Are these tantalum and silver capacitors?

Gold Refining Forum

Help Support Gold Refining Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.

pimpneightez

Well-known member
Joined
Jun 19, 2011
Messages
230
I tried to pluck one off and the glass broke showing what looks like a silver contact point and a small square of tantalum. Am I correct?
 

Attachments

  • 8701_10151463353694149_400955760_n.jpg
    8701_10151463353694149_400955760_n.jpg
    26.7 KB
If you suspect silver, a drop of nitric, wait for a few seconds and some salt or HCL will tell you if you are right if a cloud of silver chloride is formed.
There are more elaborate tests too, but this is a quick answer just to see if there are anything at all.

It isn't a capacitor, that's for sure. Personally I think that the name GTA3 with the look of it reminds me of a diode or a sparc gap over voltage protection.

Göran
 
pimpneightez said:
I tried to pluck one off and the glass broke showing what looks like a silver contact point and a small square of tantalum. Am I correct?


Ok I think I figured out what they are, and they are not capacitors. I'm assuming the GTA(x) designations on the board might stand for for Gas Transient Arrestor? Anyway they're basically a spark gap to limit damage if lightening hits a line it's connected to. Something similar in design to these examples I found on Ebay in one of my Google searches:

http://www.ebay.com/itm/380360345919

macfixer01
 
It came off a board from an old AED machine so it seems legit. any known PM's in it? Kinda looks like a silver contactor.
 
Did you test it with a drop of nitric?
I don't think there are any silver in this component, but there are so many different makers and models there is always the exception.
Test it and report back your finds.

There could be some plating on the spark gap surfaces to keep them clean.

Göran
 
No not silver, But there is a small piece of silver soldered on the bottom. Smaller than any contact point I ever got. Don't even know if it would be worth it to save any of these. You can almost see the little square of silver in the picture.
 

Latest posts

Back
Top