Wat happens to a capacitor if I expose it to excessive voltage

Yes ! ;-)

Graham

Too much voltage, too much leakage current, way to much power in a small package, and WATT happens! Too many Watts. Epoxy coated tantalums probably pop most violently. Metal can types usually have pressure release valves and built-in fuses - not much fun. However, enough Watts will blow up anything. I work on equipment that runs on 480 VAC at currents up to 2000 amperes. Yep- a Megawatt....

Paul

:-)

As some some people noticed: Electronic parts work on smoke. If the smoke escapes, they cease to function...

"Ignoramus31848" schreef in bericht news:lUexf.6$ snipped-for-privacy@fe51.usenetserver.com...

In the good old days they often exploded. Nowadays most of them just give a hiss, bit of smoke and smell perhaps, and that's it. Bit of shame, really. TO-220 parts and many other semiconductors still have that exploding behaviour, at least occasionally, when asked for.

But why don't you try?

B A N G !

Frank Bemelman ( snipped-for-privacy@xs4all.invalid.nl) wrote at Wednesday 11. January 2006 23:18 in sci.electronics.design:

I once had a reverse tantalum cap create a tiny hole and spit some its contents between two pins (reset-in and gnd) of the reset circuit. It took me quite some time to find the cause of the continuous reset.

Dime size cap isnt going to be very exciting.

Try an old wax and foil tubular-- they sometimes spray the foil out like party streamers. Not good when the foil streamers go out across other components!

Often they will explode. When I was a kid I used to connect low voltage electrolytic capacitors right across the UK mains (240V) and watch the explosion.

Ian

Of course. If you really want a mess blow up a oil filled cap, say about the size of a finger.

Reversed electrolytics do have the great advantage that they sit there for a long while before erupting thereby adding to the surprise factor. Overcharging a PP3 alkaline battery has much the same effect, I was surprised to hear a machine gun going off in my work area one coffee break. It turned out the battery contained cylindrical cells about AAA size which were exploding in sequence. This created a fine shower of caustic potash and zinc granules all over the circuits on the bench which defied all normal cleaning methods. One cell remained intact when I investigated, but it decided to blow up a minute or two later in the rubbish bin.