[sdiy] Advice?: Powering up a vintage keyboard after several years

[rsdio at audiobanshee.com]

Never use a Variac on electronics that have a voltage-regulated power supply. That includes most synths because they have linear power supplies that expect a minimum of about 3 VAC above the regulator voltage.

If you're designing electronics and want to find out where things break, a Variac is a great tool.


Testing the disconnected power supplies is a good idea. Just be sure to put a reasonable load on the power supply to make sure it doesn't fry itself.

Brian


On Oct 11, 2016, at 6:19 AM, "Barry Klein" <barryklein at cox.net> wrote:
> Well, that’s me....
> If the consensus is just plug it in I’m good but if it is check the supplies first....  memorymoogs, prophet 5, lesser synths...  I’d just leave them off – don’t need the added grief right now.
> No way am I going to tweak up the memorymoog supplies and go through calibration of them again... at least not now.
> Maybe the Variac is just a thing for tube-based things like old ham sets or guitar amps?
> I have 2 (transistor(ized) ham tranceivers and a Drake receiver that I need to try too.
>  
>  
> Barry
>  
>  
> From: Synth-diy On Behalf Of Barry Klein
> Sent: Tuesday, October 11, 2016 5:14 AM
> 
> I am going through the stuff in my garage.  I have several vintage synths – some worth quite a bit now – and they haven’t been powered in at least 5 years.
> What would you recommend – advancing on a Variac, or just plug it in?
> 
> Barry
>