should we build 1 farad cap. our own?

hey
i was wondering wether is it reasonable to build our own capacitor?
will it be cheaper? because i dont want to pay more then 100 bucks to a capacitor so can i make it cheaper?

take good care

Not recomended.  If you need a capacitor, buy one.

-------------
Support the12volt.com

Just out of curiosity, how would you build a cap.

-------------
There are 3 kinds of people in the world, those who can count and those who can't

two plates and a di-electric, wraped in cooncentric circles, but since you dont have the ability that factories have, it would be huge.

well,
the only part that interrest me is, wether can i make it cheeper or not,

and i talked to an electricity enginer,
he told me that cannecting multi micro farad capacitors to gether will make the capacitor work much more better than the single 1 farad ones but it will be shaped as one ATX case lol

get a high output alternater, scrap the cap and build and alt. haha

-------------
1993 Ford Ranger.
Head Unit.Alpine CDA-9831
Front Speakers.Infinity 6010 Reference Series
Amp.Alpine MRD-M1005
Subs.3 Kicker CVR10
Rear Speakers.SPL CS-573
20" Boss 312's, lowered 3/4

try to build one for fun if that.  ive been in the 12 volt for about three years and really haven't heard anybody say i want to build a capictor.   maybe you can make a monster.  try it out if the price isn't bad.  

-------------
Hurry get me a steel hanger, elec tape, zip ties, a monkey and a snorgle. trust me i've ran wires with less

Forget about building your own capacitor... You can't do it. And I am not saying YOU can't do it - I am saying you cant get the stuff to do it. The foil used in the caps today is VERY HIGHLY specialized, specifically for building high-value capacitors. You can't buy small amounts of it. When you read further on down, you will see WHY people charge 100 dollars plus, for a 1F cap... the stuff they use is EXCEPTIONALLY esoteric (translation - expensive), and some of it dangerous to handle without proper apparatus...

Also, the foil surface area involved in a 1F electrolytic capacitor is MONSTROUS... HUGE! Here is the faormila for figuring the surface area for a capacitor:


(Credit for this formula goes to this website...

1,100,000,000 square meters of area for a 1F vaccuum (dielectric constant of 8.85, the 8.85 can be replaced by the dielectric constant of whatever insulator you choose - the higher the better) capacitor with plates separated by 1mm (the 10^-3 number in this formula. Again you can substitute whatever you plate distance is - smaller is better) If you reduce the plate separation to .1mm, your number becomes 110,000,000 square meters. Still a HUGE number. Do you see where I am going with this? You WILL NEVER be able to build a 1F capacitor in your garage... Forget it... DO YOU have a manufacturing facility with the accuracy to place 110,000,000 square meters (that's 2 PIECES 110,000,000 square meters large, BTW) of foil .1mm apart, and then roll it up? Didn't think so... Even *I* dont have that kind of stuff in my garage! LOL

Here's another post I wrote regarding carbon caps, if interested...

-------------
It all reminds me of something that Molière once said to Guy de Maupassant at a café in Vienna: "That's nice. You should write it down."

You dont need the exotic materials mentioned above to make a capacitor. You DO need them to make a SMALL high value capacitor though. I have made capacitors in values you typically cannot buy ANYWHERE for my Tesla coils. I've used aluminum foil and plexiglass sheets (Lexan) to make large 25kv caps.

The real question is, ARE 1 farad capacitors even necessary for car audio? If you have a big enough battery/alternator, I dont understand what the point is (they look cool I guess!)

giff] wrote:

---

You dont need the exotic materials mentioned above to make a capacitor. You DO need them to make a SMALL high value capacitor though. I have made capacitors in values you typically cannot buy ANYWHERE for my Tesla coils. I've used aluminum foil and plexiglass sheets (Lexan) to make large 25kv caps.

---

Ahh, while it is true that you can build a cap with (literally) household materials, how well they stand up to abuse will be open for discussion. I too build Tesla coils, and yes, you DO need high VOLTAGE capabilities for them, but your capacitance is VERY small... The last one I built was 18 layers of copper sheet, layered with polyethylene that was 100 mil sheets. The VALUE came to .022 microF, a small value indeed, but I finally broke it when I full-wave rectified an 18/120 NST, for 25.4 KV. You DO need exotic materials to build GOOD caps of any value... We were not talking about sub-MICRO Farad caps, rated for insanely high voltages though... We were discussing VERY high value caps with (relatively) vanishingly small voltage ratings. I stand by my previous statements... Tesla caps and "stiffening" caps are two VERY different animals, both in construction AND purpose. They CANNOT be interchanged...

giff]T wrote:

---

e real question is, ARE 1 farad capacitors even necessary for car audio? If you have a big enough battery/alternator, I dont understand what the point is (they look cool I guess!)

---

This has been a subject of MUCH debate, and even I am not certain if they really do anything... They SHOULD, but DO they... Perhaps we'll never know, as no manufacturer will ever ANSWER the question with concrete EVIDENCE proving they do what they say they will...

-------------
It all reminds me of something that Molière once said to Guy de Maupassant at a café in Vienna: "That's nice. You should write it down."