What kind of capacitors do you use?

[drh4683]

I've seen many photos of peoples recap jobs on radios + TV's and I see the same caps being used by most guys. I'm not sure what brand or type they are but I'd be interested in using them.

The one's Im talking about are yellow in color, axial caps. Look like polyester or polypropelyne type caps. I THINK they might be made by mallory, but I could be wrong. Where do you guys buy these? Are they pretty good quality and where are they made?

I've always used sprague orange drops, but sometimes they are too large to fit into tight spaces, and the fact that the leads come out the bottom of those can make them difficult to install neatly where a once axial type cap was. Just looking for some good quality alternatives to the orange drop.

[jpdylon]

mallory and illinois film caps are great things. mouser has tons of mallory films. AES too.

[radiotvnut]

I've gotten mine from AES, Radiodaze, and Justradios. They seem to be excellent quality and I've never had a problem with one.

[zenithfan1]

I get most of mine from Justradios, they have a good selection, cheap prices and fast shipping. I'm not sure where they are made but most likely not the USA. Very high quality and no problems thus far.

[waltchan]

Are Jamicon capacitors any good? Everytime I ship a power supply supply to rebuild through Studio Sound Electronics, #1 source of VCR parts (www.studiosoundelectronics.com), the owner always give me high-temp Jemicon caps in my Panasonic switch-mode power supplies.

[karmaman]

Jamicon?

Jamicon is not very good.

[Findm-Keepm]

For film caps, I use Mallory "PVC" series caps or Orange Drops. I also have a bunch of Samsung, CDE (Cornell Dubilier) and ICC (Illinois) caps and don't hesitate one bit when using them. CDE's are usually the physically largest of the bunch. The Mallory PVC series are hard to find nowadays - I purchased about 3200 of them in 600V and 1600V ratings, so my stash is deep....

E-lytics? I try to go with new USA made stuff, as I've had some terrible experience with Taiwan and Hong Kong made/supplied stuff. Sprague 39D series are getting harder to find, and not all Sprague Atom caps are USA made. Vishay has had the brand for some time, and has farmed out some of the manufacturing to the Asians. Quality axial caps with low(proper) ESR ratings are the hardest to find. Just one day with my ESR meter back in 1998 and I was hooked on ESR being the number one quality indicator for caps. I was big into computer monitor repair, and aside from the occasional flyback induced troubles, caps were the number one replacement items. Found seven bad caps in an hour in one monitor - a curbside find that got retired just last year.

Merry Christmas, y'all,

[waltchan]

Originally Posted by karmaman

Jamicon?

Jamicon is not very good.

Even though your opinions with Jamicon capacitors are not very good, I am hoping they are not the very worst out there, right? I already spent almost $200 to get the power supplies rebuilt by using high-temp Jamicons. Unless Jamicon is the very worst out there, that would be bad, and I would be sad. Please verify, so I don't need to spend extra money over again?

[Findm-Keepm]

I just checked - Mallory PVC series was purchased by CDE and are now availble at Mouser - common values only.

Cheers,

[drh4683]

I'm impressed with the Illinois caps so far. Seems like finding a good distributor is rather difficult. I like mouser as I can pick anything off the catalog including the odd values, but they don't carry IC products. I visited the IC website and see they make all the odd value caps, but those who disturbute their product only list the common values. Anyone know of another place like mouser who happens to carry IC?

I've been buying from mouser for almost 10 years, so I really don't know of the other ones out their, even after a google search for some other places I'm coming up short. The IC website will show you a list of distributors by state, but nothing that helps me.

Thanks for your input

[gravitar]

I use the kind of capacitors that I find in old TV and monitor chassis that I save

[Eric H]

I use the yellow ones also, I get them from Justradios but I think they are the same as the AES caps.

They are easier to work with than Orange Drops and cheaper, i've never had a problem with them and in any case I would think any modern cap would be 10 times better than the paper/wax junk that was OEM!

One bad thing with the Yellow caps is they will melt if you hit them with the soldering iron.

[karmaman]

waltchan, you're good man. They're not the best but in a power supply (not too heavy load) they will be just fine, especially if they are high-temp ones.

[andy]

000

[drh4683]

Justradios has a good selection, including all the unique odd values. I'm curious as to where he buys them, as I can't find a thing elsewhere. Seems like justradios gets the caps from some distributor, and made his own website to simplify everything for the antique radio guy as far as finding parts in one place goes. When finding parts, I like to bypass the middleman if at all possible to find these parts directly from the source. I still can't figure out who actually makes the caps sold by justradios.
Im kind of crazy when it comes to researching for parts and materials. I like to know every little technical detail before I make a final decision.