Hi All,
Firstly an apology: I'm a newbie to this site and also a complete novice regarding what lies under the lid of all things electrical.
I've recently bought an old, I guess about '96 vintage, Marantz CD-63SE KI from that well known on-line auction site. Initially, this unit played just fine, but recently has started to intermittently fail to read CDs and instead just displays 'disc'. Based upon what I've read on this site and elsewhere, I suspect a knackered laser, so have bought a replacement VAM1202/12 Philips CD mechanism, the complete traverse unit. Although I've never attempted such-a job before, based upon all the good advice already available on-line, I feel confident to fit this myself.
My question is this - would an old laser be susceptible to atmospheric humidity? This CD player currently appears to work just fine when the air is dry, but fails to play on days when the atmospheric relative humidity is high. Is this just a coincidence?
Firstly an apology: I'm a newbie to this site and also a complete novice regarding what lies under the lid of all things electrical.
I've recently bought an old, I guess about '96 vintage, Marantz CD-63SE KI from that well known on-line auction site. Initially, this unit played just fine, but recently has started to intermittently fail to read CDs and instead just displays 'disc'. Based upon what I've read on this site and elsewhere, I suspect a knackered laser, so have bought a replacement VAM1202/12 Philips CD mechanism, the complete traverse unit. Although I've never attempted such-a job before, based upon all the good advice already available on-line, I feel confident to fit this myself.
My question is this - would an old laser be susceptible to atmospheric humidity? This CD player currently appears to work just fine when the air is dry, but fails to play on days when the atmospheric relative humidity is high. Is this just a coincidence?
The laser may be so weak at this point that all it takes to make it fail to read is the slight humidity. Otherwise you may be experiencing some other wacky weather related problem, but I can't imagine what. I live in Florida, about the most humid place on earth daily, and the only problem the humidity has ever presented my electronics is corrosion.
Sorry, I should have mentioned in my original post, I've cleaned the lens twice: once using IPA and a cotton bud, and separately using a lens cleaning CD.
If you think on condensation, it happens at sudden temperature change (from cold to warm). It is very unlikely in a living room, i.e. if there is no condensation on your windows and mirrors, you should not worry about it.
The only weird possible thing condensation can do is cloud the lens, not by condensing moisture but by absorption. Its something Sony mentioned in a service bulletin back in the early days of CD but the problem clears once the player is used for any length of time.
The real answer here would be to look at the signal with a scope and get an idea of levels and quality and whether it was marginal or not.
The real answer here would be to look at the signal with a scope and get an idea of levels and quality and whether it was marginal or not.
Electronics which fails on damp days can be due to some soldering flux which has been left bridging two PCB tracks. One of them will have a voltage source, and the other will have a highish impedance and so pick up some voltage when the dampness turns the flux into a high value resistor. Check the PCBs for flux bridges. Using a knife or small screwdriver, carefully scrape a little valley into any you find, so the two tracks are isolated even the flux becomes conductive.
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