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Audio and capacitors...
- Thread starter SFM-Ptgal
- Start date
Sure was a common problem with the Harris Stereo 80 consoles.
Digi-Key has Panasonic low-esr/low leakage electrolytics that sound good. Drop tantalum caps are about as bad as they come. I've fixed a lot of equipment from the 80s that had shorted tantalums taking down the power supply rails. Small value electolytics can be replaced by mylar or other film caps if there is enough room.
I generally only use ceramic caps in RF circuits or for RF bypassing on power supply rails.
I have also paralleled small value film capacitors across large value electrolytics and noticed some improvement in the high-end of the audio range in some circuits. It is only practical if you have plenty of circuit board room.
I generally only use ceramic caps in RF circuits or for RF bypassing on power supply rails.
I have also paralleled small value film capacitors across large value electrolytics and noticed some improvement in the high-end of the audio range in some circuits. It is only practical if you have plenty of circuit board room.
SFM-Ptgal said:
Most likely aluminum electrolytics, although Gates did use tantalum audio coupling capacitors in some equipment - IIRC the Gatesway II used tantalum caps.
Note that replacing one type of audio coupling cap with another (such as replacing tantalums with electrolytics) may be problematic depending upon the circuit. A tantalum has lower ESR than an aluminum electrolytic of the same value, and replacing the former with the latter may affect frequency response in some audio circuits. I discovered that early on when I took over a station with an early solid-state Gates console (I believe it was the aforementioned Gatesway II) that exhibited flawed frequency response. The cause was that a previous engineer (apparently with insufficient knowledge of component properties) had replaced some of the tantalum coupling caps with electrolytics. After I replaced those with new tantalums the frequency response returned to spec.
On the Stereo 80, the first hint is that the Left vs Right channels seem to vary from song to song. In my observation, that pointed to poor low frequency response due to dried up coupling caps. That console was more likely to do that than most any other model. I never did determine why.SFM-Ptgal said:
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