Power Inverter with slow startup

I have an inexpensive 12vdc to 120 vac power inverter (300 watt). I use it in my car for powering my laptop computer and use it when I am camping for running a small fan, and more.....

It used to work fine, but for some weird reason it seems slow to startup these days. It has a green light (ON) and a red light which indicates it's not ready to use. That red light used to just come on for a second when I turned it on, now it takes up to a minute.

Even more weird, I plugged it into a portable 12v battery that needed to be charged, and the inverter would not start (that's normal). But when I plugged it into my car (with fully charged battery), it still would not power up. I had to turn it on and off several times. Finally it kicked in. (As if it memorized that weak battery).

Obviously the semiconductors in the inverter still work, or the inverter would not work at all. I know there is not much else in these things, but I believe there is a capacitor. (I have not opened it yet). I'm wondering if the capacitor is getting weak?

I'm not gonna stick a lot of time or money into this thing, but if it just needs a cap, I'll fix it..... Othersise I'll just buy a new inverter.

Any inverter experts out there?

Reply to
oldschool
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Not an expert,but try new capacitors, especially in the control and start up circuits.

I have a very expensive radio service monitor (was when new about 20 years ago) I bought used around 2 years ago. It got slow to start up and I took the heat gun from the SMD rework station that has about a 1/4 inch nozzle on it and played around on the capacitors and found one or two that as soon as I heated them , it would start up.

Some old computer boards would do the same thing.

Reply to
Ralph Mowery

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