Author Topic: My new amp  (Read 80229 times)

Offline springcreek

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My new amp
« on: June 19, 2013, 12:19:57 PM »
My Leak stereo 20 has been refurbished with carbon comps and Russian K40y PIO caps. Still a long way way from Stevens but it should be a good start.  ;D

Hopefully should get it in a week or two before a trip to Stevens  8)

Then I can really start to tune it!


« Last Edit: June 19, 2013, 12:23:40 PM by springcreek »

Offline springcreek

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Re: My new amp
« Reply #1 on: June 19, 2013, 12:21:07 PM »
Not sure why the two pics went up, but twice the joy  ;D

Offline ozmillsy

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Re: My new amp
« Reply #2 on: June 19, 2013, 04:29:24 PM »
Looks to be in great condition.   Enjoy !!
It's all about the music,, not the equipment.

Offline springcreek

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Re: My new amp
« Reply #3 on: June 19, 2013, 04:35:54 PM »
Thanks Oz will do mate  ;D


Offline stevenvalve

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Re: My new amp
« Reply #4 on: June 19, 2013, 05:20:53 PM »
Nice condition. It will eventually be striped to the bone, and rebuilt with the right internal toys. But that is well down the track. Even standard they are nice. And yours is modified with some nice stuff.
« Last Edit: June 19, 2013, 05:24:59 PM by stevenvalve »

Offline springcreek

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Re: My new amp
« Reply #5 on: June 19, 2013, 06:25:03 PM »
Damn just drooled on my iPad...again!  ;D

Can't wait to get it to that standard  :o

Offline Jehuty

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Re: My new amp
« Reply #6 on: June 20, 2013, 05:52:17 AM »
Congratz Andy. It looks mint!
Not all that matters can be measured, not all that can be measured matters.

Offline data

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Re: My new amp
« Reply #7 on: June 21, 2013, 02:46:16 AM »
Very nice example of a stereo 20  8)

Offline Jehuty

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Re: My new amp
« Reply #8 on: June 21, 2013, 11:26:12 PM »
Nice condition. It will eventually be striped to the bone, and rebuilt with the right internal toys. But that is well down the track. Even standard they are nice. And yours is modified with some nice stuff.

Hi Steve,

I read this post on the US forum about damping bare wires with cotton, see: http://www.audiocircle.com/index.php?topic=54218.msg1227331#msg1227331

Quote
Many people believe lots of things.  I want to BE LIVE.  The only way to know if something is better or not is to experiment and listen on a seriously tweak system, not quote others who "believe" something.  My direct experience tells me that bypassing is really a necessity.  I have never heard a very large cap (1uf or more) that had really great extended highs.  Audio Research bypasses their exotic custom large Teflon caps with smaller values.  They do this because they listen.  A friend just bypassed his Clarity Cap MRs in his speaker with the inexpensive Vishay Roderstein .01s and .1s and says it made a serious improvement.  Audio tweaking is an art.  Certainly you must listen to different combos of caps and all properly burned in, oriented and damped.  All film caps need to be marked for outside foil and oriented so the outside foil is to ground or to the output.  This makes a noticeable improvement.  Also all caps should be damped....ie not dangling in the air....and all long single strand bare wires need to be covered with cotton sleeving to damp them.  All these things are very audible.  A person posted on Audio Asylum that he tried the Vishay Rodersteins as a bypass cap but they sounded seriously bright.  I replied that he probably has them dangling in the air on undamped leads.....he reported back a few days later saying....indeed, I was right...as soon as he damped the caps and wires he now is very happy with the bypasses.  Everything has to be done right!!!!!!  Years ago I modded an Audio Research Preamp that had both Rel-caps and Wondercaps in it.  Audio Research did not know about outside foil then.  So, they just lined all the caps up so the writing was in the same directions for visual coolness.  I removed all the film caps and tested the Rel-caps and marked them for outside foil and put all caps back in, in the electrically correct way (Wonder caps are marked for outside foil via the writing on them)......way frickin better sound.

Many interesting points from his post, not necessarily agree with all of it. I am particularly interested to know your opinion with regards to cotton sleeving compared to teflon as seen in your Leak amp (and other things you built). Could the cotton sound better? Why teflon? Why not cotton? Or even silk like the Henley...not sure where to get the silk sleeving though...

Thanks,
William
Not all that matters can be measured, not all that can be measured matters.

Offline springcreek

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Re: My new amp
« Reply #9 on: June 22, 2013, 08:35:03 AM »
Thanks guys  ;D Thanks Jehuty this is useful. I have heard others talk about using cotton sleeving on single strand and I have some here that I got from the soundlabs group. Unbleached cotton should be nice, love to know Steve's thoughts on this. I also have some cat 5 here ready for use in the Leak  ;)

Offline galwaybay

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Re: My new amp
« Reply #10 on: June 23, 2013, 09:48:51 AM »
Congrats on the new amp Andy. Welcome to the Stereo 20 owners club. Yours looks like a particularly good find, very nice cosmetic condition. In comparison mine looks like it went twelve rounds with Mike Tyson !. You've already got those Russian PIO's installed which is a bonus. They are remarkably good sounding caps IMO. Really flesh out the Leak which can be a bit on the lean and  clean side without a bit of judicious modding. Looking forward to seeing you in mountains in a couple of weeks. Cheers Peter.

Offline springcreek

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Re: My new amp
« Reply #11 on: June 26, 2013, 07:51:49 PM »
Thanks Peter

I'm really looking forward to hearing your Leak with the Quads...bet it's delicious. Would love to get some nice 57s one day.

Loving the Axiom 300s at the moment! Damn! Even my wife said they are amazing  :o

See you in a few weeks  ;D

Just need to figure out a way to sneak out Steven's spare Quads...may about 6 am when he is snoozing...after I grab the R2R of course :P

Offline Jehuty

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Re: My new amp
« Reply #12 on: June 26, 2013, 08:16:04 PM »
Loving the Axiom 300s at the moment! Damn! Even my wife said they are amazing  :o

Hi Andy, great to hear you like the Axiom 300, can't beat them for the money, what a buy! Where's the obligatory pic?  ;D

after I grab the R2R of course :P

You can try...but beware of how heavy the bloody thing is, you need at least two big (and I mean BIG) blokes to bring it out of his place!!  >:(  Last time he said when it's time to sell the house, the machine goes with it!  ;D
Not all that matters can be measured, not all that can be measured matters.

Offline springcreek

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Re: My new amp
« Reply #13 on: June 26, 2013, 09:22:08 PM »
Hey William

Well I only have a few hours on the Axiom 300s so far and they are really coming to life. Was playing some jazz tonight and it sounded really good with just a DVD player and the miniwatt  :o As you would expect the midrange is wonderfully open and alive...with my wife (who really doesn't like my audio kit) said they sounded so much more alive than the triaxioms...which are really great themselves. So far no shout or hot top end.

Very lucky score! ;)

Will be some mint Triaxioms on the market soon I think  :D

Will post some pics when I get time

Offline springcreek

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Re: My new amp
« Reply #14 on: June 26, 2013, 09:25:30 PM »
Heavy R2R...I am big and ugly and have a trolley  :P

Offline Jehuty

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Re: My new amp
« Reply #15 on: November 02, 2013, 11:30:45 PM »
Hi Andy,

How are you going with your Leak? Did you do any mods on the amp? What valves are you running?

Cheers,
William
Not all that matters can be measured, not all that can be measured matters.

Offline springcreek

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Re: My new amp
« Reply #16 on: November 03, 2013, 03:10:07 PM »
Hi William

Have made a few changes to the Leak. Steven helped me replace a few critical resistors with 2 watt Allen Bradley's. Paul B weaved his magic on the amp replacing the power supply caps with Solen's and the remaining electrolytic's. Paul also replaced many of critical resistors with vintage Phillips. Binding posts were replaced with Eichman's. Still have the Mullard rectifier, and some NEC 12AX7s. Still need to get some Mullard EL84s. Also have a better power cord.

Did you get a Leak?

Cheers, Andy
« Last Edit: November 04, 2013, 12:20:51 PM by springcreek »

Offline Jehuty

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Re: My new amp
« Reply #17 on: November 03, 2013, 04:16:15 PM »
Hi Andy,

Nothing confirmed yet. I'll update if I do go ahead.

How do you like your Leak so far with your Axiom 300? What coupling caps do you use? I got some boxes from Paul for my Goodmans Twin Axiom. I will also have 2 pairs of ribbon tweeters and a pair of Goodmans Trebax to play around. I plan to run them with a Leak 20, hence my questions. Fun times ahead!  ;D

Cheers,
William
Not all that matters can be measured, not all that can be measured matters.

Offline springcreek

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Re: My new amp
« Reply #18 on: November 03, 2013, 08:05:31 PM »
Hi William

I like the Leak a lot. Still have Sovteks in it at the moment which are pretty awful. They are really limiting the magic. Also there has been a lot of changes to my system around the same time. I have new speaker cabinets (Shindo style cabinets that Damian made), new speaker wires (Auditorium 23 also from Damian), new turntable (Micro-seiki), new tonearm (Fidelity Research), new cartridge (Garrott P77i), and new phono stage (Graham Slee Reflex M).

I am getting a great result so far, but need to do some tuning as while the bass is very good I'd like it better still. Only minor really, but I'm hoping I can get it sorted. The results are a long way ahead of where I was before!  ;D

I will be replacing the front baffle (see pic) with a veneered one when funds allow.

Let me know how you go with the new speaker cabinets.

Cheers, Andy

Ps. To give some idea of scale the TV is 50 inches.
 
Pps. The Rainbow Diffusor is for sale at $500 a pop  :P
« Last Edit: November 04, 2013, 12:32:04 PM by springcreek »

Offline Jehuty

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Re: My new amp
« Reply #19 on: November 03, 2013, 08:30:09 PM »
Hi Andy,

I see that you got plenty of new toys! How fun!  ;D

Will keep you posted about my progress.

Cheers,
William
Not all that matters can be measured, not all that can be measured matters.