JohnA
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Posts posted by JohnA
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Look at the graph of the power vs distortion curve on the Marantz. Your Belles will be operating entirely in the vertical portion of the curve along the left axis. The distortion is quite high there. A 250 watt amp will probably be even worse. It would be a complete waste with Belles. I'd look for a 30 to 50 watt Class A power amp like the Monarchy(?).
John
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They look to be identical to the theater La Scala Type ALs. I'd reuse the wood plate, terminal strip and autoformer. The rest of that stuff has to go! If you intend to use them as portable sound reinforcement, I think I'd buy a set of Klipsch Type AL-3s. If not, turn your into Type ALKs ot Type AAs.
John
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EJ,
I believe you can use some of the parts of you Type ALs to make Type AAs. That's what I'd do. I'd also use better caps and inductors when doing it.
John
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With grilles, OBM and as nice as they look, they ought to bring at least $1500.
If I could see tham to verify they are in fact that pristine and wanted a pair, I'd give $2000 for a set like that. They were about $2800 new.
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Vampire Wire Silver Clad copper for 2-channel and phono and OFC copper for all the rest.
John
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Dale,
I work in Fossil Engineering for all 11 of our coal-fired and 5 combustion turbine sites. I have even been to Operator School to "run" the simulator of one the 200 MWe units. The school puts on a class every so often for engineers. A few years ago, they started sending all of us to the real Operator school, because Management feared a strike. It was cool. I only got half way through before the conflict was settled. I have a HUGE fascination for machines, from small ones like handguns and clocks to 1300 MWe turbines and 3500 psi boiler feed pumps. It's so bad, I took a tour of a coal-fired plant in Australia while I was there on holiday. I shouldn't have told that when I got home.
Besides learning all I can about the plant, my job is civil engineering for the yard operations at the sites.
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Hi Josh,
The New/Old Heresies are for the rear channels. I'm going to make a pair of shelves to put them on so they can be heard. My brother got my rear La Scalas, minus the ALK crossovers.
John
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It's hard to imagine dirty AC power causing hum. It can easily cause pops and clicks and if your gear's power supply is poor, I can see increased distortion since thee will be an AC ripple on the, supposedly DC only PS busses to the amps.
Several years ago I was standing in my house looking out and saw a flash in the woods. Never thought twice about it. A few days or weeks later, weird things started happening to the lights and appliances in the house (flickering, dim/bright cycling, hard starts). I started checking my house voltage. Things on one side of the breaker box had higher voltage than the other. The reason turned out to be a broken neutral back at the distribution pole (the flash). A broken neutral (ground) or a corroded connection for the Neutral/ground could easily cause a hum in one house and not another. The break could be in the house or at the pole.
I can't remember anymore if I had hum in my audio gear.
(I can't resist Ray
) I work for the country's largest electric power producer. -
"Sweet Jane", Lou Reed.
"I don't Need No Doctor", Humble Pie.
"Vasoline", STP
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You're welcome!
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100 watts of music will be no problem. As always, with all speakers, turn it down at the first hint of distortion and you will never hurt anything.
John
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Kelly,
Thanks for the links! They must be knew. I've searched the net for info about this arm for years, off and on. They've been out of production since the 80s sometime. Mine is olser than the ones in the pics, it has no plastic. I tried to pay someone to replace the wiring and nobody would take my money.
John
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I'd like to get anything I can on a Decca London tonearm. Anybody have a manual, or parts?
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I don't keep up with the Cornwalls too well, but I believe the Type B network was originally used with a K-55-V squawker. If so, the K-55-M will work perfectly.
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There is a panel on the bottom that should be screwed to the cabinet, I'm not sure how many screws it should have as I have La Scalas. There is a rubber gasket that seals the back air chamber and it often sticks tightly. Perhaps that is the shape you're in. Maybe a previous owner removed the screws and could not get the panel off and forgot to replace the screws. If this is the case, use a wide putty knife, say 6" and drive it gently between the cabinet and the panel in several places to loosen the gasket. I use a plastic hammer for this. Done gently, it will leave no marks.
The woofer faces rearward and looks through a 3" x 9" slot into the mouth of the bass horn. The bass horn is very similar to the common W-horn used in concert sound systems.
You will find great rewards from changing the crossover in that year model. Go with a Klipsch Type AA or AB-3(? the pre 2002 xover whatever it was) or ALKs.
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I agree. And thanks to those who are serving now protecting my rear end from Al Qaeda. et al. I wish I could do more. Making cheap electricity and doing RR inspections seems hollow. I'd like to blow up at least one cave! I was able to supply a rifle for 2 Naval Reserve Officers to requalify, at least.
John
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Max,
It was common practice several years ago to use a transformer with MC cartridges to step-up the voltage for a MM input. Have you looked for one of those?
John
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After reading that I'm pretty sure I'll never end up with tubes. The mania would be more than I could stand. Never mind the maintenance. Replacing recepticals? Potholders? Dean!
John
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I'm a little surprised at a -M falling off like that at higher frequencies. The Type AA network makes that worse, too. I expected little output above 15k and that's what you got.
John
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Q,
Which crossover are you using in the test above. The Type AA is designed to do just what the K-77 is doing. The network peaks around 6k and falls with rising frequency. Was the K-77 the AlNiCo version?
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Yes, I disconnected one diode. That removes a lot of hash at high dB caused by the diodes turning the HF waveform into square waves above 2 watts to the tweeter. You then have full responsibility for the health of your tweeters!
I have replaced the caps with Hovland musicaps. I have air-core inductors for the woofers, but have thus far been too lazy to install them. I experimented with the tweeter inductor's screw, but put it back in because I didn't like the extra brightness at 6k.
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Do a search. It's been discussed beaucoup times.
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Eric,
Your impressions mirror mine quite closely, especially the part about overtones and after ring of drums. With my modded AAs, I can often tell, or think I can, the material used in the drum head, if it is something unusual like skin rather than mylar. The Type AL left everything muddled together like leftover beef stew!
Al K's xovers are another step out into the light.
) I work for the country's largest electric power producer.
Jeff Beck - Blow by Blow
in 2-Channel Home Audio
Posted
That is an outstanding performance and recording. One of my all time favorites! Listen for the brushes in "'Cause We've Ended as Lovers".
John