[rescue] Slightly OT: Bad Cap Saga

[Luke Goembel]

> Not to contradict you, but most of those capacitors are not
> electrolytic at
> all. Most of the electrolytic capacitors of that era are in
> steel cans. 
> They also explode when subject to full voltage after long
> periods of
> disuse, but the explosions are, due to the steel cans, more
> like a vent popping.
> 
> The worst offenders are Sprague "Black Beauty"
> capacitors which were coated
> with some sort of black plastic and supposed to be better
> than anything on
> the market at the time. The black plastic decomposed
> rapidly and some
> of them failed to last. In some cases, the equipment was
> still being 
> manufactured when the first ones failed.
> 
> Geoff.

Thanks for the information! I did some reading on 
'paper' caps and read they are not classified 
as electrolytic, as you said.
http://antiqueradio.org/recap.htm

Also, the "black beauty" story reminds me that 
sometimes 'improvements' should be taken with 
a grain of salt! Surely the inferior electrolyte 
that has been plaguing caps (since 2000?) was 
marketed as an 'improvement', even if only as 
a cheaper equivalent!