Sonic Impact 5066 Amplifier Upgrade - Page 6 of 10
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The next step is to gently remove the ribbon cable from the suspect potentiometer of unknown origin (i.e. unknown quality). Here's a shot of the underside of the top half of the amp's clamshell case showing the potentiometer. |
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I can see that the potentiometer is attached to the case via two screws but I could not figure out how to get the knob off the pot from the outside front of the case. The knob had to come off to get to the heads of these two screws. My guess is that the knob is glued to the pot's shaft. Oh well, I'm not going to use this pot after all. |
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In this photo I've removed the PCB from the bottom of the amp's clamshell case. I have also already removed two more globs of glue that covered the pads on the PCB where the wires for the power and speaker input/output wires are soldered. |
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Here's a shot of the actual amplifier PCB once I de-soldered the wires from the case. The ruler gives you an idea of just how tiny this amp really is. |
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This is the empty bottom half of the case. The next step is to de-solder the two orange capacitors that span each speaker output's spring terminals. |
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Here's a photo of the two capacitors. They read:
0.15 K. 63 According to the Tripath TA2024 datasheet (pgs 5 & 6), these are supposed to be differential output capacitors. They are supposed to provide differential noise decoupling for reduction of conducted emissions. They should be located near the chassis exit points for maximum effectiveness. Tripath recommends a value of 0.01 μF for these capacitors. |
All of the de-soldering work done up to this point had been done with my trusty Sears Craftsman 45 watt soldering gun (Model #54402) with 1/8" conical tip. This iron is non-adjustable and can develop tip temperatures of 950 F. It's great for soldering big wires (required for cables and antennas in my shortwave radio and scanner hobby) but is just too big and too hot for de-soldering the wires from the PCB (especially near the SMT components).