Author Topic: 40,000 uf without electrolyt?!  (Read 3075 times)

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Offline FriedMuleTopic starter

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40,000 uf without electrolyt?!
« on: March 12, 2018, 08:52:40 pm »
I have read an article about avoiding electrolyte condensators, but still have 40,000 uF.
I have tried to simulate it, but I can't get any results, I understand.
Will anyone please try to explain if it does work and maybe shot about how?

http://s-audio.systems/diy/psu-without-electrolytic-eng
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Online T3sl4co1l

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Re: 40,000 uf without electrolyt?!
« Reply #1 on: March 12, 2018, 09:03:18 pm »
Gotta love audiophools, always willing to break something that's never been in need of fixing.

The statement: "a low and stable impedance 0,1…0,2Ohm (equivalent to cap 40000u) in the band to megahertz" is meaningless (parsing the broken English as well as I can).  A "stable" impedance, over any frequency range, is a resistance, not a capacitance.  By definition (Kramers-Kronig relations).

A typical 1000uF 25V electrolytic, for SMPS service, has maybe 50-100mohm ESR, beating this figure.  An SMT part will have reasonably low ESL, beating the frequency range as well (say to 10s of MHz).  And by "typical" I mean middling to cheap Chinese, say Capxon or Teapo brand.

Do audiophools really buy electrolytic capacitors that are so bad, you need 40mF worth of them to get to a commodity-range ESR?  I know they swoon over their wank brands like "Pureism", "Black Gate", "Silmic" and so on, but it's not hard to figure these things out.  Well, if they went on measurement rather than belief, it wouldn't be hard...

Tim
« Last Edit: March 12, 2018, 09:10:22 pm by T3sl4co1l »
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Offline The Soulman

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Re: 40,000 uf without electrolyt?!
« Reply #2 on: March 12, 2018, 09:03:33 pm »
Not sure what your question is here, but that site appears to be 95% nonsense.
Yes electrolytic capacitors can degrade audio quality but only if used in the signal path (as dc blocking) without a healthy
bias voltage.
In a power supply they are no problem and for a power amplifier, the more the better.
 

Offline FriedMuleTopic starter

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Re: 40,000 uf without electrolyt?!
« Reply #3 on: March 12, 2018, 09:13:44 pm »
LOL yes snake oil and cryogenic frozen chicken wings in your lamps.-)
My question is because EEV have talked about there instability and when I saw that article, I thought, hmm is that real?

It is just to avoid the electrolytes' in a normal psu:-)
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Offline Buriedcode

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Re: 40,000 uf without electrolyt?!
« Reply #4 on: March 12, 2018, 09:47:28 pm »
LOL yes snake oil and cryogenic frozen chicken wings in your lamps.-)
My question is because EEV have talked about there instability and when I saw that article, I thought, hmm is that real?

It is just to avoid the electrolytes' in a normal psu:-)

Whats is a "normal" PSU? 
 

Offline Brumby

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Re: 40,000 uf without electrolyt?!
« Reply #5 on: March 12, 2018, 09:58:32 pm »
I'd start with a transformer, diode rectifier (pick a flavour) and some filter caps.  Add a regulation circuit if you wish.
 

Offline FriedMuleTopic starter

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Re: 40,000 uf without electrolyt?!
« Reply #6 on: March 12, 2018, 10:50:51 pm »
For a beginner, all psu's are standard:-)
What I mean is that it was just a good start project and maybe it can later be used to burn down one of my later failures lol:-)

But do any body know what it is?
It delivers a fine sinus curve and that's about it, is it a "dirty electricity" filter?
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Offline Zero999

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Re: 40,000 uf without electrolyt?!
« Reply #7 on: March 12, 2018, 10:57:54 pm »
Not sure what your question is here, but that site appears to be 95% nonsense.
Yes electrolytic capacitors can degrade audio quality but only if used in the signal path (as dc blocking) without a healthy
bias voltage.
In a power supply they are no problem and for a power amplifier, the more the better.
Yes, additionally for DC blocking, the AC signal voltage across the capacitor should be very low anyway, so there should be little potential for any distortion. The circuit would have to be very poorly designed for an electrolytic capacitor that size to create distortion.
 

Offline TrickyNekro

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Re: 40,000 uf without electrolyt?!
« Reply #8 on: March 13, 2018, 02:47:22 am »
Yes electrolytic capacitors can degrade audio quality but only if used in the signal path (as dc blocking) without a healthy
bias voltage.

Well isn´t that why you place them back-back?  :P
There are also non polarized electrolytics which are designed for audio and do exactly that :P
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Offline TheUnnamedNewbie

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Re: 40,000 uf without electrolyt?!
« Reply #9 on: March 13, 2018, 07:55:22 am »
Gotta love audiophools, always willing to break something that's never been in need of fixing.

The statement: "a low and stable impedance 0,1…0,2Ohm (equivalent to cap 40000u) in the band to megahertz" is meaningless (parsing the broken English as well as I can).  A "stable" impedance, over any frequency range, is a resistance, not a capacitance.  By definition (Kramers-Kronig relations).

A typical 1000uF 25V electrolytic, for SMPS service, has maybe 50-100mohm ESR, beating this figure.  An SMT part will have reasonably low ESL, beating the frequency range as well (say to 10s of MHz).  And by "typical" I mean middling to cheap Chinese, say Capxon or Teapo brand.

Do audiophools really buy electrolytic capacitors that are so bad, you need 40mF worth of them to get to a commodity-range ESR?  I know they swoon over their wank brands like "Pureism", "Black Gate", "Silmic" and so on, but it's not hard to figure these things out.  Well, if they went on measurement rather than belief, it wouldn't be hard...

Tim

You say that because you can't hear the difference!

Jokes aside, more capacitance is not always better, but you need to understand some control theory for that. There is a reason why big linear bench supplies from the name brands don't have 40 mF on their output... Some won't even get in the few uF. They use feedback to regulate and don't need passive filters (which is what the electrolytics essentially are). The main advantage those passive filters can have is with regards to noise - feedback networks will still add noise, which capacitors filter out. But well, something about preaching and choirs.

The schematic shown here just uses some feedback to get rid of capacitors. It doesn't "still have 40 000 uF". I guess it might behave similarly at low frequencies to a bridge rectifier with 40 000 uF attached to it?

The best part about magic is when it stops being magic and becomes science instead

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Offline FriedMuleTopic starter

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Re: 40,000 uf without electrolyt?!
« Reply #10 on: March 13, 2018, 08:25:36 am »
I am wary happy for your reply!
Since I am new to all this, two of your answers do confuse me. :-)

Back to OP's question, that's a parallel capacitance multiplier with 40kuF "equivalent" capacitance. It's not 100% BS, but I don't buy that either.

The schematic shown here just uses some feedback to get rid of capacitors. It doesn't "still have 40 000 uF". I guess it might behave similarly at low frequencies to a bridge rectifier with 40 000 uF attached to it?

Could it be funny to get EEV to answer this question?
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Online 2N3055

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Re: 40,000 uf without electrolyt?!
« Reply #11 on: March 13, 2018, 08:33:37 am »
Those two transistors right of the regulator are connected in such way that they will saturate, and vt2 and vt3 will start pulling all current the regulators are able to give, forcing them into current limit.

The circuit doesn't even work, not to mention that circuit has no resemblance to what they are trying to explain as operating principle... There is no capacitance multiplier here, just shunting of output to ground...

This looks like audiphool tried to create "A class power supply" ....

He could just put shunt resistor on output.. LM317 inductive impedance varies with load, and some load on output is good , but if you load it with at least 50 mA ( with a simple resistor ) it's at minimum and stable throughout rest of range...

Also for  LM317 output , capacitors in 0.1uF to 20uF with very low ESR are BAD choice. They create high Q resonances that increase noise in audio range.. Recommended for lowest noise is at least 1uF on ADJ pin (4.7uF being good choice) and at least 50uF on output (100 uF plain vanilla electrolytic, and not the extra low ESR types)

LM317 is an old design. There are many better ones now to chose from.

If you want something better search for "Low-Noise Power For Analog Circuits - Walt Jung"
It is a proper low noise design and not some "wo-wo"..

Regards,

Sinisa
 

Online T3sl4co1l

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Re: 40,000 uf without electrolyt?!
« Reply #12 on: March 13, 2018, 08:50:10 am »
You say that because you can't hear the difference!

For some strange reason, I have this problem where, the more I pay for something, the more critical I am of it, and I can't open up and embrace the breadth and warmth of the soundstage, and...

...Or I just have tin ears. ;D

Tim
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Offline dmills

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Re: 40,000 uf without electrolyt?!
« Reply #13 on: March 13, 2018, 11:32:55 am »
Those two transistors right of the regulator are connected in such way that they will saturate, and vt2 and vt3 will start pulling all current the regulators are able to give, forcing them into current limit.
I am not seeing it, now I am not saying it is not a silly circuit, but I am not seeing a shorted output here, just a shunt reg working to maintain a constant voltage across R2 (And hence constant load on the LM317), VT1 is PNP!

Regards, Dan.
 

Online 2N3055

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Re: 40,000 uf without electrolyt?!
« Reply #14 on: March 13, 2018, 12:04:14 pm »
Those two transistors right of the regulator are connected in such way that they will saturate, and vt2 and vt3 will start pulling all current the regulators are able to give, forcing them into current limit.
I am not seeing it, now I am not saying it is not a silly circuit, but I am not seeing a shorted output here, just a shunt reg working to maintain a constant voltage across R2 (And hence constant load on the LM317), VT1 is PNP!

Regards, Dan.


Hmm you are correct... My bad. Not enough coffee this morning...
I know it's PNP, but I didn't think how it would behave with R2 value of 10 Ohms...

And it will keep LM317 load at exactly same current all the time, at least until your PSU load exceeds shunt current... And that would definitely affect output impedance... It would be interesting to see how it behaves across frequency range...
 Regards,

Sinisa

 

Offline FriedMuleTopic starter

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Re: 40,000 uf without electrolyt?!
« Reply #15 on: March 13, 2018, 03:33:06 pm »
Thanks for a great help!!

As totally new, it is impossible to sort snake oil from reality!
I will defiantly look at "Low-Noise Power For Analog Circuits - Walt Jung"

As I understand it, this circuit I posted is at best, a good idea but bad made and properly without the intended result?
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Offline David Hess

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Re: 40,000 uf without electrolyt?!
« Reply #16 on: March 13, 2018, 08:15:59 pm »
http://s-audio.systems/diy/psu-without-electrolytic-eng

They did all that work to fix something which was not broken and then kept the complementary 317/337 design with a split secondary transformer when a pair of 317s could have been used yielding more symmetrical performance.

Some regulators do away with the bulk output capacitors and instead use a dampening network for performance reasons like fast response, fast current limiting, limited output energy, and perhaps high reliability but that was not done in this case.  Their effort would be better spent on removing ground loops and improving the power supply rejection, decoupling, and bypassing in the audio amplifier itself.
 
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