Japanese Smoke

[EVguru]

Last night I let the smoke out of the Mitutoyo DRO on my mill.

I'd finally gotten round to re-installing it after the move but was interrupted by a phone call. When I went back to the job I forgot I needed to change the voltage selector to 240v. It had been running from a 415/110 transformer in the electrical cabinet that I've removed as part of the VFD conversion and general re-wire.

It actually died with nary a sound nor smoke signal. The fuse blew and I'd normally expect a linear power suppy (it's an old DRO) to protect everything, but after setting the input voltage correctly and replacing the fuse it would only partially power up and I went inside to consult the Great God Google about new DRO heads compatible with my existing scales.

Just out of curiosity I brought the DRO into work this morning and had a poke around with the trusty Fluke. On of the supply rails was down and after a while I found a Tantalum capacitor that had shorted out. With the cap replaced the DRO is now working again, but I no longer have a nice new shiny DRO to look forward to.

Maybe later.

[Carld]

Sometimes you get lucky.

[hojpoj]

Well, since you've already mentally reappropriated the funds for the DRO look at it this way-

"A sweet pot of money to buy more tooling!"

Nice job troubleshooting the power problem, I'm unfortunately diagnosed with something called Borderline Electrical Retardation. I'm not allowed to play with a voltmeter anymore

[darryl]

I know a guy who burned up three voltmeters in a single day. He was my boss.

As far as the DRO, now that it's got some battle scars, you can really begin to use it.