Oh My... Oh Boy!!!

[Billyk]

It is very well made, good grip to the pins, phenolic base. It cost $13.50 plus $1.00 shipping. A bargain I'd say. here is the link: http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=320659633166&ssPageName=STRK:MEWAX:IT

That is the stock base! I am very pleased, took very little work. Used minwax golden pecan and wipe on poly finish just some steel wool between coats and put on four coats.

That's my little Terrapin buddy, a gift from the wife 'cause I listen to so much Grateful Dead. He is hugging it cause, well I just did not have a place to put it and came in to find him holding it! I suspect my wife was cleaning my space again!!


Edit: I don't know, but i think that the adapter may be imparting a wee bit of hum. There is some hum, unaffected by volume control position, with shorted inputs. I tried two NOS 6SN7 and one new one with the same result and also swapped out the 6AS7 with the original 6080. Hmmm... Maybe a poorly routed heater wire? Will investigate further, but have to say I really like what I hear other than the hum.

[jrihs]

Thanks for the link. I ordered one.

[Billyk]

Well, I finally ot around to doing some work on it. I installed a PEC pot and upgraded some of the wiring. I used some kapton insulated shielded twisted pair 26ga silver plated copper. Nice wire, hard to work with! I redid most of the rest of the signal wiring with this fancy long grain ultra pure blah blah blah copper wire. I was going to put the erse caps in to but was rather intimidated by the process of getting those very large things installed!! Oh and I have what I think are "my" tubes; a nice NOS RCA 6as7G and a chrome top Sylvania 6SN7GT. So what I hev left in my planes are the Erse caps, bypassing the 3rd power supply cap with a 2.2 Russian PIO and maybe a .10 teflon (if it makes a difference), changing the 9 pin to an 8 and then finishing up the rest of the signal wiring.

I still cannot get over the sweet noise this thing makes and it just seems to keep getting better too. The new tubes pushed it up a notch, now the wiring and pot upgrade, a whole 'nother notch. Oh Wow!!!

[dubiousmike]

So does this mean the hum you were hearing is now gone, but you're still able to use the 8pin adapter?  Do you know what resolved the issue?  I'm definitely tempted to pick up an adapter for purposes of experimentation - although my ultimate plan is still to drop in a nos rca blackplate 12bh7 up front after I've got my speedball completed.

Putting in the mounts for the output caps isn't as bad as it seems.  Based on Beefy's extremely helpful and detailed advice on this topic over on head-fi (where I post as "skeptic" for reference), I put in fly leads and zip tie mounts before starting work on the speedball kit.  After ensuring that I had adequate clearance for my film caps, I went ahead and stuck the mounts down and then just drilled through the center hole, adhesive layer and all, from the bottom side of the amp (with a 3mm bit).  Buy an extra drill bit if you do it this way because the adhesive will effectively ruin it, but the drilling is quite easy if you do it slowly.  Per Beefy's recommendation, 4-40 1/4 inch screws, nuts and washers are a perfect fit.

If it is of any interest to you, here's a cell phone picture I snapped of my kit right after I put the mounts in: http://assets.head-fi.org/5/57/57d42dd3_Crackampwithziptiemounts.jpg

[Billyk]

Hey hopeful, thanks for the insights into mounting the caps I am sure it will help!

As for the hum, after letting it warm up overnight, there is definitely just the tiniest bit. A good bit diminished from the last set of tubes I was using. Even with the hum those tubes sounded great though. I'll switch to a 5814a later this weekend, that should tell me if I am getting the hum i hear from the adapter, which is what I think. Regardless it is well worth the $14.00 to play with the 6sn7 variety of tubes.