage.com/forums/topic/256307-proactive-caps-replacement/?do=findComment&comment=3579393

 

EDIT: .... and I am not riled up. It's a slow afternoon and I don't want to start a piece of a new project right now

[Flojomojo]

That topic wasn't the trigger, I didn't see it til now, but it seems like there has been a lot more discussion of this concept lately. I've got no agenda and don't feel the need to manage a thread ...if y'all want to go back and forth with your war stories of saving electronics thru recapping or destroying stuff thru inept soldering, I'm all ears

[phoenixdownita]

That topic wasn't the trigger, I didn't see it til now, but it seems like there has been a lot more discussion of this concept lately. I've got no agenda and don't feel the need to manage a thread ...if y'all want to go back and forth with your war stories of saving electronics thru recapping or destroying stuff thru inept soldering, I'm all ears

I actually cooked my hand well one time.

It was not related to recapping but soldering in general.

I was regenerating the sliding contacts in a little slot car .... I gave the soldering iron to a friend that was assisting and when I opened my hand to get it back while not watching he decided to put the hot iron part into my palm so that when I closed the grip .... holy schmoly I still remember the pain, I literally had to walk around for 3 days with a wet sponge in hand ..... painful. I wasn't watching for sure but who puts the hot iron part of a 40W soldering iron in anyone's open hand palm ... what a friend!!!! I'm lucky I have no scars.

[Osgeld]

 

apparently its all the rage

[phoenixdownita]

 

apparently its all the rage

 

LOL, it should definitely say "don't try this at home" ... you know they are not professionals when they hold their soldering gear by the hot part (like I did)....

 

Where did you get that? I hope it is not one of those technical schools' brochure or web sites ... "Learn to solder with us" .... "Thanks but NO thanks!!"

[godslabrat]

Understood! If I wake up in the middle of the night worrying about my 2001 Xbox (I think I might have 2 of them), I'll get right on that.

 

But since online play was turned off years ago, and most of my beloved games are available elsewhere, it's unlikely I'll care.

 

Kudos to all the people who take better care of their stuff and want to preserve the old electronics, no disrespect intended.

While we're on the topic, what's the tool of choice to emulate an original Xbox?

[Flojomojo]

While we're on the topic, what's the tool of choice to emulate an original Xbox?

I believe the best thing to do would be "buy another one from the thrift store for ten bucks"

 

Discussion here from last year but I doubt much has changed

 

https://m.reddit.com/r/emulation/comments/2wknnz/will_there_ever_be_an_xbox_emulator/

[CatPix]

... it definitely does seem to be a new thing,

Well of course it is. Replacing the caps come from aging. And I wouldn't say it's a new thing, I heard the advice about capacitor replacement of GG screens as early as 2007.

In 10 years from now, there is a high chance that NES and early SNES batteries are going to fail and there will be threads about replacing NES and SNES batteries all over. It will be a new thing, but not a "trend", just a normal phenomeon caused by the fact that some of our hardware is ageing and reach some limits.

Edited August 26, 2016 by CatPix

[SIO2]

When it comes to caps I am in with the don't fix it if it isn't broken crew. Especially when it comes to the Atari 2600. Over the years I have repaired and or modified quite a few of these machines. As I worked on them and searched for the bad components, I would often remove and test capacitors. What I found is that in all cases but one the original capacitors tested fine for capacitance and ESR. Many times they tested better than new replacement capacitors I had purchased. In the one case where there was actually a bad cap, the 2200uf cap had ruptured and leaked on the main board causing some damage but I was able to wash the board and polish it up. With a new cap it worked.

 

Why I think this is becoming a big thing is partly because of handhelds like sega game gear and atari lynx that are having high cap failure rates.

Edited August 27, 2016 by SIO2

[CatPix]

IMO, I replace only the ones I'm sure are going to fail.

 

I restaured some vintage radios, and if all paper caps were going out of the windows, for the power supply electrolytical, I was carefully powering them and ensuring correct voltages were delivered.

I have a 1960's tube radio with FM, with all of the electrochemical and even the usually fragile selenium rectifier bridge left intact and working. But paper caps? meeh, cause of too much failures so... bye!

 

For consoles, haven't touched caps in most of them except in the ones I knew would fail.

Edited August 27, 2016 by CatPix

[Flojomojo]

All this doom and gloom makes me want to dump my old gear before it fails!

[Austin]

Every other preservation topic on here seems to talk about re-capping old boards. I understand the idea, that capacitors don't last forever, and it's a smart way to bring old things back to life. What surprises me is how often it comes up in conversation here, much more than in the past, so I'm curious about why.

 

It comes up in conversation so frequently now because it's becoming a serious issue for certain platforms (most infamously, the Game Gear, PC Engine DUO/Turbo DUOs, Turbo Express, Sega Nomad).

 

Even with the original XBOX, cap issues are starting to rear their ugly head.

[phoenixdownita]

All this doom and gloom makes me want to dump sell pass on to an AA member my old gear before it fails!

Fixed it for you.

[Jess Ragan]

 

LOL, it should definitely say "don't try this at home" ... you know they are not professionals when they hold their soldering gear by the hot part (like I did)....

 

Where did you get that? I hope it is not one of those technical schools' brochure or web sites ... "Learn to solder with us" .... "Thanks but NO thanks!!"

 

How did I miss that? Yeah, the only degree the woman on the right is going for is third degree burns.

[Flojomojo]

I've seen those pictures before. Stock photos tagged "soldering?"

[rayik]

It's not just about caps leaking, that is a factor, but they deteriorate over age, and either leak, or fail to function as originally intended.

 

It's a relatively cheap and easy thing to do too, especially if you're handy with a soldering iron.

 

 

That's so true. I had a Sega Genesis that had horrible audio interference. Turned out a capacitor in the power brick started leaking. Ended up changing the two caps in the PSU and all caps in the Genesis. Easy $10 half hour project.

 

Since then I've bought from digikey all the caps that are in my retro systems. When something breaks, I'll recap that system

[Osgeld]

I've seen those pictures before. Stock photos tagged "soldering?"

yes

[atarifanboi]

I guess the other angle to this,is that more people are collecting and trying to repair and keep old kit running, and now that getting new caps is so easy, they are an easy target, given that they are one of the most likely components to fail due to old age.

[Flojomojo]

I guess the other angle to this,is that more people are collecting and trying to repair and keep old kit running, and now that getting new caps is so easy, they are an easy target, given that they are one of the most likely components to fail due to old age.

That's an interesting thought. It seems plausible there's more of a maker/fixit culture nowadays than say, ten years ago. My local Micro Center has pretty much cleared out their game section and replaced it with maker kits for arduino and raspberry Pi hacking.

[phoenixdownita]

Contemporary war story linked to recapping:

 

http://atariage.com/forums/topic/256328-both-lynx-2-died-simultaneously-please-help/

[mickcris]

Understood! If I wake up in the middle of the night worrying about my 2001 Xbox (I think I might have 2 of them), I'll get right on that.

 

But since online play was turned off years ago, and most of my beloved games are available elsewhere, it's unlikely I'll care.

 

Kudos to all the people who take better care of their stuff and want to preserve the old electronics, no disrespect intended.

the clock in your xbox is probably already dead. those caps leak and mess up the board. one of my xbox's you could not turn on or off using the front button cause the trace for the button got corroded.

 

http://dannygalaga.com/xbox.html

http://www.eurasia.nu/modules.php?name=Forums&file=viewtopic&topic=7416&forum=73

[schuwalker]

I wasn't aware of the cap dilemma till the arcade scene.

 

My buddy had a Nintendo Donkey Kong upright with a serious issue of jailbars. I had posted a tech query on RGVAC about said issue. Someone responded mentioned failing caps. It was till then I noticed "cap kits" becoming a vogue item for monitor issues people were having.

 

The timeframe of this was late '90s.

[+thegoldenband]

As far as I know, every Game Gear ever made will fail (and most already have) without being recapped. If there was a batch that didn't get hit with capacitor problems, I'm not aware of it, and every Game Gear that's passed through my hands has had the issue.

[+-^CrossBow^-]

In arcade circles there is a popular term used when an arcade system isn't working properly. That term is called A.S.A.P.

 

It means Always Start At Power. And for me I learned about capacitor failure and replacement on arcade monitors since the capacitors in the video chassis are subjected to much higher extremes in both voltage and climate over the years. In most cases, replacing the caps in monitor chassis fixes a great number of issues.

 

That said, I have also recapped arcade monitors and then a day or two later had another component burn out due to the added stress as was stated. Essentially everything electrical sorts of balances itself out and comes in harmony over time of usage at an even pace. When you suddenly replace the capacitors and voltages etc are now where they should be, other components have degraded at the same rate and now are suddenly 'shocked' as it were to the changes and can then burn out and need to be replaced as well. So that does happen.

 

That said, I fixed static audio on my HD model 1 Genesis by replacing all the caps in it. I could have gotten away with just he caps in the audio portion of the circuit, but the general thought is, if you replace one, you should replace them all. The genesis and my Turbo Duo were by far the trickest and longest cap replacement procedures I've had to perform of anything I've worked on. That said they are both working in better shape than they did when I first picked them up in the early 2000's.

 

I guess the overall summary is that capacitor replacement isn't a bad idea especially as was stated for electronics made in the 90s and early 2000's as the quality of the capacitors as a whole were very poor back then.

 

You do get surprises though. When I went to recap my jaguar and jaguar CD I was pleasantly surprised by the fact that over half of the capacitors in both were Nichicon brand capacitors! So it would seem that while Atari's quality control was suspect at best during these times, they at least seem to use good quality components. BTW I replaced the caps in my jag and jag CD as the audio was very low on the jag and the CD was having intermittent read issues. All of that went away when I replaced the caps on both.