"Wurth Electronics" aluminum electrolytic caps - good, bad?

[tszaboo]

Just learn German. Its really not that hard. (yes, it is).

Back to topic, Würth is trying to sell everything. And I think I will use everything from them what they are selling. Their pricing is very reasonable, once you understand that they go with a different strategy than others. ie Vishay sells its products at Digikey/Mouser with a relatively small margin, and you can expect the booking price to be ballpark the list price. While Würth sells ie ceramic capacitors for a flat 0.1 dollar pricing, and if you want better, you need to contact them. And you should do that when you are designing the product. I fear vendor lock-in a little bit with their inductors, but so far there wasnt any unexpected delays, price increase or anything.
In any case, they are not for the consumer market, and I place reliability above a few cents of cost saving.

[tooki]

There's a reason I wrote "ür". In dialects which are non-rhotic (including High German), the letter R marks a vowel shift instead of a consonant. This mean that vowel+r is a dipthong.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rhoticity_in_English

Well it doesn't quite work that way. For one thing, German isn't English, so English rhoticity rules aren't relevant. There has been discussion among linguists as to whether rhoticity exists in German, but it's not a generally recognized attribute. (I do understand what you're saying, and indeed wiktionary for example does notate "r" as a vowel following certain other vowels.)

In any case, the rule you state is demonstrably incorrect. The shift in the "e" in German in "-er" happens ONLY with "e", not with any other vowel, and only at the end of a syllable. (For example, "Masse" vs "Wasser".)

As a counterexample, the words "wie" and "wir" form a minimal pair differing only in the addition of the final "r" — the "i" vowel remains unchanged. (It does amuse me that in standard German, "wir" is a two-syllable word. I speak German with the hard "r", so it's just one syllable for me.)

</linguist>

[jitter]

Agreed, I still think it's only to do with a sound shift.

[mrpackethead]

and it changes how the caps work how?

[tooki]

The electrons have to know which syllable they belong to! 

[Watth]

The umlaut is where all the electrolytes are.

[jitter]

Yeah, yeah...

But seriously, in the end the original question can't be answered yet. All we have to go on now are datasheets, but WE have (or is it has?) no reputation yet.
I do like the choice of the red printing and sleeving. Really stands out, so maybe that alone will earn them a reputation... 

[RobK_NL]

[...] WE have (or is it has?) no reputation yet.

Well, they do have a seriously good reputation when it comes to their inductive components. Having used those for the past 10+ years, I have no hesitation believing the datasheets for their caps.
The samples I have tested so far have proven my confidence right.

[Ice-Tea]

Just an FYI: a Wuerth bloke just confirmed this is a Wuerth factory, not just a rebadge.

[dmills]

While I will wait a bit on their caps just to let any early process issues get worked out, Wurth have a **SERIOUS** rep for quality parts in other areas.

Now I am slightly puzzled as to what the unique selling point is, I mean a premium brand electrolytic is what it is, and I would need to see a reason to go Wurth rather then Pansonic/Nippon-Chemi/ whoever, which are already known quantities and already exist in my database.
That said if there was a reason to pick their product I would probably not hold back on quality grounds.

Regards, Dan.

[jitter]

Well, I don't think that WE is going to reinvent the wheel by starting a factory from scratch and building knowledge from scratch.
Confirming that they're not rebrands only means that they own the factory, not that they built it. They may have acquired it by a take over, which in this day and age seems the most likely scenario. And a normal thing for WE, lots of acquisitions, just like TE.

The fact that WE has a good reputation on (e.g.) inductors may not mean that much when it comes to something different.
As an example, I will name Philips, which is a multinational that has its origins in the city I live in (my avatar shows the Evoluon, a landmark and related to Philips).
Philips made some good things and some bad things. The former I would buy without thinking, the latter, I wouldn't go near, obviously. Same could apply to WE.

I just found a thread in which someone confirms WE caps were made in China. That in itself doesn't mean that the quality isn't OK, but when I see the word "VENT" on a cap, my toes start to curl as it's always a cheap Chinese cap that goes under lots of different brands, some of them not even vaguely familiar. Only those brands seem to feel the need to print "VENT" on the sleeve of an electrolytic... and oh dear, look at this image:



Now I'm really going to wait until WE's caps quality is confirmed... That may just be a CapXon (or similar) underneath...

[Ice-Tea]

Well, I don't think that WE is going to reinvent the wheel by starting a factory from scratch and building knowledge from scratch.
Confirming that they're not rebrands only means that they own the factory, not that they built it. They may have acquired it by a take over, which in this day and age seems the most likely scenario.

The guy confirmed that this is the case for some of their connectors (they recently took over an Italian company), that they buy the dies for the LED but do the chip packaging themselves and that they set up the elco factory.

Then again, this was a rep, so it's not entirely impossible he's full of s**t 

[jitter]

Well, I don't think that WE is going to reinvent the wheel by starting a factory from scratch and building knowledge from scratch.
Confirming that they're not rebrands only means that they own the factory, not that they built it. They may have acquired it by a take over, which in this day and age seems the most likely scenario.

The guy confirmed that this is the case for some of their connectors (they recently took over an Italian company), that they buy the dies for the LED but do the chip packaging themselves and that they set up the elco factory.

Then again, this was a rep, so it's not entirely impossible he's full of s**t 

First of all, originally you only said they were not rebrands. Rebrands are made by someone else (not owned) who puts your brand on it. If they bought (owned), say, CapXon, they could legally say they're not rebrands.

Second of all, I don't trust sales people, and I agree, they're full of shit... let's put it a bit more mildly... creative with the truth. 

But lets get back on topic: quality! If they impose stringent quality controls (whether they set up the factory from scratch or did a take over, it doesn't matter), it should earn them a reputation. But that takes years, and WE has only been at it for ~2 years now.

Edit:
I can't help but find some very conspicuous similarities beteen WE caps and CapXons... That "*-NEG"-marking is just waaay to similar to be a coincidence. I mean, if they were going to "borrow" a style, why not one of the reputable brands, just to get the psychological effect? Meh, I wouldn't be surprised they now own CapXon, but let that brand coexist with WE's own... and they did indeed setup a new factory with their knowledge. If that should be the case, the sales rep would have been telling the truth after all (while leaving out certain details  ).



Edit: I linked in a photo from a different source in my previous post. Originally, it linked to one from WE itself but that link became inactive in less than a day... I wonder why...