I am a newbie in XO and capacitors. I wanted to find out by my self if a capacitor upgrade is worthwile or not (a capacitor upgrade for my speakers is quite expensive). Threrefore, I upgraded my tweeter capacitors and I was so surprised by the results that I would like to share my experience and ask a few questions.
My speakers are VMPS 626 Ribbon with the HET (high energy tweeter). I bought a bunch of AudioCap Theta to replace the stock capacitors for the tweeters. The capacitor set I bought is composed of two 1.0 uF (200V), two 0.33 uF (600V) and 10 0.01 uF (600V), all having 10% tolerance. My target capacitance is 1.37uF. For my left speaker, I combined three caps, one of each kind and measured a capacitance of 1.368 uF. For my right speaker, I combined only two caps, one 1.0 and one 0.33 and measured a capacitance equal to 1.367 uF. The sets of capacitors have almost identical capacitance. I installed the new capacitors and let my speakers play pink noise for two days.
Audition. My amplifier is the Sony AVD-S50ES digital amplifier. I played Chesky' "Introduction to SACD", track #6. The two speakers sound very different

. My left speaker treble is much more extended, has more "sparkle" and whereas my right speaker is a bit dull. Could this difference be explained from the fact that my left speaker has a very small capacitors (0.01 uF) and my right speaker not?
Well, to find out I added one 0.01 uF capacitor to my right speaker. And indeed, now both speakers have this extended treble
What surprises me is that a small high quality cap, an 0.33 uF AudioCap Theta , does not have an extended treble unless bypassed by a small value cap.
I wonder
- if this is specific to my speakers?
- if other capacitors brands (Auricaps, TRT, SoniCaps, MultiCap, ... ) would show the same characteristic?
- if it would be beneficial to add another 0.01 uF or may be a 0.001 uF cap?[/list:u]
Thanks,
Bruno