Do It Yourself

Bought a piece of Rosewood and churned out a couple of woodies. It is an amazing specimen as far as wood goes and I hope to use it again in the future; it had a brilliant graining that shines up pretty nicely if I do say so myself. The cups on the left are a commissioned SR225 woody, and the big 'un on the right is my D2000 that some of you might have seen over on the other site. Hope to try out Cocobolo for my next project, just not looking forward to the cost :/.

Kevin did not show Forward Voltage of LEDs in his designe,and I think it will not be 1.5V . so I want to konw it's 1.7V or 1.8V?

So this started a few weeks ago when someone found a picture of my 100 watt night light. Its an 833A tube. (new picture below) And he wanted a megatron made from 8 of these. (10 vac at 10 amps each tube) so 800 watts filament power just for the output tubes. By the time you make the +/- 1kv power supplies running at 40ma, and the power for the 300b driver tubes etc, way past the limit for usa 120v 20 amp service which is 1850 watts. And with the top of the tube at silly and dangerous high voltage... bad idea. So i started looking for slightly less silly alternatives. I think the 211 tube fits the bill. running with +/-750v power supplies at 35ma. So a megatron with…

I'm getting ready to build up one of Colin's tooleaudio I/V stages to put into my Rotel RCD-991. This is a dual PCM-63P player with pcm100 filter. I have currently been listening to it modded with THS4031s for the I/V stage and AD8599s doing the buffer/bal conversion. stock output stage: U302 is the single I/V opamp, U306 is the buffer/conversion opamp (dual) and U304 is an anti-aliasing opamp (socketed now, but not populated. I am trying to decide whether to Retain the AD8599s as buffers/conversion Replace the AD8599s with different opamps Use transformers? If so what? Other? I want to retain the muting relay functiona…

I can't seem to find it as google returns no results from possible matches from this site, but I do remember somebody (think Kevin himself) discussing and posting a schematic of an updated mod to the SRM-323S to increase the output power to 450v, would be great if somebody or Kevin himself chimed in with the pdf and what needs to be removed and added in place in the 323S for MOAR powah. I've got a spare 323S lying around so want to give it a go. cheers

Hey guys, I ran the schematic of my moth to dsavistk and he offered some recommendations for a couple of places to upgrade the caps. Looking for 33uF 450V high quality cap, film for sure. They are cathode bypass caps. Right now there is a solen polypropylene in there, the only thing I could find which may be an improvement is the Obbligato film in oil cap, they have a 30uf and 70uF 630v. All of the really really nice film caps are around the 250v range, which I think might be risky in my amp as the schematic says for 450v, but the actual amount of voltage across that point is probably closer to 250. Also looking for a 220uF 500v cap upgrade as well that I beli…

I have some gear that I've had a long time and have not fired them up in a long time. 2 Adcom GFA-555s 1 Pair Martin Logan Monoliths They are all around 20+ years old. The amps have spent some time in the garage in South FL. Should I just recap the cross-overs in the spkrs and the amps? I'm afraid to power them up. The woofers need the surrounds rebuilt anyhow. Just worried that firing them up would take out the boards if the caps were bad. I think I know the answer but thought I would ask anyhow.

So some parts are rolling in. I'm excited to finally get the solder iron up and running again. I'll jump on the balanced connections in a week or so, but I bought some extra wire and RCA connectors to build a pair of interconnects. I'll be using: DH Labs Pro Studio for the wire. Twisted pair inside with a shield outside (pretty standard) DH Labs RCA-3 connector. Now, the RCA-3 connector is a little different than what I have used in the past. It looks like this: It looks very much like these would be great for a digital cable (and they are 75 ohm as well). For audio, though, I have a twisted pair inside the cable with the shield outside. I'm fairly sure…

Has anyone used a Khozmo Attenuator? They look extremely well built. I wonder how it sounds compared to a goldpoint or a dact

Trying to make some DIY USB cable, but I cannot seem to find USB 2.0 type B male plugs anywhere in USA, only some from China on eBay with long shipping estimates. Found some type A plugs on Amazon. For type B, looking for something like these: http://www.ebay.com/itm/170578212079?_trksid=p2060778.m1438.l2649&ssPageName=STRK%3AMEBIDX%3AIT

I was just wondering how this amp would work as a headphone amp. It doesn't have a headphone jack but the speakers are connected with rca plugs into rca jacks on the back of the amp. It is rated at 1.2 watts at 1000 Hz with 10% distortion. I read that it puts out .75 watts per channel with very low distortion into 8 ohm speakers. My question is how would it work to connect headphones directly to the speaker jacks with an adapter? Would any modifications need to be made? These little amps actually sound really good with small bookshelf speakers and are dirt cheap. Thanks a lot, Gene PS I have asked this same question on several forums this morning. Sorry if …

That they might want to sell? I'm about to place an order at Parts Connexion, but they don't carry nylon sheath. I don't want to place an order at Take Five for four feet of braid (I'd probably end up buying a set of WBT plugs or something, too.) I need about 4 feet of 1/2 inch (this stuff: Take Five Audio - Canada's Online Source For High-End Audio, Parts and Accessories - Nylon Expandable Cable Sleeve ) for a half meter pair of interconnects. It doesn't have to black. Some other color or a cool pattern would be fine (or better) If anybody needs something from Parts Connexion that's not worth the shipping, holler and I'll add it to my order.

If I take say 1 120 Ohm 5 watt wire wound resistor for each channel that's sufficient for a dummy load correct?

Hi guys Just finished my Bijou. It's only got about 20 minutes on it so far, but this thing sounds great. I'm currently listening to Fiday Night in SF with my K701 - very sweet. I'm not so great at describing the sound, but this amp certainly delivers - to me at least. Cheers Oh, I've temporarily mounted it on a piece of board so it looks pretty ghetto, so I won't post pics.

Could anyone who has succesfully built an issue free AlienDAC post your BOM? I will be placing my parts order through mouser or digikey on Friday and want to make sure I get it all in one fell swoop. I spent some time reading the long thread over at HF and it seems like to many people tried something different and it didn't work out. This will only be the second audio gizmo I've built (1st was a CMOY) so any other comments or advice would be appreciated.

I've been mildly interested in pot shunting since I first heard about it, not for any reason other that it looked different and interesting. Anyway, I shunted my EHHAs RK27 earlier and call me nuts, but it sounds a shitload more detailed and clear to me now than before. I'm hearing all sorts of subtle little things quite clearly than never caught my ear before and I wasn't even trying to listen for it, they just appeared in a way they never had before. Maybe shunting really is that good or maybe my ears are just super sensitive right now, whatever, it seems clarity is greater, detail and spaciousness have improved and soundstage has expanded too with a much more natura…

Someone at HF posted about this. Check out about 3/4 of the way down the page for chassis with walnut: Hammond Mfg. - Small Enclosure Index

Hey everyone, To make a long story short, some damage occurred to a b22 that I sold internationally during shipping. I know absolutely nothing about fixing it up, but from the pics he sent me I'm guessing it should be a relatively easy fix. Is there anyone with experience with b22s(it's a 2channel board) in the area of quincy MA (or anyone in general) who would be able to help him fix it (either in person or by talking him through it?). I would be grateful for the help, as the situation is starting to turn sour. Thanks for reading.

So, I'm working on a pair of monoblocks. swt61 has seen these monster heat sinks. 12.2" wide x 12" tall with 2.925" fins and 0.326" base, weight is 13 pounds... and I got four. I've done some thermal plots of 6 devices per heatsink on a small PCB. Each device is dissipating 14.8W x 6 devices x 4 channels ~ 350W. I'm wondering how much further I can push the devices. The sim data is very close to actual temperatures and since I don't want to drill holes under the devices for thermal probes, the simulator will be gospel. I don't really want to move the devices apart anymore, as I have a PCB in mind I'd like to accommodate, plus a design of my own. Datasheets for devices:…

I think I'll ask santa for a good desoldering station this Christmas. It would be for through hole work, can anyone recommend one that works well for them?

I am in need of a preamp with some gain and I was thinking about a DIY tube preamp. Doesn't need to have crazy high gain as the power amps will have voltage gain as well. Right now what looks attractive is the K&K Audio active output stage. The level 2 kit comes with most parts including the OPTs. Looks like a fairly good design to me? If not any other suggestions? Preferably something that is well documented.

How can I measure if my DAC puts out common mode DC from the balanced outputs?

hey, i wanted to build a kgsshv as a fun project but since i am a beginner i figured out i would be better off starting with something more simple. so, how do i start? also which tools i need for the measurements and building? (sorry if this post is redundent)

As some of you may know I've got a bit of history with the Millett Hybrid Amplifier. It all started about a year ago when I set out to build a headphone amp for each of the members of my wedding party (all music lovers who use headphones in some manner). Two of these came together rather quickly as they were pretty much bone stock Hybrids. The third of the bunch which was to be built for en480c4 got a bit more complicated. First was the addition of a STEPS power supply for his birthday, next up was a set of diamond buffers for no reason and finally it was finished off with a custom Walnut enclosure because I wanted it to be in a case that no one else had. This weekend wit…

I'm looking for something that adds basic control functionality to a computer IDE drive (pause, previous track etc). The front buttons are just eject and play/next track. Is there a simple solution for this?