DUMONT RA-109A Capacitor question

[kramden66]

Sams says C132 and C133 line filter caps are .02 at 600 volts , there are a couple more modern caps put in there in place of the originals, they are .02 at 1600 volts , now would you leave those in or replace them with the 600 volt caps , could always use the 1600 volt ones for a different application down the road is my thinking.

this set has a few caps replaced but not many , some you can see were cut and resoldered or just resoldered , it looks as if someone replaced one here , one there to get it running or partly running , i know better - all these wax caps walk the plank.

Anyway just curious if anyone has an opinion

Mike

[Phil Nelson]

They probably used 1600v caps because those are AC line filters. Justradios.com has an excellent article on replacing such caps:

http://www.justradios.com/safetytips.html

I believe the ideal would be to replace them with type Y "line to ground" caps with the original voltage rating or higher.

Next best in my book would be to leave in the 1600V caps if they're something newish like orange drops. If they're plastic-coated paper (bumblebees, black beauties, etc.) then out they go -- as unreliable as paper.

Last choice would be to replace 'em with conventional 600V caps. If you're going to install new caps, why not spend a few more cents and use the cap designed for that application?

Just my $0.02.

Phil Nelson
Phil's Old Radios
http://antiqueradio.org/index.html

[kramden66]

They are the orange drop looking capacitors but are dark brown in color , after reading that and what you said since this tv does have a lot of tubes , big transformer , etc i will leave them in , i will double check them for leakage , thing i don't like is there was a .2 at 1000 volts in the set that was replaced with these two caps in series that say special on them , no value listed just a part number that i couldn't find info on , so they will go and i will put the proper value in

mike