How to: restuff an electrolytic can capacitor
- Thread starter emrr
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Admiral-dk
Well-known member
You Really should know about TAD - Tube Amp Doctor. They are responcible for the fact that the Tube Amp World hasn't completely disintegrated after the War in Ukraine .... Why - well they got a good number of special (quality) Tubes made in China @ the now defunkt Shuguang Factory. This made them contact another Chinese Brand (that didn't make Audio Tubes) back in 2019 and ask them about the production line they had bought years earlier : Can it be brought back to production ..????
Answer ; Yes - but we would like you to help us modernise it + I'm pretty sure there where a minimum yearly order included in the deal.
Result : Quality EL34, 6L6, 6V6, 12AX7 etc. (I feel confident that the majority of the production are now sold to the likes of Marshall, Fender etc.).
Have a look here : Tube Amp Doctor - and the Electrolyte Capacitors are here : Capacitors and as you can see, there are 10 Multi Caps there - like to a Lesley.
No - they do NOT have everything you 'Lust for there' (Part wise) - but I have bought a good volume from them to (the now defunkt) Orkestergraven in Aarhus - and used them for Amp repairs + sold in the shop => a single bad tube (over the years), that was replaced quickly from them
Per
ps forgot to mention, that you can select German or English on the site.
Answer ; Yes - but we would like you to help us modernise it + I'm pretty sure there where a minimum yearly order included in the deal.
Result : Quality EL34, 6L6, 6V6, 12AX7 etc. (I feel confident that the majority of the production are now sold to the likes of Marshall, Fender etc.).
Have a look here : Tube Amp Doctor - and the Electrolyte Capacitors are here : Capacitors and as you can see, there are 10 Multi Caps there - like to a Lesley.
No - they do NOT have everything you 'Lust for there' (Part wise) - but I have bought a good volume from them to (the now defunkt) Orkestergraven in Aarhus - and used them for Amp repairs + sold in the shop => a single bad tube (over the years), that was replaced quickly from them
Per
ps forgot to mention, that you can select German or English on the site.
Last edited:
k brown
Well-known member
Personally, I's rather temporarily retire some tube gear, than give C***a any MORE money!
Ricardus
WILL SOLDER FOR FOOD
You can also get new can caps from Hayseed Hamfest. They don't use the original exact style cans like you find at Tubes and More, but I like the look of the shiny cans. They're actually freshly stuffed cans with high quality caps.
I bought a couple for a Heathkit tube amp restoration a few years ago.
https://hayseedhamfest.com/
Here's how I've done it: Recapping Can Capacitors in Antique Electronics
David Kulka
Well-known member
Another way to cut the can, which may give a cleaner result. But it will help to wrap some kind of tape around the can to prevent the tool from scoring it.
Here's one I did for a can cap that had spilled its guts, 1958 reel 2 reel tape machine. I gently bent the crimp open, kept the phenolic intact and attached the new caps to the terminals, you don't see the 're-crimp' bodge job once it's fitted back to the chassis.
Attachments
I am running into problems with getting solder to flow well on the existing internal pins (where the red arrows are pointing). I have tried increasing the heat, adding flux, dremeling the surface to remove residues from the oil and paper and nothing is working and I'm not feeling too good about the stability of the joints I've managed to make so far.
I've ran into this problem with random tube sockets from time to time as well with NOS sockets and nearly the same thing as far as sanding, cleaning, adding flux. I can sometimes get a difficult socket to flow solder by sanding and xtra heat but sometimes they just won't take well and you can't use them. I suspect it must be something on the surface of the metal where oxidation or some other reaction disrupts and spoils the surface. I've seen similar things happen with edge connectors due to microscopic pitting or some other contamination where repeated cleaning still doesn't solve the problem. With the internal cap pins I suspect its the contact with the oils and paper.
If anyone has any useful tips or methods for curing poor flow I'd be interested in hearing them. Few things are more frustrating than watching your solder bead up and plop down all over everything else while the metal is so hot its reflowing things on the other side and pushing CC resistors to the brink.
I've ran into this problem with random tube sockets from time to time as well with NOS sockets and nearly the same thing as far as sanding, cleaning, adding flux. I can sometimes get a difficult socket to flow solder by sanding and xtra heat but sometimes they just won't take well and you can't use them. I suspect it must be something on the surface of the metal where oxidation or some other reaction disrupts and spoils the surface. I've seen similar things happen with edge connectors due to microscopic pitting or some other contamination where repeated cleaning still doesn't solve the problem. With the internal cap pins I suspect its the contact with the oils and paper.
If anyone has any useful tips or methods for curing poor flow I'd be interested in hearing them. Few things are more frustrating than watching your solder bead up and plop down all over everything else while the metal is so hot its reflowing things on the other side and pushing CC resistors to the brink.
If the leads are not steel they may never take solder. Consider drilling them out with a small drill bit and using real component leads.
JR
JR
Johnny1234
Well-known member
Please try Aluminum soldier. Bet that's your problem.
I have tried cleaning them with a sanding bit vigorously. What are you saying to do with the mineral oil?
The metal type is the same as the leads that come through the other side which were clearly meant to be soldered to. Presumably it's tinned copper or aluminum. The internal portion on the cans I've worked with so far is not tinned copper and may not even be tinned at all as it was not intended to be soldered to. Acid flux is something I haven't tried that may be worth considering. Maybe the aluminum solder that Johnny 1234 mentioned as well
Or drill it out with a small drill and use one of the component leads.
JR
JR
Johnny1234
Well-known member
Or just make life easy and and a Hayseed capacitor.
+1 for the mineral oil (you can use olive oil too)
Aluminium is a very reactive metal and forms an oxide if expose to air instantly. The oil acts as a barrier, I find scraping the tinned soldering iron bit against the aluminium under the oil helps get it going. The scraping scratches off the oxide layer.
If you will note from the original post by emrr, the whole purpose of restuffing was to avoid having to unsolder the existing resistors from the cap leads on the other side. If you ran component leads through newly drilled holes you would have to either attach them to the existing can tabs or unsolder them and attach the resistors to the new leads. That would be no problem if it weren't for the fact that the existing cap leads on the other side are essentially inside a cage due to the way the components are attached . . . . . which means ya gotta remove a certain amount of those just to get enough access to attach those new leads . . . . and if you have to do that then you may as well look at abandoning a re-stuff and just ripping out the guts and rebuilding to do the recap.
If it were a one off job that might be the easiest way to go, but these are for a client who has 8 modules so that's 8 X 40$ = $320 in just PS decouplers plus about an hours labor to install each one.
If you don't want to drill out the leads, I suggest Flux from: stores.ebay.com/slavinfashionart/. In addition to a variety of different US fluxes, he has a really nasty (as in good), don't inhale, Russian flux in nice, small dispenser bottles. I'm not seeing it in his current store, but ask him.
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