Club 80-90 Forums

Hi, I read with interest an excellent earlier post showing how to replace the two capacitors that often fail on the analogue dash clocks. His clock still ticked. Mine doesn’t work, so I removed it, and put 12v straight across the terminals.  Absolutely nothing happened, and it didn’t tick. Everything looks remarkably clean, and I can see no signs of damage, shorts or likely dry joints.  Can anyone advise, as there is no ticking, if the fault could still be the capacitors please?  If so, I will change them. Thanks in advance.

I have read that the capacitor is a common fault with the analogue clock. And there is a resistor that could well need replacing as well.

Thanks Rob,  I can see one small resistor.  If the capacitors don’t fix it, I can cut out the resistor, and replace it on the back of the PCB without taking the clock to bits.

A quick update - I fitted two new 100uf 16v capacitors, and the clock started (5 Euros for 5 on amazon.fr including prime delivery in France).  I am checking it for accuracy, but so far it is spot on! So if your clock ticks but misbehaves, or if, like mine, it is totally dead, it could just be these capacitors. I found that my van has a PCB dash unit replacement kit, which was another bonus. Now to see if I can get it back together Cheers.

Well done - I did the same on my last van about 15 years ago.  That one had a second hand that when the capacitors failed the hand seemed to go one second forward then one back.  After the capacitors replaced it kept better time than the digital ones in two modern cars I had in that time. 

Glad you got it working. Well done.

Scamazon is such a rip off. Any electrical shops near you and those capacitors would have cost cents.

Thanks guys,
Where we live, out in the middle of nowhere in deepest darkest SW France, Amazon (although sometimes expensive) is an absolute life saver for us. Travelling to even a smallish town with shops costs more than many of the things we need to buy, and being France, they all open and close at different times, with staggered 2 hour lunch breaks!! On the plus side, there is no road tax, no traffic jams….in fact no traffic - it is a shock when someone comes the other way, park wherever you like, with no meters or wardens, no litter, no fly tipping, and most people don’t even lock cars or houses.
The old analogue clock is still absolutely spot on Thanks again for the help.