How do I read these disk capacitors?

MillenniumFalsehood · Post by **MillenniumFalsehood** » Sat Feb 18, 2012 7:02 am

Wow, two questions in the same night . . .

I've got a box of assorted capacitors. They all have various numbers on them, sometimes followed by a K.

How should I interpret these numbers? They don't appear to be capacitance ratings, because they don't have a uF symbol (I'm probably wrong; my electronics experience is mostly in the theoretical, with the only practical knowledge being which end of an LED to hook up to the negative pole and how many a 9V battery will light with a resistor attached).

USS Atlantis · Post by **USS Atlantis** » Sat Feb 18, 2012 10:24 am

MillenniumFalsehood wrote:Wow, two questions in the same night . . .

I've got a box of assorted capacitors. They all have various numbers on them, sometimes followed by a K.

Disc capacitors are rated in pf values, similar to how resistors are rated - they use 3 digits

First digit is the first number
Second digit is the second number
Third digit is the number of zeros to tack on the end

So a 472 would be 4700pf or 4.7nf
and a 106 would be 10000000pf or 10m pf, 10k nf or 10mf

MillenniumFalsehood wrote:How should I interpret these numbers? They don't appear to be capacitance ratings, because they don't have a uF symbol (I'm probably wrong; my electronics experience is mostly in the theoretical, with the only practical knowledge being which end of an LED to hook up to the negative pole and how many a 9V battery will light with a resistor attached).

The letter isn't much use, it indicates tolerance, hardly anyone uses it anymore

MillenniumFalsehood · Post by **MillenniumFalsehood** » Sun Feb 19, 2012 2:55 pm

Thanks a lot, dude!

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How do I read these disk capacitors?

How do I read these disk capacitors?

Re: How do I read these disk capacitors?