[Hallicrafters] No PCB's in caps

[Bill]

PCB's were put in caps at one time but this practice, oil, is now banned
in this country.

However, the caps the PCB's fluid was put in were high voltage capacitors
used for industrial power distribution.  The caps are/were used for power
factor correction in very heavy reactive load situations.  To my knowledge,
PCB oil was never placed in small power supply caps.  The advantage of 
PCB oil over regular mineral oil was a higher flash point, higher
dielectric strength and more efficient heat transfer.

A distinct difference between PCB oil and regular insulating oil is the
smell.  PCB oil (pure), has a decidingly sweet odor.  Mineral oil, the
predominant oil, either has no smell or very little smell and that smell
is an oil smell we all know.

Again, pure PCB oil, known as Askeral, Inerteen, Pyranol etc., has a
very sweet smell.  If your oil smells this way, there is a good bet it
is PCB oil but I kind of doubt it.

K2WH

-----Original Message-----
From: hallicrafters-admin at mailman.qth.net
[mailto:hallicrafters-admin at mailman.qth.net]On Behalf Of Rich Oliver
Sent: Friday, October 17, 2003 14:42 PM
To: hallicrafters at mailman.qth.net
Subject: [Hallicrafters] No PCB's in caps


Several years ago I noticed that a couple of my oil filled HV caps had 
started to leak.  I did not know how excited I should get about this 
development so phoned the engineers at Sprague.  They told me they have 
never used PCB's in any of their caps; PCB's were only used in 
transformers.  The tone of the fellow I talked to was of forbearance, 
like he really wished we would all get a clue and leave him alone.  It 
was his opinion that nobody ever put PCB's in caps.  Of course that was 
one engineer at one company....

73, Rich

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