[Milsurplus] Opinions regarding restoring bathtub capacitors

[WA5CAB at cs.com]

Meir,

I am in general inclined to agree with Hutch.  I've done three BC-312/342's 
(the triple .05 cans) either in whole or in part.  Besides looking neater, the 
next guy to own or need to work on the radio isn't faced with a bunch of 
strangely colored capacitors that don't look anything like the wiring diagram in th
e manual.  Before he can start trying to fix whatever might actually be wrong, 
he has to figure our whether the receiver was repaired the lazy way or 
modified extensively.  In one of the 312's, it turned out to be a mix of the two 
cases.  By the time I finally got it straightened out and working properly, I 
vowed that any set that ended up here looking like that was either going back to 
the owner unless he was willing to pay for the time to set it right or if it 
was mine from some swap deal was going on the parts donor shelf.

I will mention that I use a vacuum pump operated de-soldering station instead 
of the solder wick.  But I have to clean out the handpiece after almost every 
can.  If anyone cares, the .047/600V axial lead capacitors that Fair sells 
are a perfect fit in the rectangular cans.

In a message dated 12/21/2008 6:37:26 PM Central Standard Time, 
olegerityincj at austin.rr.com writes: 
> Meir -
> 
> In my opinion it is worth the effort once one learns how to perform the 
> operation  with out  making a mess. 
> The old cans do provide great support and terminal tie function, with 
> the added benefit of not moving the wiring
> harness around.  Get a good vise,  large soldering iron, and plenty of 
> solder wick.  The Oil, most
> likely toxic, can be placed in a small can and disposed of at the 
> hazardous materials dump.  Wash your hands.
> 
> I did this with my BC-348-R; replaced  .5uF 250WV in square cans, 
> re-stuffed the with  .47uF 400WV caps.
> Looks great and performs well did not have to add terminal boards or 
> move the wiring around. 
> 
> Later
> Hutch
> 
> Meir WF2U wrote:
> >Folks,
> >
> >I picked up an E.H. Scott Navy RCH receiver (same as the SLR-F civilian
> >nomenclatured receiver). Paid big $42 for it...
> >It's in pretty decent condition but the initial Variac-aided "smoke test"
> >shows that at least some bathtubs are not good. They're really not shorting
> >but I get all kinds of feed back and howling in the audio, and the audio is
> >intermittent. I also found one of the 4 uF filter caps (oil filled paper
> >cans)leaking and getting warm, so I took it out I'll stuff that can with 
> the
> >new cap as it's showing above the chassis.
> >The receiver when it feels like working right, sounds great, stable and
> >fairly sensitive (it'll work down to about 60VAC input!).
> >My dilemma is whether to use the bathtubs - 2 and 3 section - to hide the
> >new caps under, or whether I should open the tubs and stuff them with new
> >bypass caps. I can imagine opening a tub like this is a pretty messy job. 
> >There are something like 10 of them, but no discrete bypass caps, so the
> >whole thing is really neatly wired and easy to service.
> >I'm sort of a purist, but who looks at the bottom of the radio under the
> >chassis?
> 

Robert & Susan Downs - Houston
wa5cab dot com (Web Store)
MVPA 9480
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