All the time i am hearing about folks wanting to add "stiffening" capacitors to amplifiers. This started years ago with i believe Wayne Harris the one implementing the use of them in his Hurst. Since that time, the use of caps has grown immensly. Whoever is making and marketiung these caps is making a killing off of them! Good for them i say. A few things i wanted to discuss about them here. First, for those of you that dont know, amplifiers have capacitors in them. They basically serve a few purposes,( I will keep it simple), they act as filters for the power supply and to allow a little headroom in the output section. Now most folks think that adding a nice big external cap is the way to go. If it works for you, great, add it on! I for one dont see much use for them except for the SPL crowds. What i do see a use for them is in the amp itself. I mean INSIDE the amp. Years ago i modified various amps for different reasons. One of the ways that i modified them was very simple. Adding capacitance to the already existing caps in the amp. I usually did this on the power supply output. that was one of themost effective means of getting the most out an amplifier. Just a quick lesson in amps here (new ones may differ nowadays) the power supply takes the 12 volts from your car, turns it into A/C voltage, steps up the voltage to the needed level, then converts it back into high voltage DC, which the gives the output section its power. By adding capacitance to the power supply ouput, you are giving the ouputs a little more needed current to drive the low impedace loads that are so often the case today. That was "adding a cap" in my terms back in the day. And THAT did more for an amp than the so-called "stiffening caps" of today. I wont go into details here about the process of doing this, cause basically, if you dont have a chlue as to what you are doing, you WILL smoke your amp, or explode the capacitors!!!!!!!! (pretty cool thing to watch!!!!!) Just my 2 cents on the subject, right or wrong.....
I exploded a cap once, 30 years ago I was in an electronics class and I was building a power supply. It was a bridge rectifier and this girl walked into class and the cap got soldered across the AC side. Scared me to death when I plugged the thing in. Scared half the class too. Never did it again
I like to pop caps all the time.. (the little ones) - the big ones are way too dangerous, but the small ones are fun to pop.. take this advice, though.. WEAR SAFETY GLASSES the little boogers are kinda sporadic with which direction they explode :blowup:
half a farad in the 240 socket for the air compressor. set it off in the dumpster outside the bays. the ****ing lid jumped up about 3 inches!!!!! But you are right, the average 150 uF 100 volt jobs do make a NICE "POP"!!!!!!! But dont breathe the smoke!!!! something about cancer in the state of california.........
Believe it was Richard Clark and the speakerworks Buick. They added the caps on the power rails of the amps if I recall correctly. According to Richard , that's about the only instance where adding capacitance did any good . Funny considering his name is all over the monster caps
you got it, wierd... are we all really stupid (other 49 states) or are californians just really paranoid? or are they hoarding all of the laboratory mice?
i thought a cap was to keep a steady supply of power to your amp.have used caps for years (15 to be exact.) never any probs.had a voltage gauge hooked to amps before i had the cap and at loud and low passages (bass)the voltage dipped from 13.8 to 12 or lower.after adding the cap the voltage never went below 13 volts.(mech gauge)my new cap never goes below 13.8.(has its own digital gauge).did not buy it to cure dimming lights.never had that prob.i just used the biggest cables i could find and big 3.
