ZX475Ti - PCB pictures required

[StillKeen]

Done! Tested it, just with a battery, home speakers and a sub, and all works .. I get sound out of both speakers and the sub! The cap's did press in, just a little force. Most 'snapped' into place, one just moved into place without the snap. I found that cleaning out the holes is the hardest part of the cap work. I'm not great with the solder wick or solder sucker, but I have two more ZX amps to re-cap tomorrow, so should get some skill developed. All that's left to do now is to add the silicone to the caps to hold them.

I was worried that I'd find that there were unknown issues deeper into the amp, things that'd take someone with electrical engineering knowledge to fix. So I'm very happy it all just worked. This amp cost $120 on eBay last year (delivered, it was sold as working, which is clearly didn't), and then I spent a bit on caps, but a good result to have it working. the caps I didn't use will fit my ZX250's if they ever need rail cap replacement.

This amp will be going in a friends car next week, provided he sells his two Alpine V12 amps to gather the funds. He's reliving being 18 again and installing a system into his daily driver. I'm going to look for a black ZX450 or ZX450v2 for me, as that was the amp I wanted at 18 (I never even let the idea of ZPA's enter my mind).

Thanks everyone for the help, I'll update the thread with a few more pictures so there's more information for anyone else who may stumble along with missing rail caps in a ZX-Ti amp.

[LowandLoud]

Great job man

LL

[trickyricky]

That was my thinking too. Stock they were 2200 I think, so possibly there is a 2200 105C cap. I'm happy that PG used 85C caps and they rarely go bad (from what I've read, although on my amp they went missing). If I was more savvy with electrical components, I'd look into it more, however I'm from a mechanical background and don't understand circuit design beyond what you learn in high school.

If I can't get the caps flush, they will likely touch components on the crossover board. It'll be close. It will rely on the components not being directly above the capacitors. I'm going to mock it up tonight and see.

Thanks

The caps that fail are the "HF" series, the ones missing in your amplifier where the RAIL caps (those don't happen to be "HF") that's why they didn't leak...just missing.

Now the Sapphire does use the "HF" in both the filter section and the rail, so those have to be replaced. Most PG amps only used the "HF" caps in the filter section (right next to the transformer/power supply), hence the fact that's why those are the only ones to get replaced, the Rail caps (as long as they are not "HF" they more than likely are fine/okay).


I like to use a tip cleaner to clean the via holes once I removed the capacitors. This removes any corrosion left behind from the electrolytic that was spilled or small solder and it makes it much easier when inserting the new caps.