I bought a Bottlehead Crack used in about 2012. It's always sounded pretty good but with a random noise you'd hear coming down the pipe. I always assumed it was the old 1940s tubes I was using. I finally decided to look closely at the work underneath and there was a positive power wire running through a tube post without solder on it. I soldered it to make the connection and the thing is perfect now. I only got it used because the price was right. I"d have loved to have put it together myself from scratch.
This is my first time to see one of your videos. I'm a lifelong music loving audiophile, but I've only been watching audiophile and electronics RU-vid for a while, now. I really enjoyed this, though I haven't built anything from a kit since my first stereo, a Heathkit transistor amp, back in the first months of 1969! Many thanks.
Very nice work! I agree 100% that buying our kits used is a crap shoot, as there is no guarantee of the build quality. It's usually easier to build from a new kit than to fix all the boogered up stuff in a bad build. I will also suggest that while you know what you are doing, the average builder probably shouldn't take apart the channel frame chokes unless they understand their construction. Once that channel is off be very careful in handling the lam stack. It is easy to knock the I's loose from the E's and that would ruin the air gap and thus the choke's inductance.
I guess Im asking the wrong place but does any of you know of a method to log back into an instagram account? I was stupid forgot my account password. I would love any assistance you can give me!
@Christopher Marcelo Thanks for your reply. I got to the site on google and im trying it out atm. I see it takes quite some time so I will reply here later when my account password hopefully is recovered.
The most amazing part was how that first track managed to punch through the youtube audio monster surprisingly unscathed. The male vocal was amazing even from here with Celestian 3s hooked to my computer.
I purchased a used stereamour, but I went to the guy's house and auditioned it. Even then I was a bit worried cause I basically paid almost what the kit cost. But I gotta say, it sounds marvelous. Dead quiet. Plenty of oomph into Klipsch Heresys. It's just a little homely.
One tip: If you apply polyurethane paint, put the objects in your wive's kitchen oven (obviously she has to be out of the house or you will be lynched). Let 'bake' for about 15 minutes at 80°C (about 180°F)
I would also add that the metal should be degreased before painting. Gets rid of the finger grease they were getting there in abundance. I'd be wary of cooking the transformers myself in case it softened up the potting too much. Yes I know they can run pretty hot when in use. Bottlehead use American alder for all of their bases and I'm sure Doc could have supplied a new one at less cost than your custom one. I have a Bottlehead Crack headphone amp that I built for my Sennheiser HD60o's. Very nice and a good build to start you off. Entire set up is nice. I have a pair of Quartets, rare in the UK, with Crites tweeters and cross over upgrade. Amp choice is a pair of Quad II's or a Luxman L30. Have a Linn with that LVX arm with an Ortophon MC10 + Audio Technica transformer so we are similar.
I agree. It's good to preserve those beautiful Sylvania green leaf globe 45 tubes! Do they have the thoriated tungsten fillament? The RCA 45s you chose to run with are nice too, still globes. Nice amp, good job on bringing it up quality build.
Was interested in bidding on item on ebay but listing was sparse on info so I email question and explained how I wanted to bid but had concerns. I did not hear back, but I gave a chance and bid anyway. I sniped and thought I had won as my bid qualified. I was surprised to learn from ebay that the seller had blocked me from bidding. I can only surmise that my earlier questions and concerns caused some guilt to the seller as he/she was probably not being up front with info.
Hi, thanks so much for the video and for your tutorials on how to read schematics. I really appreciate your time and efforts. About this project, when you fixed the soldering joints, did you just reflow the solder, or do you remove the solder and redo the mechanical connection first? I'm having to fix some solder joints on an amp I have. Thanks again and hope all's well. :)
That turned out to be a beautiful piece of electronics! Don't you think a string of high glosset brass would look nice in the grooves? Thank you for nice and interesting videos, Blue Glow
Love the look of wood with tube amp chassis'. What speakers do you run with this 2 watt wonder? You really should do a vintage mic preamp project video and then mic your speakers seperately in stereo so we can appreciate your work properly. Nice lesson on caveat emptor with these old kit amps. Keep em glowing!
How many watts to you solder with? I was told that you should use a high watt solder iron - around 450 Watt to heat the solder quickly and make the solder joint so you don't just sit there cooking your parts while you try to get the joint hot enough to melt the solder. Is a higher solder Watt setting better?
+roomba I use a Hakko FX888 soldering iron. They run about $96 shipped on ebay. Its a constant temperature iron, so I set it on 750 degrees for most point to point wiring.
You MUST get the parts hot enough to melt the solder. If you heat the solder itself and the parts are not equally hot then it will not bond. But, some things need to be heated to the right temp quickly before too much heat dissipates to parts damaged by heat. The largest I ever use is a weller 100/150 watt gun. Mostly I use 15, 20, or 30watt pencils for circuit boards.
