My "REAL SOUND" experiment.

[Jimbo]

Sounds like your in an ideal place. I. think when everything gels in a system and it then gets out of the way and you can focus on the music you are definitely in the right ball park regarding system synergy/compatibilty?

[Gazjam]

[Wakefield Turntables]

Pt XXIV - Infrastructure & tweaks parts 2

It's that night again. I have my drinking partner with me tonight.





I have used my Sunday well and that I have finally managed to do a system MOT where I clean everything. In total I think I took over two hours cleaning everything that I could clean. So cleaning duties having included.



Cleaning every RCA I could find
Cleaning every valve pin I could find
Cleaning every female IEC socket
Cleaning every pin on every plug
Cleaning the insides of the pre and phonostage
Cleaning every shelf on the rack.
Checking very valve.


I took some photo's. So here is a picture of the Radford preamp with a shed load of Mullard M8137's supposed to be the best ECC83 every made, I'm sure you guys have some comments/opinions regarding this.









Inside the Radford preamp after a decent clean. To be fair it was already very clean but it's now even cleaner. All the valve bases got a decent clean with IPA.









The next thing to have some TLC was the Croft phonostage I purchased. OMG what a complete mess inside. I looked like it had never been cleaned since new. I must have used 30 cotton buds with IPA to get it to this stage. I removed the valves cleaned every pin, cleaned the valve bases with IPA. I cleaned the insides of the phonostage. Every RCA socket was cleaned and even the female IEC. The outer casing with really filthy. I polished the outside of the case, it's sill not perfect but it looks a whole lot better when I look at it sitting on the rack.







Both units reassembled with a bit of spit and polish.







Another picture with everything sprawled over the floor.






Now a few details about the system. I have been carefully assessing things and system three needs a few things.



1. New pair of 300b valves. One of the valves is coming apart. The quality of Golden Lion 300b valves is shocking. The pins gold plating very quickly scrapes away and one the things is excessive now slightly faulty, tapping it can get generate hum and a rustling noise through the right channel. I bought this pair second hand so I have no idea how many hours have been put on them. So I need a new pair. The 300b rabbit hole is a massive one. I might just get a pair and then at some point next year 2024 buy my ultimate buy and forget pair.



2. I also need a single Mullard M8137 as I have had to replace one of these with a JJ ECC83S in the preamp. Don't get me wrong the preamp is doing amazing things but it's just one of those silly annoying things that bugs me that I don't have a full complement of M8137's sitting in the pre-amp.



3. I've managed to give the speakers a little more breathing room and they don't sit quite so close to the rack. I have idea how or if indeed this helps but it makes it easier for me to change settings on the preamp without me having to get up off my arse. Everything is now within arms reach!!



4. I have slightly increased volume to the left channel by one half notch to compensate for a -6db difference in my hearing to my left ear. Again difficult to ascertain how/if things have improved massively.



5. I have worked on the cartridge alignment today. Things are still not perfect and need some work, maybe bank holiday monday for that. The JICO stylus was loaded at 0.97g and whilst this sounded better it now sounds better still at 1.25g. SME arms don't accurately load the cartridge with the weight selected.


6. Tonearm and cartridge compliance matching. Again things are ok, not great. I might start to look for a new cartridge to match the SME V-12. Ortofon 2MB could be the way forward. I'm keeping a look out.


7. Binding posts. The binding posts on my Power amp are naff. I did find four CMC binding posts in my spares box but it turns out that they are brass . I think I'm going to remove some pure copper Cardas binding posts from my Ditton 15 speakers and try them on the amp. I will have pure copper cardas binding posts from both the speakers and power amp.



8. Power leads. I need a new extension, that's for sure. The TESCO 20M extension is working well but I think there is better to be had. I might even make up four new power leads with solid core and see if this helps the sonics are further. It's a cheap experiment that might yield better sonics.







Just a few more pictures


The cartridge now loaded at 1.26g. I really cut not be bothered to jig this around any futher.





The saga of the binding posts.





So, that's it for another night. Stay tuned....

[Jimbo]

Lots of hard work there and quite satisfying thing to do on a Bank Holiday weekend?

The Crofty is coming along nicely and I am sure the new binding posts will improve things a tad. Look forward to some listening impressions maybe sometime soon?

[Wakefield Turntables]

The REAL SOUND system has been upgraded again!



I've been away for a couple of weeks and nothing has been brewing. My 300b amplifier will be going away to have some tweaks, mainly some nice new copper binding posts. I salvaged these Cardas pure copper binding posts from my Celestion 15 speakers, I hardly use them. This saved £108.







So with the money saved I bought a pair of these.





No idea what they sound like, a complete punt! Anything is better than the shocking build quality of the Gold Lion 300b's, never again!



I also did this to my Shure SC35C







The SC35C is nude, got rid of the stupid blue bit. It bugger all apart from get in the way. I've also improved the cart setup, still a little out but better than before.


Finally some good news for my 301 and my main valve system. My tonearm cable has been repaired so the 301 shoudl be spinning soon and then I can check out the Ortofon Silver Meister II SPU / FGS experiment


As ever, stay tuned.

[zanash]

1. New pair of 300b valves. One of the valves is coming apart. The quality of Golden Lion 300b valves is shocking. The pins gold plating very quickly scrapes away and one the things is excessive now slightly faulty, tapping it can get generate hum and a rustling noise through the right channel. I bought this pair second hand so I have no idea how many hours have been put on them. So I need a new pair. The 300b rabbit hole is a massive one. I might just get a pair and then at some point next year 2024 buy my ultimate buy and forget pair.



your rustling noise....is a dirty valve base and or valve pins. I used to suffer from this on my various valve amps. Stabliant 21a is an effective cleaner and contact enhancer, which cleared all my issues.

[Jimbo]

1. New pair of 300b valves. One of the valves is coming apart. The quality of Golden Lion 300b valves is shocking. The pins gold plating very quickly scrapes away and one the things is excessive now slightly faulty, tapping it can get generate hum and a rustling noise through the right channel. I bought this pair second hand so I have no idea how many hours have been put on them. So I need a new pair. The 300b rabbit hole is a massive one. I might just get a pair and then at some point next year 2024 buy my ultimate buy and forget pair.



your rustling noise....is a dirty valve base and or valve pins. I used to suffer from this on my various valve amps. Stabliant 21a is an effective cleaner and contact enhancer, which cleared all my issues.

Good tip that Pete, I have some contact cleaner and feel some of my valve pins could do with a squirt!