I purchased my trusty SGC-230 Smartuner around 8 years ago as a faulty unit and soon got it back up and running with a new binary counter IC. It’s worked great since then but has always had a cracked ceramic post on the output terminal. It was one of the jobs I wanted to do but I never got around to finding a new post so when I had time to replace it, I never had the part handy.
A few months ago I remembered to send SGC and email about the replacement part and they were kind enough to let me know the part number. Unfortunately, they had a $25 minimum parts order so they suggested I may be able to find a better deal online. I tried to order it via an SGC dealer here in the UK who were happy to ad the part to their next order but it never arrived despite me asking 3 times! After all that effort I gave up and forgot about the replacement post again until I got an email from Ebay of suggested auctions and there, on me screen, was a pair of exact replacements for the SGC-230 output post! I placed my bid of £1.09 and a few days later they fell through my door. My 230 was about to get the care and attention it needed!
The existing terminal looked fine from the exterior…
But on the inside, it didn’t look so great…
I remove the post…
Here you can see the old broken post next to the replacement…
I used a little silicon adhesive to seal the hole…
And replaced the post…
Job done, well, it would be if I didn’t notice another problem slowly developing. The SGC-230 does not have fully sealed relays and can suffer from corrosion on the relay contacts if moisture manages to get into the enclosure. Mine seems to be suffering from this.
So, on to the next job. Expect an SGC-230 relay upgrade/replacement post soon!
