#76 Tutorial: Why do electrolytic capacitors fail so often 

Thanks for the detailed explanation of electrolytic caps. I know a lot about them already, but learned quite a bit from your video, and a few bonus items about board design considerations that I hadn't considered. I really appreciate you're taking the time to put this together.

Thank you! As always very well explained.

A wealth of knowledge being made available here in these videos. Thank you Peter for your time and effort and willingness to pass on this vet practical knowledge. Very important in the restoration of older equipment, as well as circuit design for new equipment. 73s. David

Great job my friend. Many folk do not realise that there is more than 1 check necessary to make sure a capacitor is in working condition. You covered all the bases nicely here. Cheers Peter John

That is the video for what I havê been looking for! Nice!!!

Brilliant explanation Peter thanks for taking the time to do this for us.

An accurate analysis. Love it. Thanks for sharing!

Thank you for this wonderful tutorial. And Happy New Year to you.

Very interesting as usual. Since watching your video I have started to notice caps in circuit boards placed in bad locations. Something I have only noticed since watching your explanation of why caps fail.

Great video. Thanks for the ripple current explanation.

Thanks, for another great video. I watch also Mr Carlson's Lab. :)

Wonderful job. Great Tutorial on Electrolytic caps.

Thank you again sir. You did it once again blowing my mind with this capacitor explanation.

Thank you for a very nice tutorial about capacitors. I have learned a great deal from you which helps me with my retirement hobby of antique radio repair. 73 malcolm

Really enjoy watching your videos. Lots of good information thanks for sharing.

Peter, That was an excellent tutorial on why capacitors fail. I really enjoyed your teaching on this. Hope you do more of these in the future. really good stuff. I been telling folks for years that high heat and high voltage is a capacitors worst enemy. I see so many circuits with 10 volt caps in a 10 volt circuit. Also wanted to say thank you my friend for the mention of my channel. Really appreciate that.Your first video for 2016 and it you knocked it out of the park. Well done.73 my friend.

Thank you for the nice tutorial explanation how to understand the function and the characteristics of a capacitor ,especially for the electrolytics capacitors concerning inner resistance and capacity as well as the "ripple voltages" upon them.

Great tutorial, get a better understanding of caps. Thanks a lot. Thumbs up!!!

Very well explained! Learned a lot from this video, Thank you.

Thanks Peter. Nice lesson on e-caps.

I once worked on a 1920's AM radio built by Philco. As I maneuvered the chassis on the bench I saw a small puddle of water under it. My research revealed that salt water was used as an electrolyte in the dialectic.

You speak English very well! At 13:48 the word you are looking for is " Graph" or " Chart". :-)

Just watching your older vids. They are all great. I would love to see a capacitor opened up or cut in half to see what is inside. Would love to see how these are made. Thanks Peter.

I've serviced thousands of pieces of equipment from the 80s and 90s time and often these things were 10-20 years old. Regarding electrolytic failure, I have never replaced all electrolytes in a circuit. In general electrolytics were one of the less common items to fail, like far far less than say a power transistor, but when they did fail you could nearly always detect it by the top bulging out and/or leakage. I would routinely replace any of these, but another rule of thumb was in 99% of the time it would be because the capacitor was either next to a heat sink or a wire wound resistor. So the conclusion was that electrolytics would not wear out in a design that avoided them getting hotter than ambient air temperature. Sure they may fail eventually, but that would be long past the time the onwer felt it was good for the skip. I wonder though, have the new electrolytics got worse than the older ones?

Thank you for teaching me this topic which is so critical.

It was a great pleasure following your lesson about the electrolytic capacitors used in the filter circuit where the ripple voltage and current take place. I never thought about a capacitor as being ,not only a capacitor but also a resistor and an inductance (in very small values) as well. Also the current dissipation you described, made me think as I never thought about it. You have really made a very tutorial lesson for everybody in a very simple and easy way. Thank you very much for the beautiful lesson.

Excellent study. Thank you.

Nice explanation. Thank you.

i love watching your videos.

Excelent contente Peter!!!

From what I heard I'd guess you're having DL..., DB... or DG... callsign? If so I'd say "Sehr guter Beitrag! Vielen Dank und weiter so!", otherwise let me thank you for the brilliant explanation of the physics behind the "mystery" that caps seem to be for much people. Looks like you're one of the youtubers that know what they're talking about. Thumbs up! :-D 73 and keep your HAM spirit, let's spread the knowledge!

Prima erklärt, vielen Dank!

always value to me\thank you Peter

From what I derive.... iCaps that have PAPER material inside are subject to deterioration. Mica, and Mylar and Ceramic hold up through time better.

Wonderful information. Very clearly explained. Is there no alternative to an electrolytic capacitor? What are it’s advantages in common circuits? 73’s Lynton.

Thanks for that.

Excellent presentation! Thanks - Lloyd - W9NLA

Thank you

very nice presentation...wish you would have been my electronic instructor a long time ago...thank you

ESR actually stands for voltage switching resistance or dissipation factor. It is a chief parameter in switching power circuits and deflection circuits. In standard 60 Hz circuits the ESR is a negligible parameter.

Very informative. At least now I understand what ESR is :-)

So is it safe to replace them with smaller box layered ceramic capacitors?

A very good presentation of capacitors the way they behave in circuits where the heat source is an issue, especially when to close to heat sink devices. I agree that high premium capacitors will yield the best results along with extremely low ESR and current ripple and I have confirmed this with my own testing of different grades of capacitors. As you pointed out the lower the temperature the better which insures long life, well done.

Hello Peter. Thank you for these - most informative / practical - tutorials. Can you please advise where I can find PRACTICAL short-cut tutorials about calculating SMPS transformers?

Thank you for a very informative video. I can only assume that when Sony designed my TA88 amplifier in 1969 they put in high grade capacitors and above specification. It still works today. Sadly the same cannot be said about my Apple iMac which died from capacitor failure after only 3 years.

really good

Very illuminating. Thank you! I have an 80's era HF transceiver (Ten Tec). It works fine, but I'd like to get it into top shape. Is it worthwhile just replacing all the electrolytics I can?

Your English is very good; at times, I cannot think of the correct word and I am an English speaking American.

Great video...alsoTantalum caps are a problem.. More caps go out if under more heat and use.. spikes in power can short them and I'm tracing down a bunch on a vintage prophet5 keyboard synth.

Danke sehr von UK

Excellent videos that you do, keep up the great work! I get a lot of good information from them. 73..wd0akx

Great job Peter!You lost me on one part though. I understand the ripple current aspect but, you measured in two ways as ripple voltage. Is this correct or am I missing something here?Thanks!73sTom

Thank you very much for your presentation; as you say there are many other considerations, but this represents the 'empirical' behaviour of electrolytic capacitors in power circuits. In early designs, a mains frequency (50Hz) transformer is used to 'step down' the AC voltage, which is rectified with a bridge rectifier, and 'filtered' with an electrolytic capacitor, using, say, 1mF (1,000μF) upwards.. As components became cheaper, later designs used a method which rectified mains voltage, then (by using a sketching circuit) converting )it to a lesser voltage DC-DC, at a much higher frequency, reducing the need for high value electrolytic capacitors, and there is a reduced cost, but also reduced life..

Just FYI, the little thingy with the numbers you were pointing to, is called a "Table".

nice video

What is the ripple current relation with ripple voltage you measured?

Kind of a side guestion, why does the voltage drop back down a little after the filter capacitor has been charged? (see 44:40) Why doesn't the voltage slowly drop from the charged up peak voltage? thanks

I have a radio the tantalum was shorted. It took out the audio chip, upc1020H. Are you familiar with this chip?

Hi.I think that you are German,but your explain in english is so easy for understand.Thank you.

The bad caps hit the market in the late 90s/early 2000s. It stemmed from a stolen formula for the dielectric compound that was incomplete. I'll bet those same caps are still floating around in a production line somewhere. It keeps people like me in business.

happy newyear

good video Peter, Also there has been lot of cheap crap el capacitors flooding the market now for some years, and I even have some in spare parts pcbs that have never been in service,and yet their electrolyics caps have leaked. very poor qc.

Faulty or unavoidably aging?

fit OSCONs job done!

wider mal den nagel auf den kopf getroffen . ich mag die rubycom hochqualitiativ serie. bei kleinen kapazitäten geht das ja noch . ein beispiel die ecu deine defenderter td5 hat zwei riesen elkos die nach der bzeit ab bj 1998 ja ständig auslaufen . tips gabs scjpon legt die doch nach außen wech von der platine . meiner meinung müsten alle größereren belasteten elkos gesockelt werden .

Nice tutorial. The title has a little spelling mistake and should be : "Why do electrolytic capacitors fail so often" Edit: Oh you changed it, that was quick :)

The problem I'm seeing is many capacitor failures on many newer appliances besides electronics. I am trying to understand why though. It seems, since we've changed from the older PCB dielectric to a newer less carcinogen type dielectric coolant that more capacitors are failing. I understand that "heat" is a capacitors enemy and the dielectric coolant is a necessity, but the newer fluids are breaking down and allowing electrical current flow (short) causing internal breakdowns. It seems though the information is not forth coming. Another of my thoughts is that since there are more and more harmonics on the line (high voltage) that may be presenting a new problem not dealt with in the past.

i didnt know capacitors have heat limits🤓 thanx

Sorry I didn't watch your whole video but I did have a question, ja? I hear a lot about capacitors leaking but every time I open up one of my old school amps (about 25) I can't find one leaky capacitor. Am I just lucky? Ja?

Please turn on English CC, I'm also electronic hobby deafguy, thank you.

From all of your information about the different electronic circuit designs I for one would send you my radios for service . The only thing that I need is your address for sending you my radios for service .

I can't get the "electroluuuctic" out of my head xD

love your accent are you Italian

Hard to believe the quality cap in a high price transceiver like the Kenwood lol this is called cutting corners

Are you a german ?

This video would be better if it wasn't sooooo long

i just can't stand listening to this guy... I tried. sorry

21:22 Those "GL" caps are just generic chinese crap. They aren't good for anything really. 23:02 Is that by any chance a "TEAPO" brand capacitor? If so, get rid of it. They're junk as well.

simple cheap low quality imports

talked too fast, had to watch 10 times

Peter could you have possibly made a simple subject any more complicated? old caps are crap after 40 years of service. OK new caps are better made and will likely stay stable longer. how difficult is it?