Thursday, April 19, 2012

Funky smell

From my first use, I've noticed a smell coming from the Marantz 2130 that I associate with deteriorating electrolytic capacitors.  I've smelled this smell mostly on older equipment that needs to be refurbished.  Though I was also wondering if a previous owner of this unit was a tobacco smoker.

Before installing the tuner, I washed off outer case and bare chassis areas.  The smell was still quite noticeable an annoying to me in the kitchen.  A lady friend did not smell it.

I put my hand on the top case of the Marantz, and my hand picked up the smell.  OK, so now it occurred to me it was mostly coming from the funky vinyl coating on the top cover.

I removed the cover again, leaving the tuner uncovered in it's rack spot, pushed back so I don't accidentally try to put my hand on top again.  Some say equipment sounds best with it's cover of, and it did seem a bit that way, I noticed more depth and spaciousness.  Despite the vinyl coating, the Marantz top cover vibrates when music is being played through the speakers.  That can't be good for a tuner using ceramic and SAW filters which operate through mechanical sound transmission.

I rubbed the cover off again several times with Everclear, then put outside for sun exposure during next day or so.  I've been thinking the bad smell is from oxidation, and perhaps coating the vinyl with Deoxit would help.

I'm thinking I could make a different cover out of some damping material.  Possibly a single flat plate for the top of the tuner would be sufficient, leaving sides open, but possibly with some extra protection for the front.  I don't like putting wood cases on equipment like this because it already runs quite warm and I think that would make it run too warm for long term.


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