Consider the Kendeil's as well. I've read good things about them. Don't let the fact that they are affordable fool you. It is one of the favourites if not favourite among the Naim "refurbishers" and I've read somewhere that even Naim themselves use them. But that is ofcourse just a rumour.
Modifying audio equipment: recommended components
I'm a big fan of their smaller silver post when paired with the silver spade. Expensive, though IMO still a scorching deal relative to other product on the site.
Edit: looks like CMC makes a silver-over-copper post too at roughly half the AN price.
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I'd think it's wise to choose capacitors by their estimated lifetime, rather than the metal their leads consist of
To me it's disappointing that the various Elna or Nichicon for audio are all specified for 85°C max and with a 1000 or 2000 hours endurance.
The Rubycon ZL sound quite good as power supply caps, anyway. And they last long. It think they sound better than the Panasonic FC or FM.
At any rate, wherever possible I prefer to bypass the electrolytic with a small Wima, polyester or polypropylene - just not too small, or it's useless.
Non-polarized?
Hi,
What are most of you guys preferring on non-polars for passive crossovers? Ideally, I don't want something prohibitively expensive, as I may grab a bunch of different values to have on hand for testing. I've also got a DigiKey order in the build stage, so if there's a good one they stock, that would be easy, but I can make a second order if not.
Much Thanks!
Hi,
What are most of you guys preferring on non-polars for passive crossovers? Ideally, I don't want something prohibitively expensive, as I may grab a bunch of different values to have on hand for testing. I've also got a DigiKey order in the build stage, so if there's a good one they stock, that would be easy, but I can make a second order if not.
Much Thanks!
thanks for Kendeil, I wish I could find all the caps in one place like on ebay...
there is one thing left that confuses me a bit
It's clear with Nichicon and Elna caps' polarity from the PDF info on Partsconnexion, but as to those blue Philips in my Rеstеk, do they have the same polarity as Elnas - side with "-" is actually + ? Couldn't find anywhere in the net, just a few records on this forum, that they have some tricky polarity
Could anyone advice pls?
as to the others black noName caps, the same technique as with Elna, Nichicon??
there is one thing left that confuses me a bit
It's clear with Nichicon and Elna caps' polarity from the PDF info on Partsconnexion, but as to those blue Philips in my Rеstеk, do they have the same polarity as Elnas - side with "-" is actually + ? Couldn't find anywhere in the net, just a few records on this forum, that they have some tricky polarity
Could anyone advice pls?
as to the others black noName caps, the same technique as with Elna, Nichicon??
How does tan d relate to quality? I'd assumed the lower the better, like DA and DF for film caps; higher voltage small caps have lower tan d and the "audio" caps seem to generally have a lower tan d than others, but not consistently.
Also note that Black Gates never had objective specifications like tan d and leakage, derating factors, etc. But even many audio manufacturers took them seriously enough to use in their better equipment.
I'm not clear on what the distortion mechanisms in small caps are, only that the graphite loaded electrolyte in Black Gates seemed to make some sense and there's no equivalent on the market (you'd think someone would be making a knockoff, but I haven't even heard rumors of Black Gate fakes). Electrolytics are hard to figure out from an objective viewpoint, other than we can't get away from having to use them even if just for power decoupling.
Also note that Black Gates never had objective specifications like tan d and leakage, derating factors, etc. But even many audio manufacturers took them seriously enough to use in their better equipment.
I'm not clear on what the distortion mechanisms in small caps are, only that the graphite loaded electrolyte in Black Gates seemed to make some sense and there's no equivalent on the market (you'd think someone would be making a knockoff, but I haven't even heard rumors of Black Gate fakes). Electrolytics are hard to figure out from an objective viewpoint, other than we can't get away from having to use them even if just for power decoupling.
Certainly not a rumour. All the Naim pieces i've owned used them. Excellent caps.
Attachments
This is not true.
Pannasonic FM features Copper leads, which all caps do.
A lot of them even OFC copper.
Btw. the panasonic FM is the electrolytic cap with the lowest ESR anyway.
You cannot fit steel to aluminium without a complex proces, så you´ll never find steel in places like that.
The coil is aluminium, and in larger cans the terminals are also aluminium.
I´ve been cutting leads on a lot of Electrolytic and other caps, and so far, I´ve never seen as much as just a shadow of steel. Why would anyone do that?
Also Panasonic FC features tinned copper. Steel is very hard, and you will not have any doubts if it is steel you are cutting.
And why would anyone ruin the capacitors ESR data and in addition spend more money with steel leads?
Also Panasonic FC features tinned copper. Steel is very hard, and you will not have any doubts if it is steel you are cutting.
And why would anyone ruin the capacitors ESR data and in addition spend more money with steel leads?
I'm not an expert. But steel is nothing but an alloy with mostly iron. There are many grades of steel and not all are very hard.
Lower costs come to mind. Ease of manufacture comes to mind.
I believe in industry terms they would call that copper clad steel or tinned copper clad steel. I.e. magnetic as my magnet indicates.
Tin is not a magnetic material. And neither is copper.
Take for example the Orange Drop 715p it has tinned copper clad steel (As is very likely the case with Panasonic FC) (And FM probably has tinned copper clad steel as well because FM is cheaper than FC) Whereas the higher priced and higher performance (compared to the 715p) 716p features tinned copper.
Compromise I guess. Ease of manufacture and therefore lower costs taking precedent over (even higher) performance.... leads to greater shareholder value, which is seemingly what business is all about. But I'm convinced that it would be cheaper to use the so called tinned copper clad steel...commonly called steel leads.
