Taking apart a PSU

[CrazeD]

You can discharge the capacitors with a screwdriver and a piece of copper wire.

Get a screwdriver that has a rubber handle (and/or wear thick rubber gloves) and then wrap a piece of stripped copper wire tightly around the metal part of the screwdriver. Put the other end of the copper wire into the ground hole of an electrical outlet.

Then, simply touch the screwdriver to any of the capacitors in the power supply.

NOTE: I have never tried this before and I don't know how well it works. I read about it in a guide to modding monitors, that's how they discharged the color tube.

If you don't want the hassle of that, just make sure you don't touch the heatsink or any of the large capacitors inside the PSU. I've taken a crapload apart to change fans or to remove the fans and use them for something else.

 

[Apokalipse]

However, some power supplies have the fan soldered on so you might be out of luck from the beginning.

voltmeters do have significant resistance, so they'll work fine.

 

[AMD 3200+ 64]

hahahaha holy cow i didnt no you could die from opening a power supply.

i changed my ps fan long time ago when i was like 13 to a blue led fan and the connectors didnt work so i ran the fan cable in with the other wires so it came out like a normal wire and i hooked it up. hmmm but i was never shocked or anything modding/changing fans on my power supply and i used to touch the big silver things lots i guess that was a bad idea

and i guess the guy at my local pc store didnt no what he was talkin about he said it would be fine to open it up and change fans with no worries... ****...

 

[bmxfreakrider]

hey amd...are we twins? lol same thing here, pc guy says "ohh ull be fine, i do it all the time" luckily enough i never touched anything. every psu ive gotten in the past ive done a fan ugrade on it, **** even taken the whole board out and removed some of the wires, and even got a psu that has a custom toggle switch and some home made removeable cable connectors made from connectors from our old car stereo and some speaker wire.

 

[m6qrp]

if you really want to take it a part, i suggest u unplug it from the wall and leave it for one or two week. by that time it should loose its charge and be safe. ive tried it before but be sure to leave it unpluged or it might fry you.

 

[Ethereal_Dragon]

very impressive, but did you really need to take it apart to do that? Couldnt you have just cut the wires that were already comming out of the psu and attached the connectors there? or were you going for neatness?

I was going for neatness... I hacked off all the wires right where they are connected to the board in the PSU, just to eliminate unnecessary wires. I left a short piece of a ground wire, and the green wire to the Mobo, and connected them together, so that the power supply is "always on" without having to manually connect them every time. You CAN leave the wires long, I just preferred not to, so that they wouldn't get all tangled or anything. This PSU will NEVER see the light of day in a PC again, because it is a cheap bargain-basement that came with a case.

 

[ShackledPhoenix]

First off I wanna note to people, leaving it unplugged for such and such amount of time IS NOT A SAFE WAY TO DISCHARGE IT. Many capacitors can hold their charge for a month or even more.

The best way to discharge it is with proper tools for the job.

And "I've done it plenty of times" is not proof someone knows what they're talking about. It just means they're not unlucky enough to have had a bad experience.

The actual chance of death or even serious injury isn't really all that likely but it IS possible. It can, has and will happen. Hence the warnings. Changing the fan though is a fairly simple job in most powersupplies that doesn't take you close to any dangerous components. Note, I said MOST powersupplies. If you do it, get the proper tools, study it, and be careful.

 

[mlr]

man i wish id seen this post before i did the psu mod last week,i was playing about inside there like it was a bucket of sand touching everything cutting wires with scissors not a care in the world makes me shiver now lol

 

[galic]

All you have to do to discharge a cap. is this. Get a screwdriver and short-out the caps. (the big ones), its it. Also, a good power supply usually have discharge resistors that will discharge all caps., after few minutes. You can check the voltage across the caps. terminals with a VOM. if you read any voltage use the screwdriver.

PS: You can only get kill if your body is in series with the cap. terminals, there is, if you put your finger (only one) across the terminals, you will get shock but won't kill you.


Forty years hunting Elephants and still don't know what Elephants eburnation means.

 

[Mr. Switch]

what?