DC4 and possible fuse blown

reef-freaky

reef-freaky

Premium Member
I have one of the standard DC4s (non-heavy duty) and I am thinking the internal fuse has blown. I have picked these up before at radio shack but I have lost what type to pickup.

Can you tell me what type of fuse I need to get?

Steve
 
I blew one last week as well. They don't sell them at RadioShack, at least not in NH. The best I could find in that tiny size was a 5 Amp. Home Depot also doesn't carry them. Nor does Walmart. Any suggestions on where else I might look for these (or a place to order them online)?

Clp: Ever give any thought to including a couple of spares with the DC4? It's kind of a royal PITA to have one blow and then have to hunt high and low for something that's near impossible to find and likely costs less than a quarter.
 
You are right. I just discovered that Radio shack doesn't have them either. I found a store that carries them however they were out (Frys' Electronics), I will have to go to another. Littelfuse is the manufacturer in case you want to search for some.

Steve
 
Excellent, they have the 5x20 mm 10Amp... out of curiosity, what size fuses go in the DC4HD? Just ordered a couple of those and I will surely have the same trouble tracking those bad boys down. May as well order them all at once from Action Electronics.
 
the DC4HD takes the same 5x20 mm fuse but uses the 15 AMP version!! i would suggest you buy a few of them i popped fuses all the time until i fixed the problem.
 
KLBJR,
Hopefully you are still monitoring this thread...

Can you tell me what was causing you to blow fuses? I am having the same problem. I ordered 15 from Curt and I am on my last one.

Thanks,
Ken
 
BLOWN FUSES

BLOWN FUSES

ok i will tell you how i fixed my DC4HD's. i don't want to step on any toes here so this is JMO! i was changing fuses every one to two weeks i have four DC4HD's and all were blowing fuses at the same rate even if it had only 5 or 6 amps on it! IMO their is a heat issue with the DC4's the fuse holder is next to a step down transformer which i think is causing the problem so i took it upon myself to change the fuse holder around. so what i did was to desolder the fuse holder from the board and soldered two wires were the fuse holder was and put a panel mounted fuse holder on the front of the DC4HD which also makes it very easy to change fuses by the way! now i have all four of my DC4HD's fixed this way and have not blown a fuse in over 6 months still use the same fuses just a deferent fuse holder. of coarse this will void your warranty but i was willing to take the chance! now they all work great even with a heavy amp draw. you need to be pretty good with a solder gun to do this fix!!! hope this helps you out it worked great for me and a few others.


:D :D :D
 
I agree with KLBJR -- I think it's a heat issue. I was blowing fuses constantly on both DC4s and DC4HDs even drawing no where close to the amp limit. The fuses did not really seem to blow in the usual way, but rather seemed to melt near the metal ends -- there were always little balls of solder-like material around the ends. I even sent a couple of the units to Curt for him to look at and he couldn't find anything wrong.

I ended up drilling a bunch of holes in the outer casing on all of the units. Also, I have all of my units mounted to the wall, which I think was acting as an insulator and not dissipating heat. I ended up cutting a bunch of 1/2 "spacers" from some 1/4 PVC, and mounted the units to the wall with the spacers between so there is an air gap between the units and the wall. I have not blown a single fuse in any of the units since I did this -- even using the exact same equipment that had been causing the fuses to repeatedly blow.

-Todd
 
The root cause of the problem with some of the early DC4HD was fuse holders that were not up to spec. The metal in the fuse holder would fatigue over time, and not press against the fuse hard enough. As the resistance increases, there is quite a bit of heating when the current is high. This high resistance and heating can cause the fuse to blow at lower than rated current (our testing showed 12-14 Amps). Given the problems with this fuse holder we no longer use it. The current fuse holder in the DC4HD or DC8 does not suffer from metal fatigue.
As an aside must equipment plugged into the direct connect boxes consume more current than expected. There are two main reasons for this:
- The manufacturers of lighting systems, pumps, etc. underrate the power/current consumption.
- The power factor of some equipment is not very good. Power factors less than 1.0 result in more current (A) then expected. For example the icecap 440/660 ballasts have power factors of .6. If 440 watts of light were used, then the expect current would be 440/120/.85 (efficiency) = 4.31 Amps. However, since the power factor is .6 the actual current through the cord is 7.2 Amps.

Curt
 
Well, thanks for the replies everyone.

I have a Tunze Stream and (2) 250W MH's hooked to the DC4. I have a clamp on Amp meter that I was going to use to check how much current flowed when the halides fired. Unfortunately, unplugging the DC4, me inserting the patch cable and plugging the DC4 back in caused the fuse to blow. It is early in the morning and the halides were not on so I can't imagine there was much current at all as the only other device was the Tunze. This was my last fuse. So now I am really screwed. Guess I could always stick a penny in the fuse holder.... :eek1:

Curt - How would you know if I got one of the defective fuse holders? Is this covered under warranty or anything? Like I said I just blew the last of 15 fuses I ordered from you. It's a real drag to come home and find 2/3 of your lighting and 1/3 of the flow gone... Sorry if this sounds like a rant but I'm a little disgusted right now.

Ken
 
Is there a way to tell by visual inspection which fuse holders are known to cause trouble? I am hoping since I have a M59 ballast (400W) and a Dart pump on one DC4 and I have not had a fuse blow that I have one of the good ones.
 
The new fuse holders are just metal clips that mount directly on the circuit board and are about .345" tall. The old fuse holder has its own yellow circuit board stands .515" tall. The old fuse holder will work fine on a DC4; it only may be an issue on the DC4HD.

Curt
 
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