Bottlehead Forum
Bottlehead Kits => Crack => Topic started by: PocketRocket on August 26, 2014, 07:45:15 PM
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So, my dad bought me the Bottlehead Crack Kit as a small project for him and I to work on. Construction was easy, or atleast seemed easy. The manual was easy to follow, and soldering was no problem. We checked our resistances, everything was fine. Now, when we got to checking the voltages is where things started to get confusing. None of our voltages are correct. When we first powered the unit up, as it said in the manual, the 12au7 tube started to glow but the 6080 tube did not. Only one LED lit up as well.
Voltage readings for the terminals are as follows:
1. 0
2. 229.2
3. 0
4. 229.8
5. 86.6
6. 0
7. 0
8. 0
9. 0
10. 0
11. 0
12. 0
13. 229.8
14. 0
15. 234.2
20. 0
21. 206
A1. 86.6
A2. 0
A3. 1.56
A4. 0
A5. 0
A6. 0
A7. 0
A8. 1.05
A9. 0
B1. 0
B2. 230
B3. .01
B4. 86.4
B5. 229.8
B6. 0
B7. 0
B8. 0
I have a bad feeling I made a really obvious mistake somewhere. Any help or advice you can give is highly appreciated.
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I will need to check the voltages against those in the manual in the morning to give you a detailed set of suggestions, but one of the more common errors in the octal socket (the big one) being installed rotated to wrong way. Check if the slot on the center hole of the socket is pointing the right way.
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I checked and I did indeed have it placed the wrong way. The slot was facing the right of the chassis, so I hopefully just need to rotate it 90 degrees and fit it in the right way towards the front to of the chassis.
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Yup, once you turn it and reconnect the wires to the proper socket terminals you should get some proper readings.
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Fixed, checked resistances and voltages, plugged in and jamming! Thank you.
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Well done.
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I love a happy ending! :D
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Your username makes me think of the old Dick Smith Electronics, before they turned into another Best Buy. For a short time in the 80's there was a Dick Smith store in the San Francisco Bay Area. They would send cool old school black and white catalogs in the mail, and I remember the catalog having a Strine glossary, from which I learned important phrases like fair dinkum and "throw a little wood in the hole".
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Your username makes me think of the old Dick Smith Electronics, before they turned into another Best Buy. For a short time in the 80's there was a Dick Smith store in the San Francisco Bay Area. They would send cool old school black and white catalogs in the mail, and I remember the catalog having a Strine glossary, from which I learned important phrases like fair dinkum and "throw a little wood in the hole".
Yes Dick Smith used to be good in the 70s and 80s. It was staffed by bearded boffins who took an interest in your project and helped you make cool stuff. Now their stores are slick showrooms with pushy salesmen who just want to sell you a TV or iPad.
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In a serendipitous coincidence, the radio station I run the engineering dept for is built on the site where Dick Smith opened his original Australian store in the 70s. Dick used to be on the counter advising keen kit builders. He sold me my first LED for one of my kits in 1975. I occasionally bump into Dick locally over the years as he lives in the next suburb from me. A really great guy,still into aviation and Ham radio and a great patriot.