"Mike Knudsen" wrote in message
...


Interesting. With very few and small exceptions, every cap measured LESS
than
marked. And we thought lytics were being made with very high positive
tolerances, up to 100% or double the value.

I guess you get (almost) what you pay for, no mas! --Mike K.


I can't be sure the checker isn't just reading low. I do get repeatable and
sensible readings from it.

I also don't know if the caps I checked just by chance happened to be
generally bunched around common values, or if they are actually made with
more precision than they are rated for. It's a small sample.

But modern (maybe even 50 years ago) manufacturing ought to be able to make
a reasonably precise product as long as they are able to stick with a
process that is known to work. I have to figure that the capacitor
manufacturers know what they are doing, they regularly check samples of
their product and can make running changes to hit their target specs with
almost every lot.

Just as speculation, let's say cap manufacturers have learned to make
electrolytic capacitors with good precision at little extra cost. And let's
imagine that setting the target capacitance to 5% - 10% low reduces the cost
of the "active ingredients" by 5% -10%. Well, that would be a nice reward
for knowing how to do the job!

Frank Dresser