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It was not my lamp, it was in PWK's livingroom, I just took the pic. But I do like it.

Boiled linseed oil -before and after -

And I'm very happy with the change. I originally came to lurk the forum for recapping my Heresys. Quickly got sucked in and now the Heresy is no longer recognizable. As for the caps, I initially went with the economical Solens, all the choices were bewildering. Did not notice much change from the 2 uf square black caps. Happy, but reading about all the caps, maybe things could be better. Was gathering my resources for some fancier caps, when Captain Beefheart provided a timely tip to the Russian NOS PIO caps on ebay, there are a few different sellers of the military surplus caps. They are priced even more economically than the Solens, but the shipping is of course more expensive. But ten days later they arrived on the doorstep on the earliest expected delivery date. I bought a large assortment so I could build every variation of the Heritage crossovers, and the ALK Universal. My first build is similar to the swamped type E used before with the Solens, but with the tweeter cap directly to the input instead via the T2A autoformer. Compared to the Solens, the Russian PIO caps are louder, more lively, and dynamic. The sound is fuller, has more body. I'm able to listen at louder volume. Still adjusting to the sound, and hope to tweak the voicing, balance as days go on, but extremely happy. I am now enjoying the music rather than listening for how it sounds, it is a more natural presentation, romantic, and reminiscent of the sound of my LaScalas new in 1981 which had the large PIO motor run caps on a Type AA. My Jones for fancy boutique caps has been satiated for now. Best part is these caps are even cheaper in price than the Solens. Highly recommended. Big thanks to @captainbeefheart and also to @Crankysoldermeister for his encouragement and helpful suggestion to forgo the woofer cap, that was also an easy noticeable change for the better.

In London there have to be a few vintage hi-fi shops, where you can find a selection of older gear in good or better condition, with at least some kind of warranty. If it's a good shop, they'll also be happy to give you some helpful advice on what will come closest to meeting your needs. This can have advantages over buying from private sellers. While it's possible to do everything online these days, that's not always the best way to go. Being able to see, and more importantly hear, what you like before you buy it is the way to be satisfied with what you get. Have a look around, and you may even find a shop not far from your neighbourhood. Once you get to know the staff, and they know that you're on an upgrade path and will come back later with more money if you're treated right, you may get pretty good service. Also, many hi-fi shops, even dealers in new high-end equipment, have a used/secondhand department, with a selection that changes over time. If they don't have anything that interests you, check back in a month or two, and see what has come in. If you're not too terribly cheap, they might even take your phone number and let you know when something suitable for your needs has come in. When you're looking for bargains, networking is key. For that matter, there must be hi-fi clubs in London. They may be similar to this Forum, in which members are often buying and selling gear, and sharing info about what's good and what's not, both in gear and in shops. Facebook is one place to start, plus some clubs have their own websites. With very small clubs, like under a hundred members, it won't be very lively, unlike this Forum, which has thousands of members. That's okay. You can join a few clubs without spending all your time on their sites. 'Nuff said!

It was -25F this morning at 4:00AM and now its a balmy -19F Thanks JJ

I never listened to mp3 from Tidal, but at least they lowered the price for CD quality from 20€ to 10€ in Germany, only MQA still costs 20€ (now with Atmos which I don't use). Your reasoning regarding the weakness of Tidal in play lists and pop content, visual presentation and menu navigation you could have copied 1:1 from my daughter Elisa, as well her example re at a party. For me as an old white man, the offer and the presentation is completely sufficient, I find my jazz records faster than 30 years earlier in the record store with six large rooms and incorrectly sorted records.🙃

I like polyurethane as it doesn't require much upkeep. Here is what my Heresy's looked like after pre-treatment, stain, and many coats of wipe-on poly. I plan to do the same with my La Scala's, though I probably will not stain. Here are my dad's 1982 La Scala's that he bought new. He re-finished them back in like 1995 or 1996. It's just some sort of polyurethane of the time. They still look like this picture (picture was taken in the early to mid-2000's).

Hi, an alternative to redoing the doghouse is to adhere black cloth like the Belles. I've seen photos from several people who have done this over the years. Really dresses them up IMO. Something like this:

I was impressed by the size of these:

Here is my first Chorus 1 re-capped crossover. Let me know if you see anything that doesn't look right, before I put 'em in!

Gain is +20db, with 1Vrms input you will reach 12.5 watts output. Another reason why I was going to conservatively rate the amplifier as a 12 watt amplifier, that and distortion is at 1% at 12 watts. People can enjoy the amplifier directly from a source without a preamplifier. From experience with real world grid current drive vs simulation it's tough for me to tell the exact output at 5% THD but I am willing to bet it will be at least 20 watts. It's my experience that the majority of sources will be at least 1Vrms or 1.4Vpeak which means those will never clip the amp, and of course many sources especially today's high end CD players or DAC's use higher rail voltages for the opamps, usually at least +/- 5V easily outputting 2Vrms and of course if you use a preamp on average they can swing even greater output pushing the amps boundaries to maximum of around 20 watts. 1.26Vrms will get you to 20 watts which should be doable from most sources.

You can use this to add a subwoofer output. Worked great for me to add a sub out to a tube amp. https://www.crutchfield.com/p_543ADP12/Russound-ADP-1-2-Speaker-level-to-Line-level-Adapter.html

That's interesting that you say 20 - 30watts is enough. I guess I made the walls out of double 18mm birch ply. I suppose it would be louder with more but not necessarily clearer. Crown looks great, but here in the UK is still slightly out of my budget. 🤣

He's giving them away free. Just post your SSN and address and they are yours.

A lot of us are cheap! Do you have a preamp of any kind? I've been using a used Crown D-45 for a couple of years. It replaced a pricey pair of tube monoblocks. I have used it on La Scalas, Heresy IIs, large MWM cabinets (2 15" woofers in each). The amp is 20-30 watts. Seriously, with the Belle style cabinet, you won't need much power. Would love to see those cabs in person. The pic probably doesn't show how nice spalted veneer can appear.

Sounds like you are replacing the grill board. Carefully remove the cane fabric and hand wash it in a tub with warm water and a mild detergent. I've done it to cane grills from heresies. I use Woolite detergent. I used a fabric brush as well to clean the fabric, they came out so much better after. Good luck

Pretty cold Eh ! 30 degrees with ice falling. Well...we'll KEEP ON TRUCKIN !

Certainly a great pair of LS2s. I'd let mine go for $6k even....

Another bargain

When I was in Thule Greenland for a year at -40F for six months they would put kerosene in the radiators, a plywood sheet in front of the radiator or the engine would never warm up, battery heater, head heater, plastic stick um sheets on the inside of the windows as the defrosters were useless, when parked outside never shut the engine off or it will never start again, 4 wheel drive is mandatory as the grease freezes the wheel bearings and it takes 1/4 mile to unlock them, transmission fluid into all the differentials, and chains on all four wheels. These chains would occasionally let go at 50 mph on sand covered ice roads and leave shrapnel holes in the fenders. JJK

Odd. No diodes on these. And just hooked them up, ran room correction, did a bit of tweaking...these things are super sensitive to toe-in. Going to have to fiddle about a bit. This change from the richness of the Cornwalls' bass to the tighter LS bass will take a bit of time. The soundstage seems to have receded a bit as well. Perhaps updating the caps/switching to AL3 configuration might help? I haven't given up hope yet. I've only just begun.

My H1's in Birch Raw with Watco Rejuvenating Oil.

Hi, I have recently traded in my cornwall iii for the 4's and I have them 11ft apart close to the wall and toe'd in so the speaker faces me directly. I sit 11ft away and find in this position I get the most detailed soundstage. Cheers Ady

Pfft... why spend $2.85 when you can instead spend maybe $3,000.....

I saw a pair of VMPS's at Today's Audio just outside Flint, MI years ago. Looked like something out of Dr. Who. Then there's the Genesis 1.2's

And, here I was going to suggest something radical like Locktite. 😉

Yup! I lived through that one in SW Ohio! The weatherman said we were getting a dusting of snow but wound up with 14-inches. Temps went down to -25F with wind chill down to -50F.

According to this old thread, the early AL crossovers did not have zener diodes. https://community.klipsch.com/index.php?/topic/73232-schematic-for-type-al-crossoveranyone/

Not true. I met a female Bose employee from the design department. She came to my circuit board lecture. They made products that people liked to NOT SEE, especially Women. Like the bose "sugar cube" speakers that has a small sub in the corner. All overpriced plastic with lots of compromises in performance the "normal" consumers would buy. I have a copy of the original Bose 901 Patent by Amar Bose. PWK used the 901 backwards and in a corner to improve the distortion by more that 12 db! It was the flagship of the company in the 70's and was used by PWK to show how GROSS the intermodulation distortion was. Only us "horn guys" could hear the EXTREME Intermodulation distortion that most Bose products produced. The best products that Bose ever came up with have been their MARKETING and SALES. Those have been exemplary! From an audiophile with golden ears perspective, one could even say Bose was even better at Advertising Distortion, which the purpose of their existence fundamentally! Trumpet the up and squelch the down.............lying by omission.

Oh yea, I made these too. I made a Tractrix (Bruce Edgar) horn from 18mm birch ply and 4mm bendy ply. I bought a plastic adapter to fit the drivers to the end

Yes, you can buy an external DAC.

Actually SRB means Slanted Riser Base.

Texting with @Marvel It looks like we are far enough south for all of this to just be rain this weekend.

What is your office system? That's my next project.

@DizRotus would know

@ToolShedAmps Matt pops in from time to time. There or 3 or 4 on here who have them, or are waiting for them to be built. I'm gathering there is a 6 month waiting list but don't quote me on that. Travis

Yamaha does phantom if you choose only L&R speakers. I just passed on a nice one month old r52c for a great price because I was told it's not a good match. Oh well.

Funny - some of the pics are obviously enhanced but the one with the sunset over the boats was straight from my iPhone 12.

Polk SDA. I have Polk SDA SRS. 5’3” and 180 pounds each…… Totally opposite of anything PWK made. I’m sure he had an opinion. 😉

Another idea is to add another bottle for 6 total, each channel gets a whole 6SN7 and tie both triodes in parallel, run it at 20mA with a low value cathode resistor.

You'll be fine.

Really? Show us some pictures of your welds on a k400

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So many years and VTL is still kicking !!!

Here day be

OK, next try... My first post in this thread was on April 28 2018, but no response... In 2017 I designed and build a current-drive system: - 2-way acoustic suspension loudspeakers, without crossovers and with (sorry, no horns) Scan-Speak drivers, - a 4-channel current-drive amplifier with an output impedance of 1380 Ω, - a 2x4 channel DSP/DAC for EQ, crossover and Dirac Live. I used woofers with non-conducting voice coil formers to avoid back-emf eddy currents (the other back-emf that also creates modulated noise). The amplifiers are based on an existing design for a voltage-drive amplifier of which I changed the feedback into negative current feedback and I changed the output stability filters (I would like to build an amplifier with a complementary cascode configuration). In the DSP I used filters and Linkwitz-transformers to create phase coherent crossovers (based on the ideas of Duelund), and to extend the bandwidth to full range. It's a full-range 2-way system (from just below 20 Hz). Since it was operational I gave away my voltage-drive system, no voltage-drive for me anymore... I'm open for questions, about the basic principles behind current-drive and about my system.

Well, it has been 8 years and I still have the VTL. It has proven to be a very well designed unit, one that I am still deeply enjoying though it is now driving a Sonic Frontiers Power 1 and a pair of Cornwall 2s. There has not been a need for service in any way with this unit, it is still quite happy running on the tubes that were in it the last time I posted to this thread. I know this thread goes back a ways and has been lost to the sands of time here, but I was doing a search on my preamp and this thread came up near the top of the Google list of links. At least for me, it turned out to be a wise investment to spend the most I could at the time on a quality used pre amp. The $/time factor is very low indeed and I am still enjoying the sound. How many here can say the same thing? I wonder, it would be fun to find out! It was also fun to see some names I have not seen for a long time, such as Guy. He was the driving force behind me gtetting this preamp and I am very thankfull to him for the great advice![]