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Seeking recommendations for suitable Bumblebee cap replacement

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  • Seeking recommendations for suitable Bumblebee cap replacement

    Hello everyone, I am presently re-capping a 60 Gibson Les Paul GA-40T amp which has several vintage bumblebee caps in the Tremolo circuit. I have not worked with these caps before and am asking for good modern replacement advice. I know they now make some fancy caps with fancy price tags and would perfer not to go that route so I thought I'd run it by some experts first. Thanks, fg

  • #2
    IF you actually need to replace them, regular modern caps, same value and rating, offered by a recognized supplier such a Mouser or any of the big distributors will be fine.

    Modern build quality will certainly be way better than in 60 year old ones.

    Will sound change?

    Probably, not because modern ones are bad, quite the contrary, but because old ones may have drifted, that if they were close to expected value from the beginning.

    Worst case, they will behave like what the designer intended 60 years ago, not bad at all.
    Juan Manuel Fahey

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    • #3
      If they're in the trem circuit, eg C19-22 http://schems.com/schematicheaven.ne..._crestline.pdf then the tone won't change as they're not in the signal path; just the trem will work again.
      Surely not even the most golden ears could detect nasty modern caps there
      My band:- http://www.youtube.com/user/RedwingBand

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      • #4
        They're all on the back of the board and almost 60 years old so I figured change them.

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        • #5
          more like this: http://www.ampwares.com/schematics/gibson/ga40.pdf and yes they're in the trem circuit.

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          • #6
            For the .005 uf they used .0047 uf and for the .05 uf they used .047. I was thinking of using polypropylene (orange drops) to replace the .0047 caps and polyester (mallroy) for the .047 uf caps. Does this seem good to you? BTW, thanks for the quick responses!

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            • #7
              Orange drops are a pretty standard cap used for replacement when working on guitar amps. Nobody will condemn you for using them there. There is a good used market for bumblebee caps, whether they are in tolerance or not.

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