10 MFD capacitor

Thread Starter

1-3-2-4

Joined Dec 26, 2008
199
I got myself a little confused I'm trying to convert a 10 MFD cap into uF would it be the same as 10 uF right?
 

bertus

Joined Apr 5, 2008
22,270
Hello,

The 10 MFD is probably taken from a very old schematic.
Nowerdays they would write the 10 μF.

Bertus
 

Thread Starter

1-3-2-4

Joined Dec 26, 2008
199
The funny thing is it's from a speaker PCB and the speaker is only maybe 6 years old.. that's why I'm confused.. I've only seen those markings on things from the 60's
 

wmodavis

Joined Oct 23, 2010
739
Actually to correctly make the conversion from MFD to uF you need to use a slide rule and multiply by the appropriate constant. That constant being 1.0000000.
 

crutschow

Joined Mar 14, 2008
34,280
Actually to correctly make the conversion from MFD to uF you need to use a slide rule and multiply by the appropriate constant. That constant being 1.0000000.
You must have a very long slide rule. Mine is only good to 3 decimal places (perhaps 4 if I squint). ;)

The old joke back in my early days was that an engineer is one who multiplies 2 x 2 with his slide rule, gets an answer or 3.99 and says "Aw what the heck, I'll round it off to 4.00".
 

wmodavis

Joined Oct 23, 2010
739
But I was dead serious. It works every time. And on my slide rule I can also add. Bet if you try it on yours it will work on yours too with the stipulation that it is limited to adding 2 + 2.
 

Audioguru

Joined Dec 20, 2007
11,248
The speaker with the 10 MFD capacitor might be only 6 years old but the engineer who spec'd the 10 MFD condenser is probably 60 years old and studied electronics using MFD condensers.
 

Wendy

Joined Mar 24, 2008
23,415
The speaker with the 10 MFD capacitor might be only 6 years old but the engineer who spec'd the 10 MFD condenser is probably 60 years old and studied electronics using MFD condensers.
Speaking from experience? :p

Gawd, I'm 55. Never mind.
 

BSomer

Joined Dec 28, 2011
434
When I was doing electrical service work for a local contractor I often ran into capacitors marked with a MFD vs the uF. It was generally in HID lighting like metal halide or high pressure sodium fixtures. The first time I came across that I was a little confused and got out my meter to check it. The capacitor I measured was in the microfarad range and not a milifarad or Megafarad, which I knew would be a really BIG capacitor. Capacitors used in HID ballasts are still available with this MFD marking. Some manufacturers are just stuck in their ways and don't want to change. :)
 
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