I guess you figured out I was a stereophile subscriber back then! Mags were the way before interweb. I never built that one, but he had several cheap and cheerful ideas....like the 2.99 roll of sn62 radio shack use to carry. Still have rolls of that.
Stereophile, Absolute sound, Glass Audio, Sound Practices, several others. I took them all.
Stereophile, Absolute sound, Glass Audio, Sound Practices, several others. I took them all.
@Russellc
I picked up a lot of mags at the news stand: Stereophile, HFNRR, Listener, HiFi+, and before them Audio. I tracked down copies of IAR and the Audio Critic too.
I only ever subscribed to Audio Amateur, Speaker Builder, Audio Express...
I heard about "Aunt Corey" much later because he mentioned John Curl and I was interested in why the Vendetta sounded so good and how he did it. we've been hearing here how prescient he was.
I picked up a lot of mags at the news stand: Stereophile, HFNRR, Listener, HiFi+, and before them Audio. I tracked down copies of IAR and the Audio Critic too.
I only ever subscribed to Audio Amateur, Speaker Builder, Audio Express...
I heard about "Aunt Corey" much later because he mentioned John Curl and I was interested in why the Vendetta sounded so good and how he did it. we've been hearing here how prescient he was.
One thing I have seemed to notice about builds here, is most problems are reducing hum or the like. Has anyone had problems with the tiny parts ( SMD) and their installation? I noticed on
Wayne's BA line stage that cleaning solder residue from around them is important as you would expect. However, everyone seems to have taken to them with greatest of ease. I know I had my doubts. I haven't yet invested in one of those hot plate deals, only by hand...
Wayne's BA line stage that cleaning solder residue from around them is important as you would expect. However, everyone seems to have taken to them with greatest of ease. I know I had my doubts. I haven't yet invested in one of those hot plate deals, only by hand...
I would not say that. There is definitely a learning curve.
Solder / flux paste in a syringe works well.
Hot air tool from sparkfun.com
Solder wick if you need to remove excess solder.
procedure
Wash, rinse with drug store 91% alcohol and dry the PCB.
Apply small spots of solder / flux paste to the pads on the PCB.
Place the part(s) on the PCB.
Slowly heat the PCB and parts with hot air tool.
Move the tip of the hot air tool closer to the PCB.
watch the paste sizzle, dry and the solder melts and flows by capillary action onto the PCB pads and part legs.
Move the heat away.
Cool.
Wash with drug store 91% alcohol and a firm tooth brush.
@DualTriode
I'd been imagining putting small dabs of solder onto the device pins, flux the boards and "pin" the device in place with downward force, heat... then cool. and clean.
the notion of locating the device by soldering one pin first, then the rest. with very "local" heat so as not to disturb "done" joints or have the device "skate" on the board (Canadian, eh) seems a good one.
I'd been imagining putting small dabs of solder onto the device pins, flux the boards and "pin" the device in place with downward force, heat... then cool. and clean.
the notion of locating the device by soldering one pin first, then the rest. with very "local" heat so as not to disturb "done" joints or have the device "skate" on the board (Canadian, eh) seems a good one.
that's another problem besides not having hot plate thing, I do not yet have hotair gun. Not a lot of experience with the tiny critters, just Waynes line stage, two of them and the Pearl 3. First go round I used the helping hands and chop stick method to get one foot tacked in place. Then did others.
Last couple times tape to hold in place, get one foot, do rest as before. And some tiny capacitors on Pearl 3 as well. In all cases I used Hakko solder station, tiny chisel. Tiny. Looks pointed at first, closer look chisel, by hand. All worked fine so far, you never know.
I know there are some even tinier pieces than these I did on Pearl 3 and some with mutiple legs. Your method would be necessary for sure, and for me the hot pad deal and air gun. So far not necessary.
Last couple times tape to hold in place, get one foot, do rest as before. And some tiny capacitors on Pearl 3 as well. In all cases I used Hakko solder station, tiny chisel. Tiny. Looks pointed at first, closer look chisel, by hand. All worked fine so far, you never know.
I know there are some even tinier pieces than these I did on Pearl 3 and some with mutiple legs. Your method would be necessary for sure, and for me the hot pad deal and air gun. So far not necessary.
Hello All,
There are many way to get the job done.
If there is an excess of solder or even solder bridges that is what solder wick is for.
Thanks DT
Following on from thoughts on post #3863
Has anyone considered using active rectifiers?
Is it worth the effort in Pearl III, which is already so awesome?
Has anyone considered using active rectifiers?
Is it worth the effort in Pearl III, which is already so awesome?
Putting the transformer and rectifiers in their own chassis and positioning that chassis at least 1.5 meters away from the Pearl3 preamp chassis, will be beneficial. In that arrangement, with the rectifiers inside shielded box#1 and the preamp inside shielded box#2, 1.5 meters apart, swapping over to "active rectifiers" will not make a big difference at all.
I believe that giving the opamp best working conditions will improve things, I just removed those 10uf electrolytics from regulators and replaced them with 33uf oscon polymer low esr, did the same thing at c9 and c15, but with oscon 68uf, underneath the board I put a 100nf parallel right on the opamp socket, esr is very low now.
0.25 ohm at 100 hz. 0.2 at 1 khz. 0.23 at 40khz
0.25 ohm at 100 hz. 0.2 at 1 khz. 0.23 at 40khz
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Sweet jesus, just spend six hours matching parts for the cartridge loading at the piano switch, it actually really time consuming, I measured parts on the table and soldered them in ,and wupti, capacitor values changed, I noticed no less than 10pf of change when I didnt remove residual flux, well I'm pretty content with theese matches, except the non optional 1nf, here are the numbers, I didnt match for bom values but for consistency between left and right.
Right board. Left board. Difference in percent.
1. 50.11 ohm 1. 50 ohm 1. 0.2%
2. 120.32 ohm 2. 120.31 ohm 2. 0.008%
3. 252.59 ohm 3. 252.42 ohm 3. 0.06%
4. 1000.8 ohm 4. 1000.7 ohm 4. 0.0099%
5. 9996 ohm 5. 10010 ohm 5. 0.139%
6. 106pf 6. 106.8pf 6. 0.75%
7. 235pf 7. 235.9pf 7. 0.38%
8. 1001 ohm 8. 1001.3 ohm 8. 0.029%
9. 1.02nf 9. 1.009nf 9. 1.009%
My ocd dictates me to look at the 1nf again.
Did any of you make up left/right charts?
Right board. Left board. Difference in percent.
1. 50.11 ohm 1. 50 ohm 1. 0.2%
2. 120.32 ohm 2. 120.31 ohm 2. 0.008%
3. 252.59 ohm 3. 252.42 ohm 3. 0.06%
4. 1000.8 ohm 4. 1000.7 ohm 4. 0.0099%
5. 9996 ohm 5. 10010 ohm 5. 0.139%
6. 106pf 6. 106.8pf 6. 0.75%
7. 235pf 7. 235.9pf 7. 0.38%
8. 1001 ohm 8. 1001.3 ohm 8. 0.029%
9. 1.02nf 9. 1.009nf 9. 1.009%
My ocd dictates me to look at the 1nf again.
Did any of you make up left/right charts?
That's quite an effort. But.... can't you get more than close enough by buying 1% caps and .1% resistors? And is that even necessary.
I can see doing that for the RIAA network and possibly for gain setting resistors but not the input load.
I doubt that will make much of an audible difference.
Does anyone else have any data or a verifiable opinion on this?
I can see doing that for the RIAA network and possibly for gain setting resistors but not the input load.
I doubt that will make much of an audible difference.
Does anyone else have any data or a verifiable opinion on this?
I have yet to see 2 cartridge coils (L&R) that are within 0,01%, so seems to me as waste of time.
BTW @amplidude ........ It´s CDO, not OCD....... Letters HAVE to be written in alphabetical order
6 month ago I was soooooo stupid selling 3 kilos of styroflex capacitors, many 1%, I just ordered 50 100pf and 50 1 nf siemens styroflex 1% 630v .
Wayne did build it using 0.1 parts and match those also, but I dont think you actually can hear any mismatch below 5%, it's just my OCD, and the excitement when plotting response curves, when you cant tell them apart
Wayne did build it using 0.1 parts and match those also, but I dont think you actually can hear any mismatch below 5%, it's just my OCD, and the excitement when plotting response curves, when you cant tell them apart