capacitor terms and specs confusion

[David, K3TUE]

I have been looking at cap's and have seen what looks like a voltage potential followed by WV.  Can anyone shed any light on what/why this is?

[Carl WA1KPD]

WV ="working voltage". This is the maximum voltage at which the capacitor operates without leaking excessively or arcing through. This working voltage is expressed in terms of DC but the AC equivalent is about only one half of that DC rating. As the AC frequency increases the working voltage rating decreases further still.

http://www.electronics-tutorials.com/basics/working-voltage-capacitance.htm

[Rick K5IAR]

Capacitors will generally take considerably more voltage for an instant than they will for extended periods of time.  So, the WV or working voltage should not be exceeded or even reached as far as I'm concerned, during normal operation.  However, you may get a surge voltage for an instant that surpasses this WV voltage that will not damage the capacitor.

Rick/K5IAR

[Tom WA3KLR]

Aluminum electrolytics are very good at handling voltage surges over the working voltage rating.

Tantalum electrolytics are very poor at handling transients above the working voltage.  You should not put tantalum capacitors in the rectifier filters of a.c. line-powered transformer power supplies.  They are o.k. to use AFTER the voltage regulator i.c.s.