Bottlehead Fantasy Products/Wish List

[JC]

LOL!  Reminds me of the line in "Apollo 13", when the Jim Lovell character is conducting a tour of civilians, and talks about a future with computers that will fit into a single room...

[Grainger49]

Sooooo, what is wrong with a women in tight skirts, heels and pearls vacuuming?  Is that an option for the kit?

[porcupunctis]

Are the pearls necessary?

My wish would be to bring back a speaker kit.  Maybe a La Scala type with 100+ efficiency or a full-range, single-driver bass reflex (or horn).  A metronome-like design would be simple to glue together, but maybe awkward to ship.  I bet you could get the forum community to help with the design (I would do what I could) and Bottlehead could do the packaging.  I think a lot of people could manage the glue up, sanding, and finishing but probably lack the table saws and hole-cutting gear to do the other work.  It could be the Linux of the speaker world.  Community designed and tweaked but centrally distributed.

Also, you could bring back the Bottlehead model.   I'm not saying that's what sold me on buying my first kit but then, it sure didn't stop me.

[Thoburn]

This would be a quite a departure from Bottlehead products, but I would like to see an amp with the same sort of input selection and volumn control as the Stereomour, but with an output of around 60 watts that could handle speakers such as the Vandersteen Quatro. Probably a KT88 based. Point to point with high end components such as all nickel output tranies and obbigato or simular upgraded caps. High end resistors and volumn control. Everything top shelf. Hey, it is just my fantasy amp, so be kind.

[HF9]

This would be a quite a departure from Bottlehead products, but I would like to see an amp with the same sort of input selection and volumn control as the Stereomour, but with an output of around 60 watts that could handle speakers such as the Vandersteen Quatro. Probably a KT88 based. Point to point with high end components such as all nickel output tranies and obbigato or simular upgraded caps. High end resistors and volumn control. Everything top shelf. Hey, it is just my fantasy amp, so be kind.

It would be great to see Bottlehead offer a nice high quality push-pull integrated. There's a bit of competition from the Dynaco kits and Audio Note, but I think a unique offering would be well received.

[matthewmckay]

I would like to see a bottlehead tuner kit.  Mostly becuase there doesn't seem to be much information on attempting a DIY tuner for FM reception, and I know you guys would make a good one.

[defenestration]

a sub $500 microphone preamp would be an amazing Bottlehead entry into the pro audio world... which has quite deep pockets and a taste for DIY

would love a kit or two aimed at studio applications - tempted to build a foreplay just so I could run some mixes through it... I want to run some program material through my Crack and re-record it but to do it properly I'll have to build a box like the one I use for guitar amps - https://taweber.powweb.com/weber/masslite.htm

[Paul Joppa]

Mic preamp - what functions are needed? A Seduction, deprived of RIAA, is all the amp you need; we've been using one with a B&K measuring mic for years. It's all the gain switches, impedance choices, proximity filters, etc. that gets expensive and fussy. Got an example of a minimalist mic pre that's on the market? Does it need to be rackmount?

[saildoctor]

I would like see a 1-5 watt guitar amp with headphone output!  Maybe just as a head unit?  My roommate would be grateful of this one. 

[xcortes]

Ah yes, this one interests me. The elusive element is a modern speaker with an 800 ohm voice coil. Anybody have a pair of Philips 9710AMs?

That's interesting but as nice as those philips can sound I doubt they can deliver the resolution and dynamics I love from my current setup. What I'm looking for is something for my current speakers. They're about 106 db per watt efficient and I triamp. Ever since I saw the following PJs post I've been dreamin' about it:

I do think a true zero-feedback Class-A SET OTL could be made with a single 6C33 for each channel. It would consume about 100 watts per channel, and produce no more than 1 watt per channel. I'd expect it to sound awfully good, in fact.

It would be something like a big boys Crack!

[defenestration]

a few commercial examples as requested:

http://www.mercenary.com/vt1vactubmic.html
http://www.mercenary.com/alltub40dbmo.html
http://www.mercenary.com/rmstubule.html

not tube but a respected (and cost-effective) minimal solid state design - http://www.fmraudio.com/rnp.htm

my picks for a minimal design - some of this might be a given but I'll spell it out anyways -
XLR in, balanced TRS out
switchable +48v phantom power
input polarity switch
input attenuation (switched -15db pad would be enough, variable is much nicer)
variable gain (6-12 stepped is nice but not necessary - notice that the Manley linked above is only 5 steps)
Hi-Z unbalanced input for use with electric guitar/bass (I'm curious how much this 'active DI' would add to the cost of the design?)
signal and clip indicators

rackmount isn't completely necessary but that would be a big step towards making such a Bottlehead product very studio friendly - a 1/2 rack form factor that is optionally rackable or desktop is, in my opinion, the approach most likely to find a home in project as well as professional studios - 2 channels of a particular preamp flavor in 1 or 2 rackspaces high is very desirable to many studio owners.

and . . . here are my votes for extra features beyond the bare bones -
variable input impedance
unbalanced insert jack
VU Meter

but really it doesn't need much at all... I have a solid state mic preamp within spitting distance of me right now that besides the in/out jacks only has a gain pot, a clip LED, and a phantom power switch

[Dr. Toobz]

I would like see a 1-5 watt guitar amp with headphone output!  Maybe just as a head unit?  My roommate would be grateful of this one. 

Same here - I've been wanting a small guitar amp for some time now. There's a couple of kits out there, but they all seem to be designed for sticking in a cabinet, and they're not cheap. Luckily, though, these appear to be very simple to do on one's own; a 12ax7 gain stage (with the second half of the triode used as a regulator or some other freebie function) and an EL84 pentode would net about 4-5W, single-ended.....plenty for headphones and a small speaker. The problem for those of us who live in apartments is fabricating a chassis. That's a big reason why I like Bottlehead's kits so much: everything you need for a complete amp is already there.

Count me in for a Bottlehead guitar amp!

[Grainger49]

I do think a true zero-feedback Class-A SET OTL could be made with a single 6C33 for each channel. It would consume about 100 watts per channel, and produce no more than 1 watt per channel. I'd expect it to sound awfully good, in fact.

It would be something like a big boys Crack!

Ok, Xavier, you have nailed my wish list there.  I have the tubes and the sockets.

[Doc B.]

Hmm, I dunno about that 1 watt 6C33 thing. Sounds like three years of research for two sales. Maybe that could be a free design we put up on the site for DIY. But a small guitar amp, yes. I've been playing with some ideas for a while now. I believe the electric guitar on the new Jacqui Naylor album Lucky Girl (which is being released on Tuesday) might have been played through a protoype of mine. I'll know more when I see Art Khu next week. I think we will begin working on my latest guitar amp idea after we get the DAC finished up.

Re mic pres: when the option list starts to climb you have to let me know how much you want to pay. That will have a big influence on how many gadgets are added. My suggestion might be to forgo a complete rack cabinet and build it all on a front panel, with a simple Hammond die cast box on the back for shielding - roughly like tipping a seduction up on one side. I've laid out a rack style guitar amp design like this, with the tubes set back from the face, and it looks pretty cool. The full cabinets that we use for the Tube Repro and Tube Phono are very expensive.

[Grainger49]

Not to mention a new transformer.  Look at the specs for the two filaments in each 6C33C-B.

Maybe just an SET using that tube.