[mushymanrob]

samsung 4 years old.... just went bang and the lights went out..

is it worth getting a technician out to look at it, ? can these things be fixed? or is it dead and not worth trying to fix it?

advice welcome please...

[chrisjr]

Samsung went through a phase of using dodgy capacitors in their power supplies (not sure if they have improved or not). Always possible one of those has let go. If it has gone bang then that can be quite spectacular. The cans on electrolytic capacitors make good toy rockets if you abuse them

But they do make an awful mess, amazing how much stuff is crammed into a capacitor!

If it is just a capacitor failure then it might be possible to revive it by replacing all the dodgy capacitors with new better specc'ed ones. There have been several threads on DS before where that has been done to good effect.

Depends on how competent you are with screwdriver and soldering iron as to whether you fancy a bit of DIY or farm it out to someone else.

[mushymanrob]

Quote:

Originally Posted by chrisjr

Samsung went through a phase of using dodgy capacitors in their power supplies (not sure if they have improved or not). Always possible one of those has let go. If it has gone bang then that can be quite spectacular. The cans on electrolytic capacitors make good toy rockets if you abuse them

But they do make an awful mess, amazing how much stuff is crammed into a capacitor!

If it is just a capacitor failure then it might be possible to revive it by replacing all the dodgy capacitors with new better specc'ed ones. There have been several threads on DS before where that has been done to good effect.

Depends on how competent you are with screwdriver and soldering iron as to whether you fancy a bit of DIY or farm it out to someone else.

thanks for that. i am ok with soldering iron but id let the pro do it.

[chrisjr]

If you feel up to it you could take the back off the set and have a look inside. If it is a dodgy capacitor gone pop it should be fairly obvious! They are messy things when they let go.

[Kodaz]

Quote:

Originally Posted by chrisjr

If you feel up to it you could take the back off the set and have a look inside. If it is a dodgy capacitor gone pop it should be fairly obvious! They are messy things when they let go.

Opening up old-style CRT sets was an extremely bad idea if you weren't absolutely sure what you were doing- the capacitors inside could retain lethal amounts of charge *long* after the set had been disconnected from a power source.

I don't know how much this is still an issue with modern LCD (or plasma sets) models though...?

[Winston_1]

Quote:

Originally Posted by mushymanrob

samsung 4 years old.... just went bang and the lights went out..

is it worth getting a technician out to look at it, ? can these things be fixed? or is it dead and not worth trying to fix it?

advice welcome please...

Of course it is worth fixing. People always got their TV fixed in the past before this throw away society came about.

As it is less than six years old you could even have a claim under the Sale of goods act if it was fitted with defective capacitors. Any compensation would be based on about one third of the purchase price due to its age.

[coachtrip_fan99]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Winston_1

Of course it is worth fixing. People always got their TV fixed in the past before this throw away society came about.

As it is less than six years old you could even have a claim under the Sale of goods act if it was fitted with defective capacitors. Any compensation would be based on about one third of the purchase price due to its age.

I think a lot of people either rightly, or wrongly assume that its gonna cost more to get something fixed than to just replace it.

[AidanLunn]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kodaz

Opening up old-style CRT sets was an extremely bad idea if you weren't absolutely sure what you were doing- the capacitors inside could retain lethal amounts of charge *long* after the set had been disconnected from a power source.

I don't know how much this is still an issue with modern LCD (or plasma sets) models though...?

I've had valve TVs not switched on in over 40 years still retain lethal charges!

[Nigel Goodwin]

Quote:

Originally Posted by AidanLunn

I've had valve TVs not switched on in over 40 years still retain lethal charges!

Sorry, but that's entirely untrue

The only thing that can stay charged for a considerable time is the CRT, and that doesn't hold anywhere near a 'lethal' charge.

I'm also dubious that you've had the chance to test for charge on a 40 year unused TV

[alanwarwic]

I thought they were designed to store power for 'seconds.
Totally isolated I guess they would have some charge left as much as 7 days later.

[Nigel Goodwin]

Quote:

Originally Posted by alanwarwic

Totally isolated I guess they would have some charge left as much as 7 days later.

Like I said above, the CRT will store a charge (high voltage, low current, non-lethal) for extended periods - certainly easily more than a year (on a disconnected CRT).

The main electrolytic can store a charge (again non-lethal) for a short time, around 330V at 'reasonable' current - with the voltage lowering exponentially over the discharge time. Set's specifically have discharge resistors that discharge this capacitor in a few minutes though, so they don't hold charge for extended periods (and the self-leakage of electrolytics prevents that anyway).

[AidanLunn]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Nigel Goodwin

Sorry, but that's entirely untrue

The only thing that can stay charged for a considerable time is the CRT, and that doesn't hold anywhere near a 'lethal' charge.

I'm also dubious that you've had the chance to test for charge on a 40 year unused TV

I have seen round TV tubes deliver what could be lethal current when discharging them before removing from the chassis.

Example, the MW31-18C in my Philips 485U delivered 1.3Amps when discharged - and I got this in December last year from an old lady who said it hadn't been switched on since about 1965.

It's a rare occurrence, I'll give you that, but I have seen it.

[Nigel Goodwin]

Quote:

Originally Posted by AidanLunn

I have seen round TV tubes deliver what could be lethal current when discharging them before removing from the chassis.

Example, the MW31-18C in my Philips 485U delivered 1.3Amps when discharged - and I got this in December last year from an old lady who said it hadn't been switched on since about 1965.

First off, how did you measure this 1.3 amps

(and probably just as importantly why would you want to?)

Second - what voltage was it at?

Third - how long did this VERY short pulse last?

Fourth - how could you possibly claim it could be 'lethal'

I suggest you try applying W=VxI and see how much actual energy is present - or measuring the capacitance of the tube (which is how it stores the energy, in the form of an electro-static field), and calculate it from that.

You would be a lot better off publicising the actual real dangers of stored voltage in microwave ovens (which is quite likely to be fatal) than scaremongering about TV's where it's far less dangerous than even normal mains.

[noise747]

Quote:

Originally Posted by coachtrip_fan99

I think a lot of people either rightly, or wrongly assume that its gonna cost more to get something fixed than to just replace it.

Sometimes it is to do with prices and I suppose if you have a cheap Tv like a Bush or something in that realm , then getting them fixed would no doubt cost more than they are worth.

If you got a more expensive set, then maybe it is worth getting fixed. the problem is a lot of people just want new, had their Tv for 5 years or more, goes pop oh well we may as well get a new more modern one.

My plasma is 6 years old, i think, can't be far off and is still going strong, i am not planning to replace it until it goes belly up and then I got a few options. either go back to my old CRT and keep with that.

Get it fixed depedning on how much it would cost and if it could be fixed.

Buy a new Tv set that uses less power and is a little bit easier to move. the problem is I stilll not that fond of LCD sets. and the slimmer they get the worse they sound.