Stereo thread

[Oldschool]

I have been kicking around for a while the idea of building a pair of mono block tube amps for an Audio system.

A couple of years back I was in a very old industrial plant where amoung other things I had to keep the I love lucy line running.

I did some tube stuff in college but never much touched them untill confronted with these massive Ignatron powered Silpacs and Amplydine regulated MG sets. Non of this makes sence to most people who are not electricians in 1950 so I won't get too far into it. Safe to say I was the youngest old guy in this place. Infact the guy I replaced who pensioned off left the radio for his 58 plymouth behind in my locker.

SO I had all this cool stuff and and lot of cast off projects in my little electric shop and deiced to build my first scratch Tube radio with a simple class A amp ( think it was some 12AX7 and 6L6 feeding the loud speaker for the old PA system ).

It worked but everyone sounded like they had a hair lip.

I can do better of course...

So I have been search for a high fidelty project to build something that sounds realy nice for my home. Been through a big box of tubes and assorted stuff and with the exception of some transformers all I need is a plan.

Any Audiophiles here that could push in the direction of something simple and clear?
Its not that hard to fix an amp but its a question of real skill to design one. I can't realy look at a print and tell what's a good design and what isn't.

Fun just to look at them isn't it?
6V6GT Single Ended - 6SN7 SRPP Stereo Amplifier Trial - YouTube

 

[DZLBIKE]

Talk to the BayAreaBurrito, his living room looks like something off of Star Trek!

My personal stereo is an old Marantz. :cool2:

 

[rimfire]

check out audioholics.com
you may find the forums interesting.

 

[fonz]

Bang & OlufsenThe stuff they made 30 years ago looks futuristic today. Hunt for it on Ebay. The Bang & Olufsen stuff is still worth a small fortune but it is absolutly beautiful with the best sound of any brand ever made.
Here's a pic of my 20 year old system. Everything hangs on the wall except for the turn table

 

[KustomKartKid]

when I moved into my house I found an old Heathkit tube amp in a basement closet...I put it on Ebay and guys were fist fighting over it...I don't have a clue as to why I don;t know anything about that stuff.

I did some jukebox restorations years ago too...I had a buddy of mine refurbish the amps for me and I rememeber him bragging about the "sliky smooth Russian 6L6 tubes" he was using :shrug:...I used to just nod my head in approval :smile:

Hey Oldschool...do you remember when Radio Shack was actually a cool store to walk around in.....like 1969 ?

 

[Oldschool]

when I moved into my house I found an old Heathkit tube amp in a basement closet...I put it on Ebay and guys were fist fighting over it...I don't have a clue as to why I don;t know anything about that stuff.

I did some jukebox restorations years ago too...I had a buddy of mine refurbish the amps for me and I rememeber him bragging about the "sliky smooth Russian 6L6 tubes" he was using :shrug:...I used to just nod my head in approval :smile:

Hey Oldschool...do you remember when Radio Shack was actually a cool store to walk around in.....like 1969 ?

I'll be honest with you, we didn't have an radio shack I can clearly remember untill the 70s. And even then it didn't have much of interest, and I was young and not intersted in things electronic back then.

In the early 70s I recall the new siberia mall ( thats what we called that end of town because it was in the midle of no place down the road from a closed up Studibaker dealership and furnature store lol.... ).
One of my memories was this mall with Radio shack full of things like this dead cool Sony portable TV that needed 10 poundsof D cells to run, Sears that had nothing but snow blowers and ladies ware iles full of bras for fat ladies and bell bottom pants my sister was into.
And a pet shop with shark and a monkee in the window that " deleted. because its funny but in bad taste "( filthy creatuire they got rid of not long after us kids discoverd the uly little bugger's dark secret ).....
OH we were bad kids lol

Life in a northern town......
Heathkit was choice of fab your own by the time I was in college.
I think I still have afew boxes of parts for things I never finnished.

My brother saved his paper route money and bought the TV.
I think he still has it

There is a tube sound.
Not sure if I call it silky so much as natural.
Kind of like comparing a CD to a LP that in very good shape on a very good turn table.
If you have a good ear you can pick up the difference. But it s aslight difference at best and my hearing is no hell these days.

First amp I ever worked on used the 6L6 GC for a chum of mine's base.
This would be in 1990 I guess?
Tubes were almost impossible to find and my chum was in love with this amp since college.
I lucked out and found some tubes in a TV shop.
The fellow practicaly gave them away because as he said no one asks or even has this kind of thing anymore.

TV shop......
Do they still have those?
I have shit Chinese LCD TV my wife bought witha blow pixl and ghosts on the right sde of the screan.
Stupid thing is destin for the garbage because no one within 500 kms will even look at it for repair.

 

[Dual-500]

Well well well. I knew there was something I liked about you Oldschool. Looks like you started a few years before me - but, I've replaced vibrators and tuned ferrite slugs for AM car radios too.

Started in electronics back in 1968 in the 8th grade. Took it to working as a field service engineer for a defense contractor - Automatic Test Equipment and Integrated Avionics for F-16's. Then a few years of plannig and project work in-house, got bored and went to loading embedded firmware on the F-22 Raptor (field team lead). Of course, after about 2 years they figured out I could masquerade as a decent project engineer and lead so they strapped to a desk again.

In the 80's I worked professinal audio - graduated with a degree in Theatre Arts, Technical Lighting and Sound Design. Back in the mid 70's I bought a high end stereo system which in 1978 I added lights and DJ mixer and started a mobile DJ business that morhped into a regional pro audio and lighting shop. Did sound reinforcement, stage lighting and some custom shop work as well as institutional installs - churches, clubs, etc.

Built lots of Heathkit stuff, and scratch built a preamp with a pair of 12AX7's - also built a couple of amplifier kits from a company called Southwest Technical Products.

Did without a decent home stereo for darn near 25 years, so I started working on that problem back in 2000 using overtime money and buying lots of high end used gear and a few new pieces. Brought the current system online in November of 2005 and it's been morphing ever since.

Current configuration: Features 4 x DBX DriveRack PA's that control L&R mains (2 x DR's used for active quad-amping), Center channel (tri-amped_ and the den part of a whole house system (bi-amping with a pair of JBL S-38's & a Dayton 15" subwoofer).

 

[Oldschool]

BAck in college the SAC needed a Radio station manager.

No aplicants but me....

So here I was surounded by 1800 albums a booth and gear and transmitter no one warmed up in a decade.

No liscence for said transmitter also, expired.

It was very old stuff and much of it not used in a very long time.
I found a chuck Berry album in a turn table that probably had not spun in a decade.

At this point the CD had been introduced and I was getting all kinds of free stuff from CANCON. SO I modernized the place.

Lets just say I learned a lot those years.
A REALY good turntable ( And I grew fond of the SL-1200 ) with records kept in good order and someone with a light touch could seamless run 3 turn tables and run a show or prerecord without much effort.

I keep going back to edit my responses because I tell stories that don't go any place lol.....

To condence things I learned that REALY good ( an I had realy good stuff to play with ).
Is generaly simple and focused.

Good simple Amps.
Good Speakers.
ect ect.

HArd to beat no matter what era they were made if they are kept in good order.
I had techers and technical people that were willing to help me fix things and I learned a lot.

Decades later a chum of mine needs tubes to fix an Amp.
One leads to other as it turns out he realy digs fixing and playing on other people amps lol.

Then I get sucked in and rewarm to the idea of building or rebuilding a good tune set.
Just wish I had all those albums again. And that big mixing board, And those German speakers in my office ( office would be nice too ).

Suddenly things come full cirlce again when all these tubes at work need replacing and drives need tuning.
The love afair with things I could tinker and tune comes back again.

End ramble

 

[Dual-500]

Technics SL1200

Technics SL1200 is my favorite:

 

[rollin2]

Hey dual-500.Love the old school stuff.I see your carver:thumbsup:I was running two seperate carver tfm-15 amps bridged to 300 watt per side running them mono for the rt and lft.with a set of norman labs model 9.It would get the cops to my house faster than a 911 call!!
A freind of a freind couldent live without the carvers,so sold them.Still got the normans,running all ADS.

When i was laid off,i made almost as good money buying and selling vintage sterio stuff on ebay.Sold a sansui tube amp that need a tube,powered up but did not work.Paid 50 bucks for it.Even listed as not working,sold for 1400!!

 

[fonz]

Dual 500:
I'm in aww!!! Great rack!! And the turn table. Geeze it was so cool in the late seventies when there were sterio shops every where. The special room where all the amps, preamps, tuners and speakers were all hooked together. Bring in your favorite LP and blow the doors off the store!! What a great time!!Here's the turn table that goes with my system. Dual arm tangetal tracking. The Beogram 4500 The first arm had a laser that read the blank spots in between songs. So you could program it to play only the third song 4 times or skip around and play what ever cut you wanted in any order. Way ahead of its time!! And every piece in the system had no visable knobs, dials, switches, buttons etc. Everything was hidden under a black glass and only showed up once the unit was on. The switches only worked by human touch. If you touched them lets say with a pencil eraser, it wouldn't work.

I finally had the money later in life to buy this stuff, but I'm truley impressed by the knowledge of you and Oldschool You two guys put me to shame with what you know......

 

[Dual-500]

Hey dual-500.Love the old school stuff.I see your carver:thumbsup:I was running two seperate carver tfm-15 amps bridged to 300 watt per side running them mono for the rt and lft.with a set of norman labs model 9.It would get the cops to my house faster than a 911 call!!
A freind of a freind couldent live without the carvers,so sold them.Still got the normans,running all ADS.

When i was laid off,i made almost as good money buying and selling vintage sterio stuff on ebay.Sold a sansui tube amp that need a tube,powered up but did not work.Paid 50 bucks for it.Even listed as not working,sold for 1400!!

Not to hijack Oldschools tube amp thread. But, yeah I'm currently using a Carver TFM-35x bridged mono driving a single JBL 2245 18" LF driver in a beat up old JBL cabinet. The current amp rack is about as far as it's going to go build wise, maybe a few more tweaks then everything moves into a larger rack.

Ultimately, to power the LF on the main system, I have a monster that is awaiting restoration. In fact, in it's honor is where my handle Dual-500 came from.