Signal caps to keep on hand

[mashaffer]

I want to use about $50 of Christmas money to start building a stash of caps. The idea is to have enough different useful values on hand so that I can throw a few circuits together as needed without having to go out and buy every single piece each time. In other words I am building up my parts bin.

I already have a bunch of carbon film, some salvaged carbon comp and a smattering of metal oxide and metal film resistors on hand but the caps I have are limited to a bunch of ceramics and some lowish voltage polys salvaged from SS stuff.

I am thinking in terms of poly's like orange drops but would consider other choices that you might recommend.

So what values, types would you recommend having on hand for general audio use? Also what do you think of the quality of the Xicon poly caps (I guess you could call them brown drops )? And one last question are all ceramic caps generally rated for pretty high voltages?

[Michael Koster]

"Brown drops"... LOL

If you're talking about the Xicon MPPs, I think they're excellent
caps, especially considering the price. I used them to replace
the original NFB coupling caps in a UA1016 preamp with
outstanding results.

An assortment of those would not be too costly and it would
be handy to have around. The 3 sizes they have in Mouser
at 400V would be good for voltage amp coupling, .01, .047,
and .1 uF assuming common grid leak values of 220K-1M.

1429-4103 .01/400V
1429-4473 .047/400V
1429-4104 .1/400V

Well, .01 is more of a tone control cap in most circuits...
Then if you do NFB and tone stacks you may need some
smaller values still.

All ceramic caps are not high voltage rated. The common discs
go from 50 volts on up. The HV ones are 1KV to 6KV but they
usually are marked. Maybe you can guess at the voltage rating
according to size and pF value, but that's only a guess.

Michael

[boywonder]

I recently did the same exercise, and here's what I ended up with:


100u, 220u Panasonic TSHA or TSHB's 400V/450V for PS applications.

.22u, .33u Orange drops, or Wima PP etc for coupling caps.

other assorted PP's .1u-5u film caps for dialing in B+ if implementing CLC PS designs and to use as bypass for larger electrolytics

10nf 1K-2K ceramics or PP for diode bypass when using SS rectification.

All from Mouser or Digikey. (the Wimas where available from one but not the other...IIRC)

[mashaffer]

This is what I mean by "brown drops"


tubesandmore brownies

[Michael Koster]

Originally posted by mashaffer
This is what I mean by "brown drops"


tubesandmore brownies

Those are the ones, and the sale price is better than Mouser.

Think I'll stock up myself.

Thanks,

Michael

[dsavitsk]

I did this myself years ago, and I still have gobs of them that have never seen a high voltage. I think I prefer to buy parts for projects and then never build them as a way to build up a parts bin.

What to get depends on what sort of experimenting you like to do. If you like power amps or guitar amps, then some couplers (0.1u to 1u) and PS caps are useful. For preamp, the same couplers, but also outputs in the 2.2u to 4.7u range are useful. For phono stages, very small stuff (.001u to .1u) is good to have around.

Sometimes surplus places have good deals on this stuff, sometimes not. Worth checking around, though.

http://www.goldmine-elec-products.co....asp?dept=1027

[mashaffer]

Thanks for the input guys. I need to build up a supply so the cash flow doesn't keep biting me in the back side.

[duderduderini]

Hi
for 2uF and above i have trialled several MKP's and think mundorf "M" caps (the white ones) are pretty good value and sound better as the output cap than any solen i have tried.
I can also attest to the xicon MKP's for bypass cap situations i have used .47Uf and .22uF and they sound great and are great value. Mouser has them
Good luck.

[mashaffer]

I had thought of this

http://www.tubesandmore.com/scripts/...FXP?item=C-RS1

but nothing over .1u there. Probably better to assemble my own kit huh?

mike

[Apex Jr]

Was looking for a email icon to email you.
You might want to check my website for surplus
bargains that I offer.
The normal values people look for are.
.01Uf
.022Uf
.047Uf
.068Uf
.1 Uf
I also have these in different types of caps not in quantity
and not listed on my website.

Steve @ Apex Jr.
www.apexjr.com