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The best cap material for tone pot

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  • The best cap material for tone pot

    I wonder what is the best capacitor material for tone pot.
    I spent several days researching the subject. I read statements from luthiers, pickups producer, electronics and people from hi'fi equipment.
    Each of them has a different opinion.
    Some people say that the best cap is polyester.
    Some people say that the best cap is ceramic, but foil cap (polyester, polypropylene) and paper in oil isn't good because it can catch radio waves. But some people say that ceramic cap isn't good because has piezoelectric properties. People from hi-fi audio equipment say that the best cap for audio track is 1'st polystyrene 2'st polypropylene. They also say that polyester cap isn't good because distorts the band, it gets warmer. Some people think this has no effect because no sound flows through the capacitor because the signal is shorted to ground using resistor (pot) and cap.
    As you can see, all sentences are mutually exclusive.
    What do you think about it?
    Do you have research material on this topic? - Thank you for every link sent

  • #2
    Re: The best cap material for tone pot

    From what I've read, ceramic is most susceptible to drifting due to weather conditions and is generally the least consistent due to that. Otherwise, anything that is on spec should be fine.

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    • #3
      Re: The best cap material for tone pot

      I like paper in oil cuz it sounds creamy and vintagey to me. Orange drops are my 2nd fav cuz they sound supple. I also tried ceramic and polyester.
      The things that you wanted
      I bought them for you

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      • #4
        Re: The best cap material for tone pot

        avoid ceramamic like the plague. Unless you're building a vintage instrument.

        I wanted to really believe in this whole snake oil one material is better than the other more than anyone when I got into soldering. What we pay top dollar for is accuracy which they call tolerance. You can get 1% to 10% usually in guitars. The larger values of capacitors you'll see a benefit of accuracy. When people see youtube demos usually people have the one of each kind of capacitor and when they do their tests that is what we're hearing is the subtleties in capacitance. Say for example a 10% polyester capacitor could be one on the higher side so say its a 100nf capacitor, who knows it could be 110nf instead. The higher the capacitance the warmer the guitar even at "10" where we think it's off.

        Aside from that since so little happens in a guitar. We're talking under or around 1V / 1A of current material wise go with whatever. There are places for paper in oil , wima capacitors, Japanese Nichicon capacitors and so forth. But in an electric guitar it doesn't have a place in my opinion unless a guitar tech who sells wiring harnesses wants a build to sell for more money as people want their builds to look more pretty. It's rock and roll not sushi. There is still a big pile of people who truly believe cloth wire, larger pots vs smaller asian import ones impact ones tone.

        here's my system - i'm seriously considering copying and pasting this
        want a brighter tone - use a smaller capaictor , however when you roll down to 0 you'll cut less frequencies
        want a warmer tone - use a larger capacitor - you get more compression too - when you roll down to 0 you cut more frequencies.
        the only way to get best of both worlds is with a no load tone pot
        capacitors are more easily visualized in nano farads (nf) instead of 0.022uf I'll just say 22nf on here. The usual range I suggest for guitars is between 10nf and 100nf for passives.

        When people ask about capacitors and pots this is a great video to start with. This and Dylans video about 5 myths about guitar pots I highly recommend.
        Last edited by shadowfire90; 12-09-2019, 04:35 PM.

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        • #5
          Re: The best cap material for tone pot

          If you can hear the sound going through the cap to ground and tell the difference between the materials, more power to you. I think it's all placebo affect. You want to hear a difference and therefore believe there is a difference. In a passive guitar circuit, there is no difference between material. The value and tolerance are what's important. That is what affects what you hear when the tone control is rolled back, filtering highs to ground, more than the material. Hell, my 2009 Trad Pro Les Paul has ceramic caps from the factory. I don't care either way.
          Last edited by ErikH; 12-09-2019, 05:10 PM.

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          • #6
            Re: The best cap material for tone pot

            Honestly, as long as they are withing spec (or out of it, and I like the sound), I don't care. I've had expensive ones and cheap ones of all sorts of material. I use my tone controls a lot, and I can't hear a difference.
            Administrator of the SDUGF

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            • #7
              Re: The best cap material for tone pot

              Just as with the whole "tonewood" debate, if you like a particular material and think that you can hear a difference, and it falls within your affordability range, then use it.

              Sent from my Alcatel_5044C using Tapatalk

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              • #8
                Re: The best cap material for tone pot

                Buy a quality brand that is in spec and forget about it. You will not be able to hear a difference between caps of the same value.
                -Chris

                Originally posted by John Suhr
                “Practice cures most tone issues”

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                • #9
                  Re: The best cap material for tone pot

                  Value matters, not material. Any material will work fine if you've got roughly the right value.
                  Join me in the fight against muscular atrophy!

                  Originally posted by Douglas Adams
                  This planet has - or rather had - a problem, which was this: most of the people living on it were unhappy for pretty much of the time. Many solutions were suggested for this problem, but most of these were largely concerned with the movements of small green pieces of paper, which is odd because on the whole it wasn't the small green pieces of paper that were unhappy.

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                  • #10
                    Re: The best cap material for tone pot

                    Whilst oscilloscope testing has indeed found minute differences with tested caps of same value but different dilectric materials, it often falls right on/under the threshold for most people to hear - especially with the typical additions most guitarists have with their rigs.

                    If you're wiring such that the cap goes merely from the tonepot lug to ground, then small is ok. If you wire such that the cap bridges between volume and tone pots, then PIO or orange drops have the physical size and leg length to make the distance easily.

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                    • #11
                      Re: The best cap material for tone pot

                      The cheapest cap you can get which is in spec and rated to withstand the rigors of the extreme current that passive guitar pickups will blast them with (*sarcasm*).

                      Point being, the actual [i.e. "measured"] capacitance of each individual cap is really what matters in terms of sonic performance.

                      In other words, spend your good money on an LCR meter, not "special" capacitors. As for caps, buy 'em cheap by the lot, and sort them one by one by actual measured values.
                      Originally posted by LesStrat
                      Yogi Berra was correct.
                      Originally posted by JOLLY
                      I do a few chord things, some crappy lead stuff, and then some rhythm stuff.

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                      • #12
                        Re: The best cap material for tone pot

                        Originally posted by AlexR View Post
                        If you wire such that the cap bridges between volume and tone pots, then PIO or orange drops have the physical size and leg length to make the distance easily.
                        For the price though, you would be stupid to use a PIO or orange drop rather than an inch or two of hookup wire. :P
                        Join me in the fight against muscular atrophy!

                        Originally posted by Douglas Adams
                        This planet has - or rather had - a problem, which was this: most of the people living on it were unhappy for pretty much of the time. Many solutions were suggested for this problem, but most of these were largely concerned with the movements of small green pieces of paper, which is odd because on the whole it wasn't the small green pieces of paper that were unhappy.

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                        • #13
                          Re: The best cap material for tone pot

                          If you do use Orange Drops you should specifically seek out the lowest voltage ones you can find. Even the lower voltage models (200V, I believe) are beyond excessively rated for guitars. They're really designed for much higher voltage AC applications, and are complete overkill for the inside of guitars. But if you must use them for some reason, the lower voltage ones are advantageous over the highly rated models because they are smaller (and theoretically cheaper, though this is not always the case).
                          Originally posted by LesStrat
                          Yogi Berra was correct.
                          Originally posted by JOLLY
                          I do a few chord things, some crappy lead stuff, and then some rhythm stuff.

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                          • #14
                            Re: The best cap material for tone pot

                            Originally posted by GuitarStv View Post
                            For the price though, you would be stupid to use a PIO or orange drop rather than an inch or two of hookup wire. :P
                            We all have our preferences.....price being quite low on my list. I'd rather the neatness, and the fact that a lot of hookup wire flexes - so legs of exposed components make contact with other components. I've had more than one short from cavity items grounding after time and being transported/used etc.
                            Last edited by AlexR; 12-09-2019, 11:56 PM.

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                            • #15
                              Re: The best cap material for tone pot

                              Originally posted by AlexR View Post
                              We all have our preferences.....price being quite low on my list. I'd rather the neatness, and the fact that a lot of hookup wire flexes - so legs of exposed components make contact with other components. I've had more than one short from cavity items grounding after time and being transported/used etc.
                              If you're having issues with cavity items grounding, you need to put some heat shrink around the bare wires in the circuit . . . not use a ridiculously overpriced part. And honestly, that's probably something you should do anyway, rather than hoping that a slightly thicker wire won't potentially bend or be knocked about ever.

                              Near as I can figure, the only real reason to use PIO/orange drop/whatever the flavour of the week for capacitors is today is vanity. Some people just really like the look of them in wiring cavities. That's why those fake bumblebee caps that Gibson was selling for a load of money make lots of sense. They're cosmetically right. If you often open up your wiring cavity to stare at the sexiness . . . knock yourself out. But it makes no difference to the tone your guitar puts out.
                              Join me in the fight against muscular atrophy!

                              Originally posted by Douglas Adams
                              This planet has - or rather had - a problem, which was this: most of the people living on it were unhappy for pretty much of the time. Many solutions were suggested for this problem, but most of these were largely concerned with the movements of small green pieces of paper, which is odd because on the whole it wasn't the small green pieces of paper that were unhappy.

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