Does capacitor brand really make any difference?

[NickKUK]

I use this quite a bit:

Filter Design and Analysis

They've got all the different filters you're going to bump into.

 

[nortiks]

Not at all.
The tone control circuit / cable capacitance, in combination with the pickups's internal LCR characteristics, forms a resonant filter.
You may find this helpful http://buildyourguitar.com/resources/lemme/

+ a million^^^. Just shunting the pickup to ground with various values of resistance significantly changes this response. And this is why a few manufacturers make variable Z inputs for guitar centric A/D boxes, which is simply a pot going to ground. It totally works and I built a pedal for myself that incorporates this feature. So it only follows if we had a shunt to ground whose resistance was not fixed, but is instead frequency dependent, well, we all know how that ends...a frequency dependent filter. And from the ESR plots of the caps that provide that data, we can see that it is not linear.

 

[Frank Araneo]

Not at all.
The tone control circuit / cable capacitance, in combination with the pickups's internal LCR characteristics, forms a resonant filter.
You may find this helpful http://buildyourguitar.com/resources/lemme/

Thanks for the link; I appreciate you taking the time to post it. I also respect your comments I've read on other issues. And I'm aware of the impact of capacitance issues of cables, pot and cap values, etc.., and the influence they impart on tone in the signal chain. I'm not debating that.

"Standard tone controls lower the resonant frequency by connecting a capacitor in parallel with the pickup (usually through a variable resistor to give some control over how much the capacitor affects the pickup). Therefore, one way to change the sound is to replace the standard tone control potentiometer with a rotary switch that connects different capacitors across the pickup (a recommended range is 470 pF to 10 nF). This will give you much more sound variation than a standard tone control (Fig. 8)."

My point was the brand or style of cap used in a guitar tone circuit (as tested in the videos I linked), not the cap value, has virtually no impact on the signal remaining in the circuit going to the amp. And if it does, is it discernible, which is the only relevant aspect. I've replaced cheap "chicklet" caps with Russian paper-in-oil of the same value, and could not really discern any difference. Some claim they can discern a difference. We're all free to spend our $$ as we wish. I was discussing the influence of the legendary (and expensive!) Sylvania dual-getter 6L6 (aka Mesa STR 415) with Mike Bendinelli of Mesa Boogie, and his response: "After the first cymbal crash, nobody can hear any difference."

Thanks again.

 

[Frank Araneo]

+ a million^^^. Just shunting the pickup to ground with various values of resistance significantly changes this response. And this is why a few manufacturers make variable Z inputs for guitar centric A/D boxes, which is simply a pot going to ground. It totally works and I built a pedal for myself that incorporates this feature. So it only follows if we had a shunt to ground whose resistance was not fixed, but is instead frequency dependent, well, we all know how that ends...a frequency dependent filter. And from the ESR plots of the caps that provide that data, we can see that it is not linear.

No argument there. Pot/cap values in a guitar tone circuit certainly effect tone. My point was, because the signal flowing through the guitar tone pot/cap is going to ground (and thus out of the signal chain), does the brand or style of cap really influence the signal remaining in the signal chain? The videos I linked suggest "no".