Help with capacitors!

[chcjunior]

I was curious as to what my SG would sound like sans tone controls....so I cut out the capacitors connecting the tone and volume controls. Then I decided to replace it. Here's the glitch.

The original capacitor was marked with a 223 which was underlined. The new capacitor is marked with a 221 which is also underlined. However, the tone control has no effect currently. The wiring is correct and the solder joint is good.

What am I missing?

 

[Chaos]

Re: Help with capacitors!

The third digit indicates the number of zeros following the first and second digit capacitance value

221 = 220pf
223 = 22000pf (22nf or .022uf)

I think you can guess why your tone control isn't functional...

 

[chcjunior]

Re: Help with capacitors!

The third digit indicates the number of zeros following the first and second digit capacitance value

221 = 220pf
223 = 22000pf (22nf or .022uf)

I think you can guess why your tone control isn't functional...

Thanks for the clarification. Defininitely a difference between 2 and 21780!

 

[Lewguitar]

Re: Help with capacitors!

Actually, your tone control is probably working but only bleeding off highs that are so high you can't hear the difference. Maybe bleeding off highs that the pickup isn't even generating. Lew

 

[chcjunior]

Re: Help with capacitors!

It sounds like the cap is too weak,I have a couple of caps here that I yanked that should be good,if you want them then PM your address to me and I'll mail them out tommorow.

Thanks for the offer....but I'm going to order some capacitors from Stew Mac so I can play around with different values. Appreciate the generosity though.

 

[chcjunior]

Re: Help with capacitors!

Actually, your tone control is probably working but only bleeding off highs that are so high you can't hear the difference. Maybe bleeding off highs that the pickup isn't even generating. Lew

So the higher the value is the higher the frequencies that the capacitor is bleeding off?

 

[Lewguitar]

Re: Help with capacitors!

So the higher the value is the higher the frequencies that the capacitor is bleeding off?

This is a simplistic way to look at it but should be helpful:

1. Capacitors BLOCK BASS frequencies but PASS TREBLE frequencies.

2. In a tone control the cap blocks bass from bleeding out of the circuit and disappearing but allows treble to bleed back to the planet earth (or GROUND) and disappear back into it again.

3. The .02 would be a larger cap than .002 and the size of the cap determines the cut off point: how much midrange is allowed to bleed off.

4. A tiny cap, like 250 pf, would pass only very high frequencies...but most of us can hear that. It's the same value as the bright cap on the bright switch of a blackface Fender amp.

Lew

 

[chcjunior]

Re: Help with capacitors!

Thanks for the info, Lew. I just emailed it to myself for safe keeping.