Resistor and Capacitor Color Code Charts
March 1955 Popular Electronics

March 1955 Popular Electronics Table of Contents Wax nostalgic about and learn from the history of early electronics. See articles from Popular Electronics, published October 1954 - April 1985. All copyrights are hereby acknowledged. articles from Popular Electronics.

As time marches on and electronics components get smaller and smaller, there is no just no room to apply color code markings for values, but in a lot of instances there is not even room to apply a laser alphanumerical marking (at least not one large enough to be seen with an unaided eye). This goes for common passive components like capacitors, inductors, and resistors as well as for integrated circuits, RF couplers and power dividers, diodes, and transformers. Open you cell phone and try to find a useful component designation. Only the largest parts will have anything you can look up on the Internet. There are ways to hunt down identification for some of the parts, but at least for Rs, Ls, and Cs, the only way to discover a value without the assistance of a schematic is to measure it. If you look at older electronics equipment, you will immediately notice color stripes and/or dots on many components. The table below will help you decipher the meanings for component value, tolerance, temperature coefficients, etc. ,as applicable.

Capacitor Color Code Chart

Related Pages on RF Cafe
- Capacitors & Capacitance Calculations
- Capacitor Color Codes
- Capacitance Conversions
- Capacitor Dielectrics
- Standard Capacitor Values
- Capacitor Vendors
- The Noble Art of De-Coupling

Capacitance is given in µµfd. Colors have the same values as on resistors, except as indicated in tables. Colors (A) and (B) are for first two digits; (e) is for multiplier. (D) is for tolerance, (E) and (F) give voltage rating in hundreds of volts; (E) is used only for ratings less than 1000 volts. (E) and (F) for first two digits of ratings 1000 volts or more. Values of colors for (E) and (F) are same as in resistance values. (G) is class or characteristic of capacitor. (H), (I), and (J) give temperature coefficient. (G), (H), (I), and (J) are not listed in the tables, since this information is seldom needed by the average home builder.

Capacitor Color Code Chart

Resistor Color Code Chart

The ohmic value of a resistor can be deter­mined by means of the color code. There are two standard methods of indicating this value. In Fig. A. the body (A) and end (B) indicate the first and second digits of the value while the dot (C) indicates the multiplier to be used. The tolerance of the unit is indicated by the end color (D). For example. if the body (A) is green the number is 5; if the end (B) is grey the second number is 8. If the dot (C) is red the multiplier is 100 or two zeros should be added. The resistor is then a 5800 ohm unit. If the end (D) has no color. the tolerance is ±20%. In Fig. B. the first two stripes indicate the first two digits; the third stripe the multiplier: the fourth stripe the tolerance. Thus, if stripe (A) is green, (B) is grey, (e) is red, and (D) is silver. the resistor is a 5800 ohm, ± 10% unit.

Resistor Color Code Chart

Posted April 21, 2013