Capacitors and Resistors?

[Nola]

Can you guys point me to the best place to buy capacitors and resistors? Like J quality/5% tolerance or higher. And maybe a kit that has an assortment of values. I'm doing some modifications tone/volume knobs and swapping some pickups -- just started getting into this so I'm a newb and not sure where to buy. Looking for good quality parts.

Also, what types (bumble bee, orange drop, ceramic, etc) should I be looking for? Are the orange drops really much better than ceramic? If so, why? Etc.

Thanks!

 

[miroslav]

You can buy them at a lot of places...but this is one of the places that focuses its items toward the guitar players and amp builders (there are others).

Antique Electronic Supply

AFA caps for the tone pots in the guitar...since it's a passive circuit, you can use whatever you want, it will yield the same result, but some people just like using the more esoteric, Hi-Q stuff anyway. If you were building an amp...it would be a different story.

Also keep in mind that some of these caps tend to be much larger than others, for the same values...so make sure your guitar cavity has the room. Like the Orange Drop are pretty large compared to a ceramic disc cap.
I've used a lot of silver mica caps for guitar tone purposes...they are small, and more durable than a basic ceramic disc cap.
You can also find this stuff all over eBay...once you figure out what you want and the values you need. That's where I've bought most of mine.

If you were talking electrolytic caps for active electronic stuff...I would say go to a bigger supplier that moves a lot of product, so you know you are get fresh stock, since electrolytic caps can get stale over time just sitting on a shelf. I used all high-end, long-life Panasonic caps when I recapped my console...got them at Mouser and Digikey.

 

[Nola]

Thanks, Miro! What voltage value do you recommend? Like if I want to try a .033 or .047 cap -- I've seen those between 100v and 650v. I assume the higher is a larger capacitor, so I'd probably want the smaller, but what is the lowest voltage that will work in control pots?

 

[miroslav]

Again... being a passive circuit...I really don't think voltage value matters at all.
When I was buying the silver mica for my guitars, I was just focused on capacitance value, and paid little attention to voltage values...so whatever was available.
AFA tolerance...get 5% -10%...I don't think that will matter much either.

 

[spantini]

Not to butt in, but... This reminded me of when there were usually a couple of electronics stores in town where you could just walk in retail and cobble together anything your heart desired from their bins. Well, you buy the stuff and take it home. They all shut down when everything became disposable.

 

[Guitargodgt]

Small Bear is a good place to start as they are more geared towards what you are doing.

If you know how to use thier search there is also mouser and digikey however they carry almost literally everything so you will find SMT components along side Through Hole components. So just searching 10uF capacitor will yield a SHIT load of results. You have to know how to narrow it down with thier narrow search function.

I was just pricing a Klon clone out this morning with mouser and small bear, but like I said you need to know what you are looking for.

I was pretty stoked when I found linear taper pots that were an exact match for OEM boss parts....... then immediately got bummed that they don't stock them (Roland won't ship parts anymore because fuck the end user apparently).

 

[Guitargodgt]

Not to butt in, but... This reminded me of when there were usually a couple of electronics stores in town where you could just walk in retail and cobble together anything your heart desired from their bins. Well, you buy the stuff and take it home. They all shut down when everything became disposable.

Yeah we still had a radio shack up until last year. Sucked to see it go, having to order everything sucks ass these days. Shipping on just a few parts is barely worth it. I loved the resister packs you could get from radio shack.

 

[jimistone]

YouTube

excellent video of Lindy Fralin explaining and demoing tone caps

 

[jimistone]

I usually get caps off ebay. I can usually find whatever I want. I don't see how it's worth someones while to sell one cap for a dollar, with free shipping, but they do.
(which pretty much explains the demise of Radio Shack)

 

[rob aylestone]

If you are thin king in pure electronic terms then you just buy from a convenient source. If you believe certain types of component sound better, then you buy at a premium price and accept the cost. My own view is that as long as the component is the same specification, then that's pretty much it. The process of removing one capacitor and soldering in a new one prevents any meaningful objective listening decision. You cannot A/B, you need to dismantle, swap, rebuild, try? It means that subjectivity creeps in and that $50 expensive capacitor guaranteed too be identical in shape, size and construction to the batch Leo Fender put to one side in his workshop as the 'specials' cannot in any meaningful way be compared. You stick it in and wow, it sounds better. Especially when you spent $50 or more. Your brain convinces you. I buy components on spec, and usually price. Changing the specs slightly can yield interesting results - and that kind of thing I like.

 

[Guitargodgt]

A $50 cap.

Sheeeeeeeyit what the fuck are you buying dude!

And Nola, I would just stick with Vishay or similar ceramic capacitors. I don't think you are going to see a huge difference between those and orange drops for the purpose you are after. If it's good enough for pretty much the entire industry, it's good enough for you. haha

 

[ecc83]

It has been proved that certain foil capacitors DO produce measurable distortion and other type none, at least nothing that can be measured with the best gear available.

However, the distortion is at a miniscule level, less than 0.001% and needs a signal voltage at 10V (about 100 times a passive guitar signal) to even measure that. The inescapable conclusion of that is that capacitors types do not matter diddly in guitar circuits and not a lot elsewhere except in the very highest of high end gear.

The BS talked about "Orange Drops" and "Mully Mustards" has never, AFAIK been double blind tested and ranks with $1000 mains cables for snake oil.

Inside a guitar you just need 63V types and if in UK buy from RS Components or one of many other "proper" electronics suppliers. If in the States Mouser?
Tolerance does not matter a ***t since pups vary lots and in any case the capacitance of the guitar lead is unknown, variable and can have a big effect.

Dave.

 

[CoolCat]

I think of the caps and resistors very much like woods for guitars.

Fender Custom Shop might get the first dibbsy but that doesnt mean there isnt 90% of the pile just as good. Tone wise it gets even more debated once they toss on paint and clear poly on the wood...etc...

Caps and Resitors as someone already said the "spec" should tell the results. I did some time on military "spec" testing and its real and the tests and data is real because the conditions of extreme cold and extreme heat and brutal conditions simulated testing is real...but that didnt mean the other consumer stuff wouldnt pass the test too, it just wasnt required so the testing labor and time drives some extra cost. The consumer stuff wasnt tested and the spec's relaxed and warrantys relaxed making it cheaper.

When dealing with parts that are $1 or $5 difference and you are only buy 1qty for a guitar mod-hot rod...spend the $5 man...come on... sure if you are Fender buying 900billion capacitors then going cheaper pays off but for low quantity buys ...buy the Bumble Bee or whatever the brand is that makes it fun and removes the brand-name confusion. Will it really sound better? I dont know....will a military spec part last longer it should.

the thing to beware is the lowest line super cheap where there is no testing and no quality control and its a shit-line of cheapness.

a certain deivce I was involved with had military specs on one end, welded metal, highest HD glass etc.. the super-cheapest line shipped off to Malaysia production was using glue and plastic window for the cheap version of the same thing...lol no comparison.

my 2 cents Id drop the extra $3 for Orange Drop on a small scale project, why not....but I doubt you'll hear it.
seems to me the pots is the moving part and where the quality of mechanical motion would pay off most.
maybe a good switchcraft jack for the plug gets moved a lot.

 

[CoolCat]

I buy components on spec, and usually price. Changing the specs slightly can yield interesting results - and that kind of thing I like.

that sounds logical, values can make a bigger difference than brand names.
from what I read about Leo he was all about saving a dollar and the story how he used the same styrofoam coffee cup so he could save money for caps and resistors etc...

I didnt read the whole thread before last post....$50 caps? that starts sounding like snake oil sales. Do they offer a return policy? you could do a sound-clip test for the gang here....I'd love to hear a $50 cap vs a $5 cap vs a $1 cap...

 

[miroslav]

Not too long ago I was doing some mods to a few guitars, adding a tone toggle switch so I can cut some HF with it without turning the tone knob...and I also had another guitar that already had that same kind of option, factory installed...though they used some real cheap ceramic disc caps in one of the positions.
So I figured I would swap out the cheap ceramic disc cap in that guitar too for a Cornell Dubilier sivler mic cap, since I had enough of them on hand.
I could swear it sounded better with the cheap ceramic disc cap.... ...but I chalked it up to a slight difference in the capacitance values, and left it alone.

Point is...in the passive guitar circuit, it's not going to matter much...but if it's in your one, prized guitar, and you want to put in expensive parts just because...then do it if it will make you feel better. A few caps won't break the bank.
The real point is...sometimes what you want, in the value you want, is not on hand or easily/quickly gotten...while there are other options that can be, so you don't have to worry that it's going to sound "bad" 'cuz you put in the cheaper caps.

 

[Nola]

Yeah, I watched some good comparisons on YT last night, and there was very little, if any, difference between ceramic and all the other types. The oil/paper one sounded a bit better on the lower strings, but that could have been anything, like how the guy held his pick for that passage since we're not robots. One thing I do think I want to put in is audio taper pots for volume and tone. I think the factory ones are linear (why? this doesn't make sense to me...the audio is much more how I'd expect to hear roll off of volume or tone). From what I read and saw on YT, the Bourne pots look the best. Even better than the CTS. They seem smoother. So, I'll probably start with two Bourne pots and ceramic capacitors (if I need them...I'm changing out a pickup to SD Antiquities, and I think that might fix the issue with this guitar being overly bright).

Here is one of the videos if you want to check it out (he does some follow up testing (after the audience chimed in) in the follow up videos. It is pretty helpful in seeing there is very little difference):

YouTube

 

[rob aylestone]

This is what I feel happens. Subjective, not objective. The physics of capacitive and inductive filters has been fizzling around for a long time now, and considering the guitar eq is such an old fashioned and really simplistic circuit - there can be so little actually happening that we can hear. When you look at RF devices that use filters, people put them on display devices so they can see what happens when your tweak their interacting components - in an audio circuit with a HF roll off, there wouldn't;t be very much to see. A curve, that changes very slightly between pickups and amplifier input. I see very little 'musicality' in what is really just a roll off. Where the curve starts, how steep it is, how wide it is, how linear/non-linear but I just cannot see anything remotely magical happening.Todays EQ systems in mixers and DAWs is far more complex. I do know that when I changed the pickups on my Jazz Bass, I now use the tone knob far more as I can have more smooth changes in tone. The old pickups meant that the change from dull to bright was a very narrow range on the knob, but the new pickups have spread this out so much I can actually use it.

 

[Nola]

Agree, Rob, pickup swap seems like the biggest change. I'd say since my Jazzmaster has a 1meg pot going to 500k might create a big change, but first I am going to try going with the Antiquities. They sound awesome in all the demos I've heard. I'm just trying to get out some of the shrill higher end. So my thinking is swap pickup, if that doesn't work try a 500k pot, and if that doesn't work maybe a .047 capacitor. Though, I am new to all this, so I could be off, but that seems like a good order to try based on what I've learned so far.

 

[rob aylestone]

Something might sound awesome - but better sounds from any instrument usually indicate something 'extra' rather than something 'cut' which is after all - what capacitors do? I can't quite come to terms with the notion that passive components have any ability to create awesomeness?

 

[miroslav]

I don't even bother to swap out the cheap switches and pots that come on many of my guitars...until they're giving me some functionality issues (most never have)...otherwise, for the guitar "sound", they're not going to make much difference. The switch is either on or off, etc...and the volume and tone pots I usually leave full-on. AFA turning them down from full-on...well, there's no way to say that if I put a cheap pot on "8"...it will sound worse than an expensive pot on "8".
I mean...how do you define that or even compare it...?

If you're doing heavy gigs and you just want the security of using high-Q parts because you can't afford to have a switch go intermittent on you during a performance, etc...that's a different consideration. I mean...go all mil-spec then.