One topic that seems
to be an ongoing battle in the gear community is that of guitar tone
capacitors. Some seem to think tone cap
selection has next-to-nothing to do with the overall sound of one’s guitar,
while others believe the tone cap is the holy grail of guitar sound
quality. The following article will aim
to shed some light on this subject without confusing or making the issue too
complicated. First, let’s just talk about some of the things we know…
Capacitors are
commonly used as electrical “energy storage devices.” When it comes to guitars, we use capacitors
in passive tone circuits to filter out high frequencies and shape our
sound. With that said, we come to our
first major bullet point in the realm of tone capacitor selection, and that is
the “value” of our capacitors. The value
of a tone cap defines the amount of “capacitance,” and as a general rule, the
higher the capacitance, the darker the overall tone. For example a .047uF cap (uF = Microfarad)
would be darker sounding than a .022uF cap.
This is why many guitarists will choose a .047uF capacitor to pair with
their brighter single coil pickups, and a .022uF to go with their slightly
darker humbuckers.
The next bullet point
in our tone cap selection is “voltage.”
Lucky for all of us, voltage only plays into the physical size of a
capacitor and has little to no effect on the actual sound of a cap. Typically, a cap with a voltage rating of .5V
or higher will work in a guitar but the user will likely not notice any tonal
difference between a cap rated at .5V and another rated at 600V. So all we need to keep in mind here is the
amount of physical space we are working with inside the control cavity of our
guitars.
Lastly, we come to
the most controversial of our bullet points: capacitor types. There are tons of
different types of capacitors out there and they have all been used in a
variety of different applications over the years, including everything from
radio to hi-fi to amp circuits and beyond.
Ceramic, film in foil, polyester, and paper in oil are just a few kinds
of caps that one will commonly see in the amp and guitar world. So let’s get to the tricky, controversial
part and make it into something very simple…
It is inevitable that
if you were to take 3 different types of capacitors, all of the same value
(capacitance), and carefully measure their output frequencies you would find
that there are some very real differences between them. However, most of us will not possess the
equipment or the desire necessary to conduct this sort of experiment. The good news is that all of this information is completely subjective and the best tone
cap selection for each user comes down to HOW IT SOUNDS to each user.
At Mojotone, we use
.047uF caps on brighter guitars like strats and teles, and .022uF caps for
humbucker guitars. We also stick with
our Mojotone Vitamin T oil-filled capacitors, as years of customer feedback
have proven them to be long-lasting, smooth, versatile, and reliable. If you are looking to experiment, we
recommend starting with .047uF and .022uF caps first. Once you have had your
fun with these traditional and bona fide specs, feel free to try lower and
higher values to reflect what you ultimately perceive as the best sound for
each of your guitars. Similarly, experimenting
with different types of capacitors is
just as important and, as always, let your ears do the decision-making.