Guitar electronics question. This seems backwards.

[thesjkexperience]

I took some old pickup wire and put alligator clips where the caps would go (I took the caps out first) and tested different values and material types in my Strats and T-style guitar.

I usually run vintage style and output single coil pickups in all my guitars and also used the .1 uF capacitor like the old days. I wire the Strats so the bridge pu is on the bottom tone and the neck & middle are on the upper tone. This worked well as I typically rolled the bridge down to around 7.5 - 8 to tame the top end a bit. I also used the .1uF caps thinking that they are still in the circuit even with the tone all the way up and that they would cut the treble a bit more than a lower value cap.

I experimented with SoZo, USSR & USA paper in oil, a couple of ceramic discs, a Luxe and a few caps that I pulled out of the guitars long ago. First there really is a difference, even with the tones on 10, between the materials and there was an obvious difference between the different values. What shocked me was the .033 uF caps seemed to sweeten the top end most with the tone on 10 and not a higher .1 or even .15 uF! I do not understand why this would be.

In general I found the SoZo mustard caps to sound more aggressive on the wound strings and slightly airier on the trebles (kinda like the noon to 2 o'clock on the HBOD Nature knob) where the Paper In Oil, regardless of manufacturer, were fatter and smoother on the wound strings and more clear and direct on the plain strings. I had the widest range of values in the SoZo (.1 , .688, .047, .033 and .025 uF) and only .1 and .05 in PIO though one of the .05s tested at closer to .044 uF.

I did have a Chinese ceramic disc that rated .084 uF, so I don't know what it was originally supposed to be (.05 or .1) but it had a nice, sweet, top end verses others close to its value, but clearly something is off with that cap! I did not really care for the Luxe at .089 (supposed to be .1 uf) or the maroon cap that came out of my CS Strat and Orange Drop 255.

I put SoZo .033 uF caps in my T-Bone and CS '68 Strat. I put a USSR PIO cap that measured .044 uF in my '56 ri Strat because the PIO fattened up the low wind pickups a bit.

While it wasn't a blind test I did have incentive to accept what I heard verses what I saw and it sure was not what I expected! The one downside to the lower cap is some of the guitars won't make the Wah-Wah sound when you roll it up and down quickly. I ordered a few .033 uF USSR PIO to try out and see how they compare and I may try wiring two .033s to see if I can find a good balance between top end and getting back my Wah sound.

Comments welcome.

[cajone5]

interesting -- i should try this -- thanks for the description!

[thesjkexperience]

Today I am going to try and run 2 small caps of different materials to see how that works. Mostly I will be using various values of PIO and SoZo mustard caps.

BTW I did email SoZo about the different caps they offer and how they would sound in guitars and amps. He said in guitars it may be hard to tell the difference, but in amps the Blue caps (Astron copies for Fender amps) sound bigger. Once I settle on some values for each guitar I might pick up a few blue caps and see how it goes. I would also like to change the caps in my Victoria tweed from the orange drops to PIO or the SoZo Blues, but since I told my Wife about the "death caps" in amps she keeps an eye out. I guess I am lucky as I used to open my amps and work on them all the time in the '80s and never got shocked.

The strange thing is my T-Bone works great with the lower value cap, but my Strats do not sound the same with the caps on alligator clips as they do with the caps soldered in. Double strange!