More Amp Construction

That is awesome.

... But in light of how huge it is, and how much empty real estate is inside, you gotta take back making fun of how big my BeePre rebuild was. In comparison, mine is slender and compact (albeit not nearly as cool). 😁Bigby_without fans.jpg
 
Where's the remote?
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I built this BeePre recently for a local rocket scientist. He helped me out with some rather complicated car repairs, and in return I bought him a basic BeePre kit. ...then we started talking and down the rabbit hole we went until we arrived at this packaging with a remote stepped attenuator, balanced inputs and outputs, and some silver cast powder coating.
 
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I wrapped up this little Stereomour last Friday for another local customer. We chatted for quite a while before he placed his order, and ultimately what made the most sense was a Steremour with a remote attenuator installed, and to fill out the front panel I talked him into adding some meters as well.
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There was definitely a point in this build where I wasn't sure it was all going to fit!
 
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I'm super excited to have the old Thorium back in my hands. I built this amp in 2008 and the gentleman I sold it to used it until the 3C24s died, then e-mailed me and asked if I wanted to buy it back (and his pair of AKG K-1000s). I was quite happy to get it back, and I spent a couple of hours this weekend redoing and optimizing some of the wiring, as well as installing a lovely pair of ceramic based 3C24 tubes. I have no idea what I'll end up doing with this amp, but it sure looks nice on the rack.
 
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I'm super excited to have the old Thorium back in my hands. I built this amp in 2008 and the gentleman I sold it to used it until the 3C24s died, then e-mailed me and asked if I wanted to buy it back (and his pair of AKG K-1000s). I was quite happy to get it back, and I spent a couple of hours this weekend redoing and optimizing some of the wiring, as well as installing a lovely pair of ceramic based 3C24 tubes. I have no idea what I'll end up doing with this amp, but it sure looks nice on the rack.
Looks like a mad science project (in a good way). Is it strictly a headphone amp?
Those glowing tubes are super cool!
 
I recently fixed up a pair of leak TL-12+ amps. One had been blown up at some point, and both were nearly all original.
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The owner wanted Russian PIO coupling caps and luckily I had them all in stock.
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The can caps in these are a really strange diameter so I opened them up, drilled out the contents, then restuffed them with some new lytics.
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On the back I removed the extra AC outlets and had some small brass panels made to hold power switches and a fuse holder. I also threaded binding posts into the factory speaker screw terminals. I also made some new bottom panels since these were console amps and likely never had any.
 
I recently fixed up a pair of leak TL-12+ amps. One had been blown up at some point, and both were nearly all original.
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The owner wanted Russian PIO coupling caps and luckily I had them all in stock.
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The can caps in these are a really strange diameter so I opened them up, drilled out the contents, then restuffed them with some new lytics.
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On the back I removed the extra AC outlets and had some small brass panels made to hold power switches and a fuse holder. I also threaded binding posts into the factory speaker screw terminals. I also made some new bottom panels since these were console amps and likely never had any.
Sweet looking amps and digging the color. My ST20 didn’t have a bottom either so it might be a Leak thing.
 
Really nice builds. Is that an off-the-shelf stepped attenuator in the Beepre and Stereomour? If so, what brand?

cheers and thanks, Derek
 
It's an attenuator you can get overseas. If you type "JV8 remote" into eBay it will pull it up. If you get the DIY version, you can populate your own resistors which I like, as you can scale the impedance of the attenuator up or down as needed, but be aware that assembling it requires surface mount soldering that's pretty annoying. I've also found that sometimes the kits come without all the parts you need and often without any instructions, and the sellers are about as helpful as you would expect them to be.

The finished version is worth the extra cost IMO.
 
Awesome. many thanks. I'm mostly interested b/c I'm looking to pilfer some pcb layout ideas. I have all the parts for an Arduino-based stepped attenuator w/ Apple remote, but haven't done any of the real head scratching work yet -- and I'm looking to be a bit lazy and not waste time inventing a square-ish wheel when round ones already exist.
 
I'm getting the cast off my right hand this Friday and go for surgery on my left hand mid june. Right hand is great.
 
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