All information about the properties of the enamelled wires, winding
structure, insulation materials, inductance of windings,
leakage inductance, capacitance between primary and secondary, for hand
winding the Unity Coupled Output Transformers again.
Anybody knows the details or knows where to get the details please help.

·à¤l¤f wrote:
All information about the properties of the enamelled wires, winding
structure, insulation materials, inductance of windings,
leakage inductance, capacitance between primary and secondary, for hand
winding the Unity Coupled Output Transformers again.
Anybody knows the details or knows where to get the details please help.

There is a guy in Wisconsin who will happily rewind your xfmr but the
price is high and he's not about to help you or anyone else DIY.

You could tear it down, document it, and rewind it but you will need
to build some fixturing. It's not a impossible job but if you have
never worked in a transformer shop this is not an ideal first project.
If you were to very carefully document the job and do a web page you
would be a real hero on Usenet.

Start with the patents , the numbers are on Roger Russell's web page
and are free for viewing at www.uspto.gov. There is additional useful
information in the blue and white JFK/MM era Audio Cyclopedia and in
Crowhurst's articles in the Audio Anthologies. Also you may want copies
of Bereskin's article on building a Class B amp with explicit winding
data from the old IEEE papers someone has put on the Web somewhere.

I have long held that repro'ing these would be a good seller for
hobbyists and restorers alike.

Bret Ludwig wrote:

·à¤l¤f wrote:
All information about the properties of the enamelled wires, winding
structure, insulation materials, inductance of windings,
leakage inductance, capacitance between primary and secondary, for hand
winding the Unity Coupled Output Transformers again.
Anybody knows the details or knows where to get the details please help.

There is a guy in Wisconsin who will happily rewind your xfmr but the
price is high and he's not about to help you or anyone else DIY.

You could tear it down, document it, and rewind it but you will need
to build some fixturing. It's not a impossible job but if you have
never worked in a transformer shop this is not an ideal first project.
If you were to very carefully document the job and do a web page you
would be a real hero on Usenet.

Start with the patents , the numbers are on Roger Russell's web page
and are free for viewing at www.uspto.gov. There is additional useful
information in the blue and white JFK/MM era Audio Cyclopedia and in
Crowhurst's articles in the Audio Anthologies. Also you may want copies
of Bereskin's article on building a Class B amp with explicit winding
data from the old IEEE papers someone has put on the Web somewhere.

I have long held that repro'ing these would be a good seller for
hobbyists and restorers alike.

McIntosh OPTs are not easily rewound to the original spec because they
require triple insulated winding wire and bifilar wound windings.

But enough information to design and build your own OPT
exits at my website.

But you have to become an expert in the process.

And when you are done, you will find that there isn't any need for bifilar
windings if you know what EAR does with their unity gain OPTs.

Nearly every person gives up trying to wind their own OPTs
especially McIntosh reproductions because its all too much
bother to get it 100% right.

Patrick Turner.

You also need to fix whatever burned out the transformer before it
kills a replacement.

"Patrick Turner" wrote in message
...


Bret Ludwig wrote:

·à¤l¤f wrote:
All information about the properties of the enamelled wires, winding
structure, insulation materials, inductance of windings,
leakage inductance, capacitance between primary and secondary, for
hand
winding the Unity Coupled Output Transformers again.
Anybody knows the details or knows where to get the details please
help.

There is a guy in Wisconsin who will happily rewind your xfmr but the
price is high and he's not about to help you or anyone else DIY.

You could tear it down, document it, and rewind it but you will need
to build some fixturing. It's not a impossible job but if you have
never worked in a transformer shop this is not an ideal first project.
If you were to very carefully document the job and do a web page you
would be a real hero on Usenet.

Start with the patents , the numbers are on Roger Russell's web page
and are free for viewing at www.uspto.gov. There is additional useful
information in the blue and white JFK/MM era Audio Cyclopedia and in
Crowhurst's articles in the Audio Anthologies. Also you may want copies
of Bereskin's article on building a Class B amp with explicit winding
data from the old IEEE papers someone has put on the Web somewhere.

I have long held that repro'ing these would be a good seller for
hobbyists and restorers alike.

McIntosh OPTs are not easily rewound to the original spec because they
require triple insulated winding wire and bifilar wound windings.

But enough information to design and build your own OPT
exits at my website.

But you have to become an expert in the process.

And when you are done, you will find that there isn't any need for bifilar
windings if you know what EAR does with their unity gain OPTs.

Nearly every person gives up trying to wind their own OPTs
especially McIntosh reproductions because its all too much
bother to get it 100% right.

Patrick Turner.

What a grand gesture it would be if Prof. Turner had a step-by-step
instruction, with pixs, on winding your own xfrs. I bet something like that
would become world famous. Probably not an easy undertaking, but
nevertheless much needed.

west

What a grand gesture it would be if Prof. Turner had a step-by-step
instruction, with pixs, on winding your own xfrs. I bet something like that
would become world famous. Probably not an easy undertaking, but
nevertheless much needed.

west


It might be famous in the very small (and steadily shrinking) world of
tube-o-philes. Maybe he'd sell 40 copies max.

West, maybe you could figure it out yourself and post it on your website.

;-)

Patrick Turner wrote:
Bret Ludwig wrote:

·à¤l¤f wrote:
All information about the properties of the enamelled wires, winding
structure, insulation materials, inductance of windings,
leakage inductance, capacitance between primary and secondary, for hand
winding the Unity Coupled Output Transformers again.
Anybody knows the details or knows where to get the details please help.

There is a guy in Wisconsin who will happily rewind your xfmr but the
price is high and he's not about to help you or anyone else DIY.

You could tear it down, document it, and rewind it but you will need
to build some fixturing. It's not a impossible job but if you have
never worked in a transformer shop this is not an ideal first project.
If you were to very carefully document the job and do a web page you
would be a real hero on Usenet.

Start with the patents , the numbers are on Roger Russell's web page
and are free for viewing at www.uspto.gov. There is additional useful
information in the blue and white JFK/MM era Audio Cyclopedia and in
Crowhurst's articles in the Audio Anthologies. Also you may want copies
of Bereskin's article on building a Class B amp with explicit winding
data from the old IEEE papers someone has put on the Web somewhere.

I have long held that repro'ing these would be a good seller for
hobbyists and restorers alike.

McIntosh OPTs are not easily rewound to the original spec because they
require triple insulated winding wire and bifilar wound windings.

But enough information to design and build your own OPT
exits at my website.

But you have to become an expert in the process.

And when you are done, you will find that there isn't any need for bifilar
windings if you know what EAR does with their unity gain OPTs.

Nearly every person gives up trying to wind their own OPTs
especially McIntosh reproductions because its all too much
bother to get it 100% right.

Winding the McIntosh transformer is simpler than many of the
"conventional" high quality transformers such as the UTC and Peerless
20-20 Plus series, the Marantz 8B and 5 outputs, or the units in the
Fairchild 275 or the HK Citations. The "secret" of McIntosh was its
"high D factor"- the ratio of sale price to build cost was high.

Tim de Paravicini's design is not as good as the true McIntosh design.
It's simpler in that he straps sweep tubes as triodes, not in the
conventional way, but by making them act more or less as Class B zero
bias triodes. This is not new to de Paravicini-I challenge anyone to
show me what is-it was used in the RCA theatre amps (which are not
considered prizes sonically) and is described in Orr's W6SAI Radio
Handbook for use as a AM modulator. The 509 and 549 are decent amps,
but not as good as what can be built around the true McIntosh circuit.

The key to doing the McIntosh xfmr is being willing to pay the piper
in terms of ordering a run of the right wire ($3000 to a wire mill, but
you'll get enough for a LOT of xfmrs) and getting the right C-cores,
and building some wind fixturing. It is not rocket science but it is
not a job for a stock Universal or a Gorman.

Coupling the McIntosh output circuit to better drivers and a proper
power supply produces the best possible tube amplifier that can be
built while having any semblance of power output and efficiency. A
Williamson design optimized to run a pair of 807s or KT66s at what I
would call their "natural lifespan" is going to be a 20 watt amp. The
MC275 gets an honest 80 watts per either channel with KT88s at the same
tube life. Milojub Nestoriovic understood that and his amps are really
good.

John Stewart and others have revisited the Crowhurst explorations in
an effort to use cheap components. I don't want to use cheap
components, I want to do it elegantly and right. That means the
McIntosh transformer, and not on E-I cores like the Mickey Mouse 275
reissue and not on toroids. On proper C-cores gapped with "Larry paper"
tensioned to get the BH loop right. (Insiders will get the joke....)

west wrote:

"Patrick Turner" wrote in message
...


Bret Ludwig wrote:

·à¤l¤f wrote:
All information about the properties of the enamelled wires, winding
structure, insulation materials, inductance of windings,
leakage inductance, capacitance between primary and secondary, for
hand
winding the Unity Coupled Output Transformers again.
Anybody knows the details or knows where to get the details please
help.

There is a guy in Wisconsin who will happily rewind your xfmr but the
price is high and he's not about to help you or anyone else DIY.

You could tear it down, document it, and rewind it but you will need
to build some fixturing. It's not a impossible job but if you have
never worked in a transformer shop this is not an ideal first project.
If you were to very carefully document the job and do a web page you
would be a real hero on Usenet.

Start with the patents , the numbers are on Roger Russell's web page
and are free for viewing at www.uspto.gov. There is additional useful
information in the blue and white JFK/MM era Audio Cyclopedia and in
Crowhurst's articles in the Audio Anthologies. Also you may want copies
of Bereskin's article on building a Class B amp with explicit winding
data from the old IEEE papers someone has put on the Web somewhere.

I have long held that repro'ing these would be a good seller for
hobbyists and restorers alike.

McIntosh OPTs are not easily rewound to the original spec because they
require triple insulated winding wire and bifilar wound windings.

But enough information to design and build your own OPT
exits at my website.

But you have to become an expert in the process.

And when you are done, you will find that there isn't any need for bifilar
windings if you know what EAR does with their unity gain OPTs.

Nearly every person gives up trying to wind their own OPTs
especially McIntosh reproductions because its all too much
bother to get it 100% right.

Patrick Turner.

What a grand gesture it would be if Prof. Turner had a step-by-step
instruction, with pixs, on winding your own xfrs. I bet something like that
would become world famous. Probably not an easy undertaking, but
nevertheless much needed.

What a grand gesture it would be if someome made a grand payment for
all the design work involved along with building and testing to make sure what I
have
designed meets the spec.
America's equipment is old and failing, and the cheap fix with a chinese made
horror
looks certain to only become more popular.

I have limited time for such things; I am way too busy, and these last few weeks
have
seen the development of repetitive strain aches and pains in my best arm.
There is enough info at my website for anyone
with average intelligence but with a large amount of willpower,
patience etc to design whatever they want.

Then unfortunately there are much needed fixes for the other
369 varieties of OPTs used in ancient old gear that nobody wants to pay the
right price to fix.

I cannot be a benevolent society.

If you want it, DO IT YOURSELF!

Patrick Turner





west

Bret Ludwig wrote:

Patrick Turner wrote:
Bret Ludwig wrote:

·à¤l¤f wrote:
All information about the properties of the enamelled wires, winding
structure, insulation materials, inductance of windings,
leakage inductance, capacitance between primary and secondary, for hand
winding the Unity Coupled Output Transformers again.
Anybody knows the details or knows where to get the details please help.

There is a guy in Wisconsin who will happily rewind your xfmr but the
price is high and he's not about to help you or anyone else DIY.

You could tear it down, document it, and rewind it but you will need
to build some fixturing. It's not a impossible job but if you have
never worked in a transformer shop this is not an ideal first project.
If you were to very carefully document the job and do a web page you
would be a real hero on Usenet.

Start with the patents , the numbers are on Roger Russell's web page
and are free for viewing at www.uspto.gov. There is additional useful
information in the blue and white JFK/MM era Audio Cyclopedia and in
Crowhurst's articles in the Audio Anthologies. Also you may want copies
of Bereskin's article on building a Class B amp with explicit winding
data from the old IEEE papers someone has put on the Web somewhere.

I have long held that repro'ing these would be a good seller for
hobbyists and restorers alike.

McIntosh OPTs are not easily rewound to the original spec because they
require triple insulated winding wire and bifilar wound windings.

But enough information to design and build your own OPT
exits at my website.

But you have to become an expert in the process.

And when you are done, you will find that there isn't any need for bifilar
windings if you know what EAR does with their unity gain OPTs.

Nearly every person gives up trying to wind their own OPTs
especially McIntosh reproductions because its all too much
bother to get it 100% right.

Winding the McIntosh transformer is simpler than many of the
"conventional" high quality transformers such as the UTC and Peerless
20-20 Plus series, the Marantz 8B and 5 outputs, or the units in the
Fairchild 275 or the HK Citations. The "secret" of McIntosh was its
"high D factor"- the ratio of sale price to build cost was high.

All very well but people have been spoilde by chinese prices.

They may have spent up big on McI amps when they earned well and
were bushy tailed and bright eyed, but 40 years later they hate repair expenses.

The labour in the McI remains the same.



Tim de Paravicini's design is not as good as the true McIntosh design.
It's simpler in that he straps sweep tubes as triodes, not in the
conventional way, but by making them act more or less as Class B zero
bias triodes.

His EAR 509 amp does not use the PL509 tubes in triode.
It is set up identically in principle to McI, but with separate screen windings
to have the G2 running at 1/2 the B+.
But the AC working is real pentode with 1/2 the voltage betwen a and k fed back at
the cathode,
and with the loading as it is in EAR509, this is pentode mode with 12dB of local
NFB.
The tubes are dangerously biased high to make a small but significant
amount of class A power before lurching into mainly class B.

Strapping windings with C where windings have the same AC and different DC
potential is a practice
promoted by GE back in 1957, and the cap shunting ties windings tightly together
like the bifilar windings achieve.

This is not new to de Paravicini-I challenge anyone to
show me what is-it was used in the RCA theatre amps (which are not
considered prizes sonically) and is described in Orr's W6SAI Radio
Handbook for use as a AM modulator. The 509 and 549 are decent amps,
but not as good as what can be built around the true McIntosh circuit.

The 509 is a horrid amp because its far too much class AB and uses ghastly
tubes such as the EL/PL 509, KT88 would be better, and that TdeP
used PL509 to begin with was stoopid; maybe someone sold him
10,000 tubes nobody wanted for a $.
Why 40 V heaters?

The total amount of applied NFB in 3 loops in EAR509 = 44dB.

It measures no better than what I would achieve with 4 EL34 and
10 times less NFB and one stage less NFB.

The sound is harsh after the first few watts.


The key to doing the McIntosh xfmr is being willing to pay the piper
in terms of ordering a run of the right wire ($3000 to a wire mill, but
you'll get enough for a LOT of xfmrs) and getting the right C-cores,
and building some wind fixturing. It is not rocket science but it is
not a job for a stock Universal or a Gorman.

The only time such things are viable is if someone such as McIntosh make a run of
retro amps with a pile of trannies that can be supported by the profit made from
the
retro models sold.

Then you have to wait 20 years to sell the spare but genuine spec trannies.



Coupling the McIntosh output circuit to better drivers and a proper
power supply produces the best possible tube amplifier that can be
built while having any semblance of power output and efficiency. A
Williamson design optimized to run a pair of 807s or KT66s at what I
would call their "natural lifespan" is going to be a 20 watt amp.

The Williamson can use a sixpack of KT88
and be 75 watts of AB triode.
I use 12 x 6550 in large amps, and the OPTs were
easy to layer wind since the higher the power, the larger the core,
but less turns are used, and its nice thick wire.

The
MC275 gets an honest 80 watts per either channel with KT88s at the same
tube life. Milojub Nestoriovic understood that and his amps are really
good.

John Stewart and others have revisited the Crowhurst explorations in
an effort to use cheap components. I don't want to use cheap
components, I want to do it elegantly and right. That means the
McIntosh transformer, and not on E-I cores like the Mickey Mouse 275
reissue and not on toroids. On proper C-cores gapped with "Larry paper"
tensioned to get the BH loop right. (Insiders will get the joke....)

I have used C-cores for OPTs gapped with plastic shopping bag
material; it gave a fine gap to tailor the saturation characteristic.

Eilor make very nice C-cores; just select the right size of C-core
and design the windings around it.

Nothing is impossible if patience, willpower, knowledge and
intelligence are sufficient.

Patrick Turner.

Patrick Turner wrote:

papers someone has put on the Web somewhere.

I have long held that repro'ing these would be a good seller for
hobbyists and restorers alike.

McIntosh OPTs are not easily rewound to the original spec because they
require triple insulated winding wire and bifilar wound windings.

But enough information to design and build your own OPT
exits at my website.

But you have to become an expert in the process.

And when you are done, you will find that there isn't any need for bifilar
windings if you know what EAR does with their unity gain OPTs.

Nearly every person gives up trying to wind their own OPTs
especially McIntosh reproductions because its all too much
bother to get it 100% right.

Very few people are acttually winding and most that do wind SE crap or
Williamsons to the old DTN Williamson wind specs.

Winding the McIntosh transformer is simpler than many of the
"conventional" high quality transformers such as the UTC and Peerless
20-20 Plus series, the Marantz 8B and 5 outputs, or the units in the
Fairchild 275 or the HK Citations. The "secret" of McIntosh was its
"high D factor"- the ratio of sale price to build cost was high.

All very well but people have been spoilde by chinese prices.


Where can you get GOOD Chinese made OPTs?


They may have spent up big on McI amps when they earned well and
were bushy tailed and bright eyed, but 40 years later they hate repair expenses.

The labour in the McI remains the same.



Tim de Paravicini's design is not as good as the true McIntosh design.
It's simpler in that he straps sweep tubes as triodes, not in the
conventional way, but by making them act more or less as Class B zero
bias triodes.

His EAR 509 amp does not use the PL509 tubes in triode.
It is set up identically in principle to McI, but with separate screen windings
to have the G2 running at 1/2 the B+.
But the AC working is real pentode with 1/2 the voltage betwen a and k fed back at
the cathode,
and with the loading as it is in EAR509, this is pentode mode with 12dB of local
NFB.
The tubes are dangerously biased high to make a small but significant
amount of class A power before lurching into mainly class B.

This is done in the MC3500 and in the Hugh Alvin Lockhart homebrew Mac
20 years before that. You can do it easily with the MC275 opt as well.
An aftermarket power supply designed to power Collins or Heathkit ham
equipment will supply HT, low B+ for the screens and all the other
small signal tube plate supplies except the drivers, and heater
voltages. Some have a bias supply as well.



Strapping windings with C where windings have the same AC and different DC
potential is a practice
promoted by GE back in 1957, and the cap shunting ties windings tightly together
like the bifilar windings achieve.

This is not new to de Paravicini-I challenge anyone to
show me what is-it was used in the RCA theatre amps (which are not
considered prizes sonically) and is described in Orr's W6SAI Radio
Handbook for use as a AM modulator. The 509 and 549 are decent amps,
but not as good as what can be built around the true McIntosh circuit.

The 509 is a horrid amp because its far too much class AB and uses ghastly
tubes such as the EL/PL 509, KT88 would be better, and that TdeP
used PL509 to begin with was stoopid; maybe someone sold him
10,000 tubes nobody wanted for a $.
Why 40 V heaters?

It wasn't stupid, the glass was cheap and satisfactory. He would have
been classier to provide for enough 6.3V heater supply so those could
have been used as well but that's no big issue.

The series heater string sweep tubes were cheaper than their 6.3 volt
counterparts, they no longer are. LOTS of SSB linears used them as well
as OTL audio amps and so forth.

Sweep and transmitting types are fine for audio except the screens
must be run at a lower level than the plates.

The total amount of applied NFB in 3 loops in EAR509 = 44dB.

It measures no better than what I would achieve with 4 EL34 and
10 times less NFB and one stage less NFB.

The sound is harsh after the first few watts.

Most 509s and 549s are used in recording monitor situations and people
mostly really like them. TdP has a reputation for arrogance, but at
least he understands the sun doesn't shine out the ass of the RDH 4, an
overrated volume to say the very least.



The key to doing the McIntosh xfmr is being willing to pay the piper
in terms of ordering a run of the right wire ($3000 to a wire mill, but
you'll get enough for a LOT of xfmrs) and getting the right C-cores,
and building some wind fixturing. It is not rocket science but it is
not a job for a stock Universal or a Gorman.

The only time such things are viable is if someone such as McIntosh make a run of
retro amps with a pile of trannies that can be supported by the profit made from
the
retro models sold.

Then you have to wait 20 years to sell the spare but genuine spec trannies.

The retro 275 does not use the 275 transformer. It uses a E-I core
bifilar design in a Kornblum or Peavey guitar amp quality build
implementation. No one will call bull**** on Mac.



Coupling the McIntosh output circuit to better drivers and a proper
power supply produces the best possible tube amplifier that can be
built while having any semblance of power output and efficiency. A
Williamson design optimized to run a pair of 807s or KT66s at what I
would call their "natural lifespan" is going to be a 20 watt amp.

The Williamson can use a sixpack of KT88
and be 75 watts of AB triode.
I use 12 x 6550 in large amps, and the OPTs were
easy to layer wind since the higher the power, the larger the core,
but less turns are used, and its nice thick wire.

Engineering is doing at reasonable cost, weight and efficiency what
any goofball could do for a lot more money and bother. A six pack of
KT88s putting out any less than 200 watts is a colossally stupid
endeavor.


The
MC275 gets an honest 80 watts per either channel with KT88s at the same
tube life. Milojub Nestoriovic understood that and his amps are really
good.

John Stewart and others have revisited the Crowhurst explorations in
an effort to use cheap components. I don't want to use cheap
components, I want to do it elegantly and right. That means the
McIntosh transformer, and not on E-I cores like the Mickey Mouse 275
reissue and not on toroids. On proper C-cores gapped with "Larry paper"
tensioned to get the BH loop right. (Insiders will get the joke....)

I have used C-cores for OPTs gapped with plastic shopping bag
material; it gave a fine gap to tailor the saturation characteristic.

Eilor make very nice C-cores; just select the right size of C-core
and design the windings around it.

Nothing is impossible if patience, willpower, knowledge and
intelligence are sufficient.
The Mcintosh is an icon in the United States and in Japan even if
Australians and Brits tend to stick their noses up at it. While it's no
get rich quick project, I'm sure someone could sell a fair number of
the transformers if they really met the standard. Ned Carlson is
apparently selling fair numbers of Dynaco transformers, and they are a
thoroughly mediocre product, the originals aren't even rare. You can
still dig up ST-70s at yard sales, there are people that seem to do
nothing besides buy such junk, swap a few parts and peddle on eBay to
the gullible and dumb. You just don't see McIntosh at yard sales.

Bret Ludwig wrote:

Patrick Turner wrote:

papers someone has put on the Web somewhere.

I have long held that repro'ing these would be a good seller for
hobbyists and restorers alike.

McIntosh OPTs are not easily rewound to the original spec because they
require triple insulated winding wire and bifilar wound windings.

But enough information to design and build your own OPT
exits at my website.

But you have to become an expert in the process.

And when you are done, you will find that there isn't any need for bifilar
windings if you know what EAR does with their unity gain OPTs.

Nearly every person gives up trying to wind their own OPTs
especially McIntosh reproductions because its all too much
bother to get it 100% right.

Very few people are acttually winding and most that do wind SE crap or
Williamsons to the old DTN Williamson wind specs.

Winding the McIntosh transformer is simpler than many of the
"conventional" high quality transformers such as the UTC and Peerless
20-20 Plus series, the Marantz 8B and 5 outputs, or the units in the
Fairchild 275 or the HK Citations. The "secret" of McIntosh was its
"high D factor"- the ratio of sale price to build cost was high.

All very well but people have been spoilde by chinese prices.

Where can you get GOOD Chinese made OPTs?

I don't have any idea right now; I always roll my own,
unless a customer supplies me with trannies like one did last year;
he preferred the Hammond solution for his 2A3 amps, using a 1670 series
for 2A3, about 4.5kG of iron, and quite OK to use imho.


But some of the chinese amps are showing promise;
they are learning what interleaving means, etc.

Buy them as the spare parts for the amps they are meant for.




They may have spent up big on McI amps when they earned well and
were bushy tailed and bright eyed, but 40 years later they hate repair expenses.

The labour in the McI remains the same.



Tim de Paravicini's design is not as good as the true McIntosh design.
It's simpler in that he straps sweep tubes as triodes, not in the
conventional way, but by making them act more or less as Class B zero
bias triodes.

His EAR 509 amp does not use the PL509 tubes in triode.
It is set up identically in principle to McI, but with separate screen windings
to have the G2 running at 1/2 the B+.
But the AC working is real pentode with 1/2 the voltage betwen a and k fed back at
the cathode,
and with the loading as it is in EAR509, this is pentode mode with 12dB of local
NFB.
The tubes are dangerously biased high to make a small but significant
amount of class A power before lurching into mainly class B.

This is done in the MC3500 and in the Hugh Alvin Lockhart homebrew Mac
20 years before that. You can do it easily with the MC275 opt as well.
An aftermarket power supply designed to power Collins or Heathkit ham
equipment will supply HT, low B+ for the screens and all the other
small signal tube plate supplies except the drivers, and heater
voltages. Some have a bias supply as well.

But there is no way you can have a separate screen winding in a stock McI.
The screens must either be taken to the anode point of the opposite tube in the PP
circuit,
and the DC voltage suit the KT88/6550....

These amps were meant to operate with low bias currents, and near class B op;
thus 75 watts was easy from a pair of 6550 without the tubes dying too soon.
Lotsa FB cleaned up the thd....



Strapping windings with C where windings have the same AC and different DC
potential is a practice
promoted by GE back in 1957, and the cap shunting ties windings tightly together
like the bifilar windings achieve.

This is not new to de Paravicini-I challenge anyone to
show me what is-it was used in the RCA theatre amps (which are not
considered prizes sonically) and is described in Orr's W6SAI Radio
Handbook for use as a AM modulator. The 509 and 549 are decent amps,
but not as good as what can be built around the true McIntosh circuit.

The 509 is a horrid amp because its far too much class AB and uses ghastly
tubes such as the EL/PL 509, KT88 would be better, and that TdeP
used PL509 to begin with was stoopid; maybe someone sold him
10,000 tubes nobody wanted for a $.
Why 40 V heaters?

It wasn't stupid, the glass was cheap and satisfactory. He would have
been classier to provide for enough 6.3V heater supply so those could
have been used as well but that's no big issue.

Anyway, stoopid is a harsh word, but using PL509 condemns ppl to
just that tube and no other; the circuit is illsuited for any other tube I can think of.

And for best operation, nothing else except the
4 ohm tap should be used, even with speakers of 8 ohms,
you still get 70+ watts, but the higher tube load is better for the tubes.



The series heater string sweep tubes were cheaper than their 6.3 volt
counterparts, they no longer are. LOTS of SSB linears used them as well
as OTL audio amps and so forth.

Series heaters are another no-no afaiac.


Sweep and transmitting types are fine for audio except the screens
must be run at a lower level than the plates.

Yes, that is generally true, except that most latter day sweep tubes produced much more
thd
than their more linear beam tets such as 6L6, 807 etc..
The 6L6 and 807 could have plate supply B+ up to 600V, and screens were
best kept to 300V or lower.

6CM5/EL36 like about 300V for Ea, and go OK with only 150V for Eg2.

But of all the sweep tubes, 6CM5, and its rare brother without a top cap, the 6FW5
make splendid triodes with sound to rival a 2A3, and with better PP ability;
I have a PP amp using thse good for a max of 28 watts AB triode,
Ea = Eg2 = 375V, Bias = -60V, load minimum about 6k, fixed bias.

6CD6, 6DQ6 and others are not wonderful at all in either beam mode or triode mode
for audio, but the sweep tubes would be great for ham radio RF.



The total amount of applied NFB in 3 loops in EAR509 = 44dB.

It measures no better than what I would achieve with 4 EL34 and
10 times less NFB and one stage less NFB.

The sound is harsh after the first few watts.

Most 509s and 549s are used in recording monitor situations and people
mostly really like them.

I cannot imagine why EAR509 has got a good reputation;
it was designed tongue in cheek along the line of an SS amp,
lotsa gain, lotsa FB, little class A, and FB cleans up the mess.

My personal experience was with one that nearly burned a house down
when a dude went out to get some beer.
After rebuilding one completely, and doing its mate the same way,
I made lots of changes to make the circuit stable and operate well,
and allow an instant view of the bias condition with red/green led monitoring
of the DC anode currents that lurch about wildly when you crank the volume.

After listening to the EAR509 amps I didn't see any need for praise.
The McI with KT88/6550 is a much better amp.


TdP has a reputation for arrogance, but at
least he understands the sun doesn't shine out the ass of the RDH 4, an
overrated volume to say the very least.

Much happened with tubes after 1955, and much if what is in RDH4
is based on "good practice" prior to 1953.






The key to doing the McIntosh xfmr is being willing to pay the piper
in terms of ordering a run of the right wire ($3000 to a wire mill, but
you'll get enough for a LOT of xfmrs) and getting the right C-cores,
and building some wind fixturing. It is not rocket science but it is
not a job for a stock Universal or a Gorman.

The only time such things are viable is if someone such as McIntosh make a run of
retro amps with a pile of trannies that can be supported by the profit made from
the
retro models sold.

Then you have to wait 20 years to sell the spare but genuine spec trannies.

The retro 275 does not use the 275 transformer. It uses a E-I core
bifilar design in a Kornblum or Peavey guitar amp quality build
implementation. No one will call bull**** on Mac.

I am not fully aware of the retro design details.

But good E&I is ok.
I get GOSS which has a nice high µ, very low thd, so it can be better than any C-cored
tranny.





Coupling the McIntosh output circuit to better drivers and a proper
power supply produces the best possible tube amplifier that can be
built while having any semblance of power output and efficiency. A
Williamson design optimized to run a pair of 807s or KT66s at what I
would call their "natural lifespan" is going to be a 20 watt amp.

The Williamson can use a sixpack of KT88
and be 75 watts of AB triode.
I use 12 x 6550 in large amps, and the OPTs were
easy to layer wind since the higher the power, the larger the core,
but less turns are used, and its nice thick wire.

Engineering is doing at reasonable cost, weight and efficiency what
any goofball could do for a lot more money and bother. A six pack of
KT88s putting out any less than 200 watts is a colossally stupid
endeavor.

Not to some ppl I know.
I like to have each pair of KT88 make no more than 50 watts into 4 ohms,
but capable of 65w max into 2.5-3 ohms, and mainly class A into 8 ohms, UL, or CFB.

So a dozen used in my 300 watt amps are not stressed out.

ARC use 16 x 6550 to make 600W in their Reference 600 amps.

Its very hard to tell if the amp is working
in beam tetrode, UL, or triode, if the average power is only a few watts.




The
MC275 gets an honest 80 watts per either channel with KT88s at the same
tube life. Milojub Nestoriovic understood that and his amps are really
good.

John Stewart and others have revisited the Crowhurst explorations in
an effort to use cheap components. I don't want to use cheap
components, I want to do it elegantly and right. That means the
McIntosh transformer, and not on E-I cores like the Mickey Mouse 275
reissue and not on toroids. On proper C-cores gapped with "Larry paper"
tensioned to get the BH loop right. (Insiders will get the joke....)

I have used C-cores for OPTs gapped with plastic shopping bag
material; it gave a fine gap to tailor the saturation characteristic.

Eilor make very nice C-cores; just select the right size of C-core
and design the windings around it.

Nothing is impossible if patience, willpower, knowledge and
intelligence are sufficient.
The Mcintosh is an icon in the United States and in Japan even if
Australians and Brits tend to stick their noses up at it.

Prior to 1970, we were more a british import orientated lot.
US gear cost a lot more, and Oz audio buffs reckoned the poms
really invented hi-fi, not the yanks, so those with money,
the tiny minority, bought Quad and Leak and Radfords.
A few bought McI amps.

Today we buy any damn thing if the price is right.

While it's no
get rich quick project, I'm sure someone could sell a fair number of
the transformers if they really met the standard. Ned Carlson is
apparently selling fair numbers of Dynaco transformers, and they are a
thoroughly mediocre product, the originals aren't even rare. You can
still dig up ST-70s at yard sales, there are people that seem to do
nothing besides buy such junk, swap a few parts and peddle on eBay to
the gullible and dumb. You just don't see McIntosh at yard sales.

ST70 was an entry level product made down to a price, unlike the McI,
which was designed up to a quality.

Different sorts of ppl by expensive quality rather than the cheapest deal
of Mediocre Brand.

But the ST80 was a better amp from Dynaco.

I don't want to be solely a transformer maker, like bricklaying, its boring work
after a short time.

If you want a tranny from me, you have to pay the big price for me to make a one off
design,
or you buy the whole amp built around the OPTs.

Patrick Turner.

Bret Ludwig wrote:


John Stewart and others have revisited the Crowhurst explorations in
an effort to use cheap components.

Another is in the works, this time with purpose built transformers. But it will be
a while. The hitech sales job has again taken over my life.
Designing anything to a price or cost point is a real challenge. But it does make
one think about what is important.
Throwing money at a problem is something I can't afford. And I'm sure that is the
case with most of us.

Cheers, John Stewart

I don't want to use cheap
components, I want to do it elegantly and right. That means the
McIntosh transformer, and not on E-I cores like the Mickey Mouse 275
reissue and not on toroids. On proper C-cores gapped with "Larry paper"
tensioned to get the BH loop right. (Insiders will get the joke....)

John Stewart wrote:
Bret Ludwig wrote:


John Stewart and others have revisited the Crowhurst explorations in
an effort to use cheap components.

Another is in the works, this time with purpose built transformers. But it will be
a while. The hitech sales job has again taken over my life.
Designing anything to a price or cost point is a real challenge. But it does make
one think about what is important.
Throwing money at a problem is something I can't afford. And I'm sure that is the
case with most of us.

Cheers, John Stewart

I'm sure a really impressive amp could be built with a terrifically
ornate transformer. A guy in Canada named Perkins was working on one
such and I'm sure it would have been great, but the cost was
phenomenal. If you spec an existing xfmr you have a market for at
least a few for repair/ replacements you are ahead of the game as well
as some people specifically want to clone existing units that have high
collector value. Dave Jahnsen has done very well with his DIY
Teletronix comressor book and many people have built Marantz 7 preamp
clones (usually w/o the switching). I would not build a tube hi-fi amp
if I could not get a transformer equal to a HK Citation, a Marantz or
Mac or a UTC Linear Standard or a real (not Magnequeef dogpoop)
Peerless 20-20. (UTC and Peerless also built many OEM and catalog
designs that were not particularly magnificent.) Aside from Sowter in
England and perhaps some Japanese units not advertised over here, I
know of no such transformers being sold here. Hammonds and Dyna
designs, okay for guitar amps or if you wanted to fix Uncle Herb's old
console, are not serious hi-fi items as far as I can determine. The
Dynaco designs have flaws and since the opt's are still quite common,
many with low time on them, I'm baffled why anyone would reproduce them
except it was convenient and the clientele gullible. An upgraded
transformer that is sold to fit the ST or Mark chassis that fixes the
DC symmetry and lumpy insertion loss issues wuld have bee good, but I'm
amazed and disappointed he's selling these Dyna winds.

While a project can be too expensive, I think a lot of people are
disappointed with ones that don't cost enough to "make it worth the
while". If they are going to build say a pair of monoblocks they are
more apt to feel it's worth the candle if they have to spend a few
hundred in parts than if it's a junkbox project. Sadly, low income
people are not building this stuff: it's almost all people with a fair
bit of cash to spend. Of course there are the losers who mostly seem to
always be fooling with junked Magnavox consoles they haul away for free
and sell the butchered chassis to morons on eBay, but that's what they
are.

Bret Ludwig wrote:

John Stewart wrote:
Bret Ludwig wrote:


John Stewart and others have revisited the Crowhurst explorations in
an effort to use cheap components.

Another is in the works, this time with purpose built transformers. But it will be
a while. The hitech sales job has again taken over my life.
Designing anything to a price or cost point is a real challenge. But it does make
one think about what is important.
Throwing money at a problem is something I can't afford. And I'm sure that is the
case with most of us.

Cheers, John Stewart

I'm sure a really impressive amp could be built with a terrifically
ornate transformer. A guy in Canada named Perkins was working on one
such and I'm sure it would have been great, but the cost was
phenomenal. If you spec an existing xfmr you have a market for at
least a few for repair/ replacements you are ahead of the game as well
as some people specifically want to clone existing units that have high
collector value. Dave Jahnsen has done very well with his DIY
Teletronix comressor book and many people have built Marantz 7 preamp
clones (usually w/o the switching). I would not build a tube hi-fi amp
if I could not get a transformer equal to a HK Citation, a Marantz or
Mac or a UTC Linear Standard or a real (not Magnequeef dogpoop)
Peerless 20-20. (UTC and Peerless also built many OEM and catalog
designs that were not particularly magnificent.) Aside from Sowter in
England and perhaps some Japanese units not advertised over here, I
know of no such transformers being sold here. Hammonds and Dyna
designs, okay for guitar amps or if you wanted to fix Uncle Herb's old
console, are not serious hi-fi items as far as I can determine. The
Dynaco designs have flaws and since the opt's are still quite common,
many with low time on them, I'm baffled why anyone would reproduce them
except it was convenient and the clientele gullible. An upgraded
transformer that is sold to fit the ST or Mark chassis that fixes the
DC symmetry and lumpy insertion loss issues wuld have bee good, but I'm
amazed and disappointed he's selling these Dyna winds.

While a project can be too expensive, I think a lot of people are
disappointed with ones that don't cost enough to "make it worth the
while". If they are going to build say a pair of monoblocks they are
more apt to feel it's worth the candle if they have to spend a few
hundred in parts than if it's a junkbox project. Sadly, low income
people are not building this stuff: it's almost all people with a fair
bit of cash to spend. Of course there are the losers who mostly seem to
always be fooling with junked Magnavox consoles they haul away for free
and sell the butchered chassis to morons on eBay, but that's what they
are.

Try winding a decent OPT. Then it all becomes clear why so few people
manage it.
Then have a look at the prices the DIY brigade want to pay for gear.
They want professional ppl to work for nothing.
They will pay a plumber to fix a broken toilet pipe but they
won't pay a skilled person the same to wind a tranny for them.

If I make a magnificent replacement for McIntosh and all the other
575 tranny types used in ancient amps, hardly anyone will buy them.

Patrick Turner.

Patrick Turner wrote:
snip


Try winding a decent OPT. Then it all becomes clear why so few people
manage it.
Then have a look at the prices the DIY brigade want to pay for gear.
They want professional ppl to work for nothing.
They will pay a plumber to fix a broken toilet pipe but they
won't pay a skilled person the same to wind a tranny for them.

If I make a magnificent replacement for McIntosh and all the other
575 tranny types used in ancient amps, hardly anyone will buy them.

I worked in a transformer wind shop. The winders were all women, many
Asians or Hispanics and at that time the starting pay was around $5.50
an hour. Minimum wage in the US was a little under $5 an hour as I
recall. The techs were paid a little more, I think I was getting the
totally uncalled for new hire pay at $7.00 an hour. We had techs with a
year's experience or more they had to bump up to that then. I left
there for another electronics job and they started me at like $9.50
after that. When I left THAT to become a _stores clerk_ at a now
defunct airline I signed on at $14.80 /hr and needed less knowledge and
did half as much work. Yet that was still below average wages in the
United States.

You want to pay someone else to do the winding no matter what country
you are in.

Patrick Turner wrote:

Bret Ludwig wrote:

·à¤l¤f wrote:
All information about the properties of the enamelled wires, winding
structure, insulation materials, inductance of windings,
leakage inductance, capacitance between primary and secondary, for hand
winding the Unity Coupled Output Transformers again.
Anybody knows the details or knows where to get the details please help.

There is a guy in Wisconsin who will happily rewind your xfmr but the
price is high and he's not about to help you or anyone else DIY.

You could tear it down, document it, and rewind it but you will need
to build some fixturing. It's not a impossible job but if you have
never worked in a transformer shop this is not an ideal first project.
If you were to very carefully document the job and do a web page you
would be a real hero on Usenet.

Start with the patents , the numbers are on Roger Russell's web page
and are free for viewing at www.uspto.gov. There is additional useful
information in the blue and white JFK/MM era Audio Cyclopedia and in
Crowhurst's articles in the Audio Anthologies. Also you may want copies
of Bereskin's article on building a Class B amp with explicit winding
data from the old IEEE papers someone has put on the Web somewhere.

I have long held that repro'ing these would be a good seller for
hobbyists and restorers alike.

McIntosh OPTs are not easily rewound to the original spec because they
require triple insulated winding wire and bifilar wound windings.

Why do they *require* triple insulated ?

I thought that's only required for safety ac mains insulation barriers ?

Graham

Pooh Bear wrote:
Patrick Turner wrote:

Bret Ludwig wrote:

·à¤l¤f wrote:
All information about the properties of the enamelled wires, winding
structure, insulation materials, inductance of windings,
leakage inductance, capacitance between primary and secondary, for hand
winding the Unity Coupled Output Transformers again.
Anybody knows the details or knows where to get the details please help.

There is a guy in Wisconsin who will happily rewind your xfmr but the
price is high and he's not about to help you or anyone else DIY.

You could tear it down, document it, and rewind it but you will need
to build some fixturing. It's not a impossible job but if you have
never worked in a transformer shop this is not an ideal first project.
If you were to very carefully document the job and do a web page you
would be a real hero on Usenet.

Start with the patents , the numbers are on Roger Russell's web page
and are free for viewing at www.uspto.gov. There is additional useful
information in the blue and white JFK/MM era Audio Cyclopedia and in
Crowhurst's articles in the Audio Anthologies. Also you may want copies
of Bereskin's article on building a Class B amp with explicit winding
data from the old IEEE papers someone has put on the Web somewhere.

I have long held that repro'ing these would be a good seller for
hobbyists and restorers alike.

McIntosh OPTs are not easily rewound to the original spec because they
require triple insulated winding wire and bifilar wound windings.

Why do they *require* triple insulated ?

I thought that's only required for safety ac mains insulation barriers ?

Look at the schematic, carefully. The McIntosh amp can be found at
many places on the web if you do not have it in a book. The actual wire
has one insulating coat but it must have a very high voltage
withstanding rating because the DC plus peak AC are in the neighborhood
of 2 kV at peak power. At the same time the thickness has to be low so
as the wire can be wound trifilarly and in a orderly neat manner,
filling the space.

Bret Ludwig wrote:

Patrick Turner wrote:
snip


Try winding a decent OPT. Then it all becomes clear why so few people
manage it.
Then have a look at the prices the DIY brigade want to pay for gear.
They want professional ppl to work for nothing.
They will pay a plumber to fix a broken toilet pipe but they
won't pay a skilled person the same to wind a tranny for them.

If I make a magnificent replacement for McIntosh and all the other
575 tranny types used in ancient amps, hardly anyone will buy them.

I worked in a transformer wind shop. The winders were all women, many
Asians or Hispanics and at that time the starting pay was around $5.50
an hour. Minimum wage in the US was a little under $5 an hour as I
recall.

Ah, I can relate to that because its about the wage I work for when I build
amplifiers.

The techs were paid a little more, I think I was getting the
totally uncalled for new hire pay at $7.00 an hour. We had techs with a
year's experience or more they had to bump up to that then. I left
there for another electronics job and they started me at like $9.50
after that. When I left THAT to become a _stores clerk_ at a now
defunct airline I signed on at $14.80 /hr and needed less knowledge and
did half as much work. Yet that was still below average wages in the
United States.

You want to pay someone else to do the winding no matter what country
you are in.

But then the quality ceases to exist because ppl winding don't undertsand
the importance
of mistake-free windings; they cover their mistakes after each wire layer,
and all they want is to get paid.

No thanks, but I am not at all interested in paying crummy
labourers in china or elsewhere.

Money isn't supremely important to me; its making sure whatever i make will
last
and sound well.

I stopped making money that could allow me to be marriageable and take
holidays
when my health stopped me from working in the construction
industry. I could have been earning $50 an hour easily everyday now.

But all the "professional" artisans and craftsmen here in Oz work mainly
for peanuts.

Patrick Turner.

Pooh Bear wrote:

Patrick Turner wrote:

Bret Ludwig wrote:

·à¤l¤f wrote:
All information about the properties of the enamelled wires, winding
structure, insulation materials, inductance of windings,
leakage inductance, capacitance between primary and secondary, for hand
winding the Unity Coupled Output Transformers again.
Anybody knows the details or knows where to get the details please help.

There is a guy in Wisconsin who will happily rewind your xfmr but the
price is high and he's not about to help you or anyone else DIY.

You could tear it down, document it, and rewind it but you will need
to build some fixturing. It's not a impossible job but if you have
never worked in a transformer shop this is not an ideal first project.
If you were to very carefully document the job and do a web page you
would be a real hero on Usenet.

Start with the patents , the numbers are on Roger Russell's web page
and are free for viewing at www.uspto.gov. There is additional useful
information in the blue and white JFK/MM era Audio Cyclopedia and in
Crowhurst's articles in the Audio Anthologies. Also you may want copies
of Bereskin's article on building a Class B amp with explicit winding
data from the old IEEE papers someone has put on the Web somewhere.

I have long held that repro'ing these would be a good seller for
hobbyists and restorers alike.

McIntosh OPTs are not easily rewound to the original spec because they
require triple insulated winding wire and bifilar wound windings.

Why do they *require* triple insulated ?

Winding wire comes in 3 categories, once insulated, twice insulated, and thrice
insulated.
So cat 3 has 3 layers of polyisteramide coating.
Just about everyone winding motors and trannies uses cat 2 wire.

But McI were wise to use cat 3 because the bilfilar windings connected to the
anode circuits run at a DC potential of +470V, and the cathode windings are
at 0V potential, so there is a tendency for the windings to short between
anode and cathode circuits when a small brakdown of insulation occurs.


I thought that's only required for safety ac mains insulation barriers ?

Most countries' electrical standards codes spell out what the minimum
distance must be between any part of the primary wire and
any part of any secondary or earthy metal surface, such as the core.

I cannot recall exactly what the Oz codes say but its supposed to be
2 or 3 mm.
Clearly the enamel which is only 0.1mm even if there are 3 layers isn't enough
for mains isolation.

But the rules for pri to sec insulation don't apply to the OPT
unless its medical gear in which case there may be two isolation trannies
in series.

If you twist a pair of enamel grade 2 wires together and apply a DC voltage,
it may take 6,000V before an arc between the enameled wires occurs
after some time.
But we must not tempt fate and expect to be able to wind one
winding straight on top of another where big V differences occur because
over a long time the the insulation may braek down, and moisture and pollution
will help an arc to begin.

Patrick Turner.


Graham

Bret Ludwig wrote:

Pooh Bear wrote:
Patrick Turner wrote:

Bret Ludwig wrote:

·à¤l¤f wrote:
All information about the properties of the enamelled wires, winding
structure, insulation materials, inductance of windings,
leakage inductance, capacitance between primary and secondary, for hand
winding the Unity Coupled Output Transformers again.
Anybody knows the details or knows where to get the details please help.

There is a guy in Wisconsin who will happily rewind your xfmr but the
price is high and he's not about to help you or anyone else DIY.

You could tear it down, document it, and rewind it but you will need
to build some fixturing. It's not a impossible job but if you have
never worked in a transformer shop this is not an ideal first project.
If you were to very carefully document the job and do a web page you
would be a real hero on Usenet.

Start with the patents , the numbers are on Roger Russell's web page
and are free for viewing at www.uspto.gov. There is additional useful
information in the blue and white JFK/MM era Audio Cyclopedia and in
Crowhurst's articles in the Audio Anthologies. Also you may want copies
of Bereskin's article on building a Class B amp with explicit winding
data from the old IEEE papers someone has put on the Web somewhere.

I have long held that repro'ing these would be a good seller for
hobbyists and restorers alike.

McIntosh OPTs are not easily rewound to the original spec because they
require triple insulated winding wire and bifilar wound windings.

Why do they *require* triple insulated ?

I thought that's only required for safety ac mains insulation barriers ?

Look at the schematic, carefully. The McIntosh amp can be found at
many places on the web if you do not have it in a book. The actual wire
has one insulating coat but it must have a very high voltage
withstanding rating because the DC plus peak AC are in the neighborhood
of 2 kV at peak power. At the same time the thickness has to be low so
as the wire can be wound trifilarly and in a orderly neat manner,
filling the space.

Not all McI OP trannies have trifilar wound coils.

And the 2kV of peak voltage that can occur can only occur between
parts of the cathode and anode coils and earthy windings such as the
speaker secondary.

It would be almost impossible to get one winding wound bililar
with another to ever experience a 2kV potential difference in signals between the
two windings.
But the B+ PD is always present, and it can destroy an OPT if ever there
is an arc between coils, once that arc gets started.

Patrick Turner.

Patrick Turner wrote:

Pooh Bear wrote:

Patrick Turner wrote:

Bret Ludwig wrote:

·à¤l¤f wrote:
All information about the properties of the enamelled wires, winding
structure, insulation materials, inductance of windings,
leakage inductance, capacitance between primary and secondary, for hand
winding the Unity Coupled Output Transformers again.
Anybody knows the details or knows where to get the details please help.

There is a guy in Wisconsin who will happily rewind your xfmr but the
price is high and he's not about to help you or anyone else DIY.

You could tear it down, document it, and rewind it but you will need
to build some fixturing. It's not a impossible job but if you have
never worked in a transformer shop this is not an ideal first project.
If you were to very carefully document the job and do a web page you
would be a real hero on Usenet.

Start with the patents , the numbers are on Roger Russell's web page
and are free for viewing at www.uspto.gov. There is additional useful
information in the blue and white JFK/MM era Audio Cyclopedia and in
Crowhurst's articles in the Audio Anthologies. Also you may want copies
of Bereskin's article on building a Class B amp with explicit winding
data from the old IEEE papers someone has put on the Web somewhere.

I have long held that repro'ing these would be a good seller for
hobbyists and restorers alike.

McIntosh OPTs are not easily rewound to the original spec because they
require triple insulated winding wire and bifilar wound windings.

Why do they *require* triple insulated ?

Winding wire comes in 3 categories, once insulated, twice insulated, and thrice
insulated.
So cat 3 has 3 layers of polyisteramide coating.
Just about everyone winding motors and trannies uses cat 2 wire.

But McI were wise to use cat 3 because the bilfilar windings connected to the
anode circuits run at a DC potential of +470V, and the cathode windings are
at 0V potential, so there is a tendency for the windings to short between
anode and cathode circuits when a small brakdown of insulation occurs.

I thought that's only required for safety ac mains insulation barriers ?

Most countries' electrical standards codes spell out what the minimum
distance must be between any part of the primary wire and
any part of any secondary or earthy metal surface, such as the core.

I cannot recall exactly what the Oz codes say but its supposed to be
2 or 3 mm.
Clearly the enamel which is only 0.1mm even if there are 3 layers isn't enough
for mains isolation.

But the rules for pri to sec insulation don't apply to the OPT
unless its medical gear in which case there may be two isolation trannies
in series.

If you twist a pair of enamel grade 2 wires together and apply a DC voltage,
it may take 6,000V before an arc between the enameled wires occurs
after some time.
But we must not tempt fate and expect to be able to wind one
winding straight on top of another where big V differences occur because
over a long time the the insulation may braek down, and moisture and pollution
will help an arc to begin.

Ok, I follow and understand all that you say.

I rather think that the 'triple insulated' wire I'm familiar with is perhaps
different to that originally used here.

See for example...........
http://www.furukawa.co.jp/makisen/en...xe_feature.htm

I've used some of this stuff and its insulation is pretty awesome. It meets most IEC
specs for pri-sec isolation for example.

It was just a query on account of the mention of triple insulated wire. It's good
stuff btw. You can significantly improve coupling using it. In fact it's perfect for
tube output stages too.


Graham

Pooh Bear wrote:

Patrick Turner wrote:

Pooh Bear wrote:

Patrick Turner wrote:



But we must not tempt fate and expect to be able to wind one
winding straight on top of another where big V differences occur because
over a long time the the insulation may braek down, and moisture and pollution
will help an arc to begin.

Ok, I follow and understand all that you say.

I rather think that the 'triple insulated' wire I'm familiar with is perhaps
different to that originally used here.

See for example...........
http://www.furukawa.co.jp/makisen/en...xe_feature.htm

The description there says they use 3 layers of insulation extruded over the copper
wire.
That is exactly what I was talking about.



I've used some of this stuff and its insulation is pretty awesome. It meets most IEC
specs for pri-sec isolation for example.

It was just a query on account of the mention of triple insulated wire. It's good
stuff btw. You can significantly improve coupling using it. In fact it's perfect for
tube output stages too.

Well the extra coupling is due to bifilar, not the extra insulation thickness.
The extra insulation thickness will mean you get less turns into a given window area,
and it makes it harder to cram all the turns you want onto the wind up.

Cat 2 wire is quite ok for all regular trannies with well DC isolated windings.
If I wanted Cat3, I have top order a minimum quantity which would be very
expensive; hardly anyone uses it since with good design there rarely a need.

But if you got it, use it.
Square section or rectangular section wire is also better for any tranny since it allows
more Cu per
area, so less Cu losses.
But its a complete PITA to use, so hardly anyone does, and they don't need to.

Patrick Turner


Graham

On Wed, 16 Nov 2005 21:17:30 +0000, Pooh Bear
wrote:



Patrick Turner wrote:

Pooh Bear wrote:

Patrick Turner wrote:

Bret Ludwig wrote:

·à¤l¤f wrote:
All information about the properties of the enamelled wires, winding
structure, insulation materials, inductance of windings,
leakage inductance, capacitance between primary and secondary, for hand
winding the Unity Coupled Output Transformers again.
Anybody knows the details or knows where to get the details please help.

There is a guy in Wisconsin who will happily rewind your xfmr but the
price is high and he's not about to help you or anyone else DIY.

You could tear it down, document it, and rewind it but you will need
to build some fixturing. It's not a impossible job but if you have
never worked in a transformer shop this is not an ideal first project.
If you were to very carefully document the job and do a web page you
would be a real hero on Usenet.

Start with the patents , the numbers are on Roger Russell's web page
and are free for viewing at www.uspto.gov. There is additional useful
information in the blue and white JFK/MM era Audio Cyclopedia and in
Crowhurst's articles in the Audio Anthologies. Also you may want copies
of Bereskin's article on building a Class B amp with explicit winding
data from the old IEEE papers someone has put on the Web somewhere.

I have long held that repro'ing these would be a good seller for
hobbyists and restorers alike.

McIntosh OPTs are not easily rewound to the original spec because they
require triple insulated winding wire and bifilar wound windings.

Why do they *require* triple insulated ?

Winding wire comes in 3 categories, once insulated, twice insulated, and thrice
insulated.
So cat 3 has 3 layers of polyisteramide coating.
Just about everyone winding motors and trannies uses cat 2 wire.

But McI were wise to use cat 3 because the bilfilar windings connected to the
anode circuits run at a DC potential of +470V, and the cathode windings are
at 0V potential, so there is a tendency for the windings to short between
anode and cathode circuits when a small brakdown of insulation occurs.

I thought that's only required for safety ac mains insulation barriers ?

Most countries' electrical standards codes spell out what the minimum
distance must be between any part of the primary wire and
any part of any secondary or earthy metal surface, such as the core.

I cannot recall exactly what the Oz codes say but its supposed to be
2 or 3 mm.
Clearly the enamel which is only 0.1mm even if there are 3 layers isn't enough
for mains isolation.

But the rules for pri to sec insulation don't apply to the OPT
unless its medical gear in which case there may be two isolation trannies
in series.

If you twist a pair of enamel grade 2 wires together and apply a DC voltage,
it may take 6,000V before an arc between the enameled wires occurs
after some time.
But we must not tempt fate and expect to be able to wind one
winding straight on top of another where big V differences occur because
over a long time the the insulation may braek down, and moisture and pollution
will help an arc to begin.

Ok, I follow and understand all that you say.

I rather think that the 'triple insulated' wire I'm familiar with is perhaps
different to that originally used here.

See for example...........
http://www.furukawa.co.jp/makisen/en...xe_feature.htm

I've used some of this stuff and its insulation is pretty awesome. It meets most IEC
specs for pri-sec isolation for example.

It was just a query on account of the mention of triple insulated wire. It's good
stuff btw. You can significantly improve coupling using it. In fact it's perfect for
tube output stages too.


Graham
The triple insulation is used for protection against corona as well as
dielectric strength. Triple insulation lowers the occurence of pin
holes in the insulation.

Jerry

Patrick Turner wrote:

snip

If I make a magnificent replacement for McIntosh and all the other
575 tranny types used in ancient amps, hardly anyone will buy them.


You have to decide on one or two particularly desireable types.
Peerless or UTC are who to copy if you want to do a catalog spec unit,
Marantz and Harmon-Kardon or Fairchild, for a proprietary type.


I worked in a transformer wind shop. The winders were all women, many
Asians or Hispanics and at that time the starting pay was around $5.50
an hour. Minimum wage in the US was a little under $5 an hour as I
recall.

Ah, I can relate to that because its about the wage I work for when I build
amplifiers.

That's your foolishness then. Never mix your hobby with your career.
Never works.


The techs were paid a little more, I think I was getting the
totally uncalled for new hire pay at $7.00 an hour. We had techs with a
year's experience or more they had to bump up to that then. I left
there for another electronics job and they started me at like $9.50
after that. When I left THAT to become a _stores clerk_ at a now
defunct airline I signed on at $14.80 /hr and needed less knowledge and
did half as much work. Yet that was still below average wages in the
United States.

You want to pay someone else to do the winding no matter what country
you are in.

But then the quality ceases to exist because ppl winding don't undertsand
the importance
of mistake-free windings; they cover their mistakes after each wire layer,
and all they want is to get paid.

Bull****, we were winding mil-spec missile components which would fail
test if a **** hair got between two windings in a lot of cases. We
wound one thingamabob we called "the Norelco" that was quadrifilar and
worked on three phase variable frequency drive over a two decade
frequency ratio. The labor was getting paid a little over minimum wage
and the workmanship damned good, and the owners made all the profit.

No thanks, but I am not at all interested in paying crummy
labourers in china or elsewhere.


The arrogance of the artisan.

If Australia is so great I am sure you could do them there. You could
even do them in the United States, there are lots of illiterate
mestizos you could train that could do them better than you, or I,
being suited to repetitive work like women, and would be thrilled at
the $6 an hour and no health benefits many American places pay,
contrary to widespread belief.

You might be able to build a hot rod better than an Aston Martin in
your garage, but it won't have any resale value and it won't be sought
after unless enough are made so people know of them.

Money isn't supremely important to me; its making sure whatever i make will
last
and sound well.

But you will never make very many, and when you die, they will go to
the skip when the first problem develops, because the name on them
isn't known and they will have no market value. If they are lucky the
transformers will go into guitar amps and last a few years of touring,
until a cathode-plate short blows them out.

Bret Ludwig wrote:

Patrick Turner wrote:

snip

If I make a magnificent replacement for McIntosh and all the other
575 tranny types used in ancient amps, hardly anyone will buy them.


You have to decide on one or two particularly desireable types.
Peerless or UTC are who to copy if you want to do a catalog spec unit,
Marantz and Harmon-Kardon or Fairchild, for a proprietary type.

I worked in a transformer wind shop. The winders were all women, many
Asians or Hispanics and at that time the starting pay was around $5.50
an hour. Minimum wage in the US was a little under $5 an hour as I
recall.

Ah, I can relate to that because its about the wage I work for when I build
amplifiers.

That's your foolishness then. Never mix your hobby with your career.
Never works.


The techs were paid a little more, I think I was getting the
totally uncalled for new hire pay at $7.00 an hour. We had techs with a
year's experience or more they had to bump up to that then. I left
there for another electronics job and they started me at like $9.50
after that. When I left THAT to become a _stores clerk_ at a now
defunct airline I signed on at $14.80 /hr and needed less knowledge and
did half as much work. Yet that was still below average wages in the
United States.

You want to pay someone else to do the winding no matter what country
you are in.

But then the quality ceases to exist because ppl winding don't undertsand
the importance
of mistake-free windings; they cover their mistakes after each wire layer,
and all they want is to get paid.

Bull****, we were winding mil-spec missile components which would fail
test if a **** hair got between two windings in a lot of cases. We
wound one thingamabob we called "the Norelco" that was quadrifilar and
worked on three phase variable frequency drive over a two decade
frequency ratio. The labor was getting paid a little over minimum wage
and the workmanship damned good, and the owners made all the profit.

No thanks, but I am not at all interested in paying crummy
labourers in china or elsewhere.


The arrogance of the artisan.

If Australia is so great I am sure you could do them there. You could
even do them in the United States, there are lots of illiterate
mestizos you could train that could do them better than you, or I,
being suited to repetitive work like women, and would be thrilled at
the $6 an hour and no health benefits many American places pay,
contrary to widespread belief.

You might be able to build a hot rod better than an Aston Martin in
your garage, but it won't have any resale value and it won't be sought
after unless enough are made so people know of them.

Money isn't supremely important to me; its making sure whatever i make will
last
and sound well.

But you will never make very many, and when you die, they will go to
the skip when the first problem develops, because the name on them
isn't known and they will have no market value. If they are lucky the
transformers will go into guitar amps and last a few years of touring,
until a cathode-plate short blows them out.

Bret, as always, encourages! JLS

Bret Ludwig wrote:

Patrick Turner wrote:

snip

If I make a magnificent replacement for McIntosh and all the other
575 tranny types used in ancient amps, hardly anyone will buy them.


You have to decide on one or two particularly desireable types.
Peerless or UTC are who to copy if you want to do a catalog spec unit,
Marantz and Harmon-Kardon or Fairchild, for a proprietary type.


I have provided the general public with a design at my website
which has many applications.
Read all about OPT No1 at

http://www.turneraudio.com.au/htmlwe...utputtrans.htm

It suits many apps.

I help those who help themselves.

Some ppl have wound this item and found it to be very nice.




I worked in a transformer wind shop. The winders were all women, many
Asians or Hispanics and at that time the starting pay was around $5.50
an hour. Minimum wage in the US was a little under $5 an hour as I
recall.

Ah, I can relate to that because its about the wage I work for when I build
amplifiers.

That's your foolishness then. Never mix your hobby with your career.
Never works.

But If all tube amp makers were not fools as you suggest, there would be nothing
made except the crap from mexico or china.

Career? I have a job I like.
I don't know what a career is; is it something from which one gets paid without
having to do anything much?

I know plumbers and lawyers who are like that.





The techs were paid a little more, I think I was getting the
totally uncalled for new hire pay at $7.00 an hour. We had techs with a
year's experience or more they had to bump up to that then. I left
there for another electronics job and they started me at like $9.50
after that. When I left THAT to become a _stores clerk_ at a now
defunct airline I signed on at $14.80 /hr and needed less knowledge and
did half as much work. Yet that was still below average wages in the
United States.

You want to pay someone else to do the winding no matter what country
you are in.

But then the quality ceases to exist because ppl winding don't undertsand
the importance
of mistake-free windings; they cover their mistakes after each wire layer,
and all they want is to get paid.

Bull****, we were winding mil-spec missile components which would fail
test if a **** hair got between two windings in a lot of cases. We
wound one thingamabob we called "the Norelco" that was quadrifilar and
worked on three phase variable frequency drive over a two decade
frequency ratio. The labor was getting paid a little over minimum wage
and the workmanship damned good, and the owners made all the profit.

In Oz, trying to find people who one could trust to wind
OPTs for minimum wages is quite impossible.
40 years ago there were many, but NONE exist now.
I have trawled around the so called specialist transformer winding companies
and NONE want to do my designs at a price which is reasonable
or in the time frame I want.
All have bosses which employ labour. The labour get paid low, the bosses charge
high;
its how business works.
All care is allegedly taken with windings, but no responsibility.
They don't test anything they wind, and crossed over turns and resulting pressure
spots may take
5 years to cause a failure, and that's a failure I don't want to happen.
None of them have vacuum impregnation facilities.



There is simply no way I could make a cent in Oz competing with chinese
imports if I subcontracted all the work out to even basic wage earning
people making one amp at a time.

Not a single person wants to work for me, and training someone to
build tube amps would not lead to them getting any promotion in future elsewhere,

or any skills that are recognised in the mainstream industries.
There could be no propmotion here, just more amps to build.
Young ppl expect more than this.
Its too difficult, and too lowly paid.
I do all the work instead.
I worked my arse off for years to pay for my house so i don't pay rent
like many other ppl do so I don't need such huge wages.
I also don't smoke and rarely drink, am not married,
and don't bet on the horses and don't pay a huge entertaimant bill.
My other hobby is chess. I drive an old 1986 Laser.
So I can get by on much less than the basic wage which most
ppl spend on crap.




No thanks, but I am not at all interested in paying crummy
labourers in china or elsewhere.


The arrogance of the artisan.

Well after 4 years of having a website and speaking to chinese
ppl who have emailed me if they coulod provide me with trannies,
I have concluded the chinese don't have much idea
about reading and understanding websites and none knew
about transformers when they did speak good enough english.

The chinese are very good at winding 10,000 batches of
transformers i would not be seen dead using in any of my amps.

And buddy, just what are you skilled at?

You mock my arrogance instead of seeing the conditions
which constrain me when making specialist gear which aims at the
fussy and fickle audiophile market.
If the damn military wanted something fromm me it'd all be different,
military contracts are usually well gilded, if you can provide the goods,
but every audio enthusiast claims he is broke....




If Australia is so great I am sure you could do them there. You could
even do them in the United States, there are lots of illiterate
mestizos you could train that could do them better than you, or I,
being suited to repetitive work like women, and would be thrilled at
the $6 an hour and no health benefits many American places pay,
contrary to widespread belief.

I have to supervise them.
It means they must wind with me around to guide them and inspect their work.

That means providing a workplace and investement.

I just use a double garage and part of my house.
There is only room for me.

If I got an order for 100 amps I could do something.

If I spent millions of $$$ like Halcro of Sth Australia did then I'd be able to
go big,
and make $$.
Or go broke.
The world is littered with audio companies that didn't last long.





You might be able to build a hot rod better than an Aston Martin in
your garage, but it won't have any resale value and it won't be sought
after unless enough are made so people know of them.

I don't give a hoot about not being known.
Enough locals make it worth persuing.
I'm nearly 60, and to go big you need to be 30.

I don't mind povety, and frugality.
I have always been like this.
And I have no boss over me, and have time to tell you about it all.






Money isn't supremely important to me; its making sure whatever i make will
last
and sound well.

But you will never make very many, and when you die, they will go to
the skip when the first problem develops, because the name on them
isn't known and they will have no market value. If they are lucky the
transformers will go into guitar amps and last a few years of touring,
until a cathode-plate short blows them out.

I don't care what happens after I die.

I make amps which will last better than Leak or Quad or Radford or Dynaco, and
all sustain
shorts better.

If people wanna dump the amps like they have dumped nearly everything else,
then maybe I should be making dumper bins instead of amps, heck
there is money in rubbish eh..

But I have yet to see any guitar amps with Quad II trannies in them.

If they don't do their best to care for their gear well that's their problem not
mine.

I have no guilt about what I do to make a living.

Nothing anyone makes lasts forever; sooner or later it is swept away
or melted down and made into something else.

Something treasured 50 years ago may now be reborn as a foot scraper
to remove poop off your shoe.

If the world does that, its not something to cry about.

Patrick Turner

But you will never make very many, and when you die, they will go to
the skip when the first problem develops, because the name on them
isn't known and they will have no market value. If they are lucky the
transformers will go into guitar amps and last a few years of touring,
until a cathode-plate short blows them out.

Bret, as always, encourages! JLS

He must be a Cathode Follower, a negative place to be.

I have heard it all before.

Patrick Turner.

Patrick Turner wrote:


But you will never make very many, and when you die, they will go to
the skip when the first problem develops, because the name on them
isn't known and they will have no market value. If they are lucky the
transformers will go into guitar amps and last a few years of touring,
until a cathode-plate short blows them out.

Bret, as always, encourages! JLS

He must be a Cathode Follower, a negative place to be.

I don't mean to belittle your work, I am sure your products are good.

But there's no sense in not getting paid for excellence. Audio
Research, Krell, Mark Levinson, VTL, tons of others are building stuff
and someone is doing very well.

The military stuff is all very tested. Testing is everything, I
guarantee all the classic gear was very well tested to the limits of
the test equipment available at the time. Promulgators of the single
ended cow ****ed sound eschew testing, and results are predictable.
(Predictably bad).

Paul Klipsch was in his 50s when he really got going so age is no
excuse.

If I seem negative, perhaps it's because I have seen this before. So
many artisans did this kind of thing and their work has been largely
lost, often totally.

Bret Ludwig wrote:

Patrick Turner wrote:


But you will never make very many, and when you die, they will go to
the skip when the first problem develops, because the name on them
isn't known and they will have no market value. If they are lucky the
transformers will go into guitar amps and last a few years of touring,
until a cathode-plate short blows them out.

Bret, as always, encourages! JLS

He must be a Cathode Follower, a negative place to be.

I don't mean to belittle your work, I am sure your products are good.

But there's no sense in not getting paid for excellence. Audio
Research, Krell, Mark Levinson, VTL, tons of others are building stuff
and someone is doing very well.

But the products these ppl make are 3 times the price of mine,
and mine are as good or better performing, ( a feat any really
serious DIYer can acieve BTW.)

All these names have been around for 30 years+ and have come into existance
with an enormous amount of $$ spent on product promotion and
investement in manufacturing plants.

You don't pay for the all the cosmetics and promotion and
factories when one orders and eventually receives a hand made amp
from me.

The military stuff is all very tested. Testing is everything, I
guarantee all the classic gear was very well tested to the limits of
the test equipment available at the time.

I have had to service mu hi-end audio gear by top names.

The excellence and reliablity and ease of servicing is a complete myth.

Promulgators of the single
ended cow ****ed sound eschew testing, and results are predictable.
(Predictably bad).

Cow ****ed.

What a concept.

One can only guess at what an amp may sound like that could be described
as being "bull pricked" .
Just place hands over ears and hope you don't get facialed.



Paul Klipsch was in his 50s when he really got going so age is no
excuse.

Yes but he must have had other people around him who helped
to run his business and finance it all.

I have had utterly no help from anyone at any time.

Nobody thinks that forming a group to build tube amps in Australia
would in any way succeed like it did for ARC and CJ after decades of market
exposure.

As for the SS amp makers, let me say they will all secumb to digital amps;
they will be the first dinosaurs to perish under the impact
of the digital meteor heading their way.



If I seem negative, perhaps it's because I have seen this before. So
many artisans did this kind of thing and their work has been largely
lost, often totally.

I will leave a legacy of a few happy owners.

When i worked in the construction industry I left a legacy
of happy ppl. I am no less a man because I didn't build a hundred homes a year;
I used to specialize in design and construction of house extensions.
I had and still have the ability to carefully access a persons needs, and build
something for him.
I only had to do about one large job a year and thus keep out of jail and off
the streets.
I never had a fight with a client during 20 years of woking in my own business.
Most other tradesmen had wives who did the books and answered phone calls and
the
housework and cooking.
I never found a woman prepared to commit herself to all that so guess who
had to do all those hard yards.

I am happy to be what I am, and if i were to become
more "successful" ie, turn out quantity as well as quality,
then I would need to have equally committed people
surrounding me and prepared to be dedicated to the product
and not finacially greedy, ie, prepared to work long hard hours for SFA
like me until headway is made, if any at all.
I am a hopeless salesman and promoter, but I know how to delight ppl
with music gear. But anyone who does connect themself to
my product does so at their expense and risk, and
so should they like to see better cosmetics on the amps then *they*
have to pay for that, and take steps to be able to make the amps more saleable
and do all the trawling around and promotions work.
I would never let anything out of the workshop unless i get
what I want from the making of the product.

When i had sample amps in a local hi-fi store they wouldn't
spend a single cent on promoting anything and still wanted 50%
of the retail price which had to be cheap like Jolida amps.
I gracefully withdrew having amplifiers in their shop
and strated a website especially when i learnt they used my amps as work horses
to demonstrate to
ppl visiting the shop to point out the benefits of tubes and then convince ppl
to buy the cheaper priced Jolidas, or Golden Tube Audio, etc.

Meanwhile, after having amps in shops with my name on it and with a flyer
for 2 years, only 2 ppl ever had the panache to find out who i was
and contact me directly to negotiate a sale privately to avoid the
horrendous shop mark up.

I got used by the emporium, ignored by the fickle public, but
luckily a small band of locals hear the benefits of what i make.
But to pay the bills, most of my work is fixing crap.

Patrick Turner.

Patrick Turner wrote:
snip

I have had to service mu hi-end audio gear by top names.

The excellence and reliablity and ease of servicing is a complete myth.

In some cases it is.

Promulgators of the single
ended cow ****ed sound eschew testing, and results are predictable.
(Predictably bad).

Cow ****ed.

What a concept.

One can only guess at what an amp may sound like that could be described
as being "bull pricked" .

That would include Arny's favorite PA amps!

Just place hands over ears and hope you don't get facialed.



Paul Klipsch was in his 50s when he really got going so age is no
excuse.

Yes but he must have had other people around him who helped
to run his business and finance it all.

I have had utterly no help from anyone at any time.

Nobody thinks that forming a group to build tube amps in Australia
would in any way succeed like it did for ARC and CJ after decades of market
exposure.

If Australian labor costs are like the _real_ labor costs in the
US-actually not too bad right now if you stay out of SoCal because
people not suited to service industry work who are not doctors, lawyers
or accountants are ****ed-you just might. ARC and c-j are not
physically particularly well built and a good ad campaign with some
honest old fashioned **** slinging could work.

If I seem negative, perhaps it's because I have seen this before. So
many artisans did this kind of thing and their work has been largely
lost, often totally.

I will leave a legacy of a few happy owners.

When i worked in the construction industry I left a legacy
of happy ppl. I am no less a man because I didn't build a hundred homes a year;
I used to specialize in design and construction of house extensions.
I had and still have the ability to carefully access a persons needs, and build
something for him.
I only had to do about one large job a year and thus keep out of jail and off
the streets.
I never had a fight with a client during 20 years of woking in my own business.
Most other tradesmen had wives who did the books and answered phone calls and
the
housework and cooking.
I never found a woman prepared to commit herself to all that so guess who
had to do all those hard yards.

Well, I guess you're all right anyway. I do hope your amps last a long
time and someone somewhere uses them in 50 years.

"Cattle die, and kinsmen die, and so too shall I. But one thing lives
forever, the fame of a dead man's deeds."

"Patrick Turner" wrote in message

But the products these ppl make are 3 times the price of mine,
and mine are as good or better performing, ( a feat any really
serious DIYer can acieve BTW.)

All these names have been around for 30 years+ and have come into
existance with an enormous amount of $$ spent on product promotion and
investement in manufacturing plants.

You don't pay for the all the cosmetics and promotion and
factories when one orders and eventually receives a hand made
amp from me.

I have had to service mu hi-end audio gear by top names.

The excellence and reliablity and ease of servicing is a complete myth.
What a concept.

One can only guess at what an amp may sound like that could be described
as being "bull pricked" .
Just place hands over ears and hope you don't get facialed.

Yes but he must have had other people around him who helped
to run his business and finance it all.

I have had utterly no help from anyone at any time.

Nobody thinks that forming a group to build tube amps in Australia
would in any way succeed like it did for ARC and CJ after decades of
market exposure.

As for the SS amp makers, let me say they will all secumb to digital amps;
they will be the first dinosaurs to perish under the impact
of the digital meteor heading their way.

I will leave a legacy of a few happy owners.

When i worked in the construction industry I left a legacy
of happy ppl. I am no less a man because I didn't build a hundred homes a
year;
I used to specialize in design and construction of house extensions.
I had and still have the ability to carefully access a persons needs, and
build something for him.
I only had to do about one large job a year and thus keep out of jail and
off the streets.
I never had a fight with a client during 20 years of woking in my own
business.
Most other tradesmen had wives who did the books and answered phone calls
and the housework and cooking.
I never found a woman prepared to commit herself to all that so guess who
had to do all those hard yards.

I am happy to be what I am, and if i were to become
more "successful" ie, turn out quantity as well as quality,
then I would need to have equally committed people
surrounding me and prepared to be dedicated to the product
and not finacially greedy, ie, prepared to work long hard hours for SFA
like me until headway is made, if any at all.
I am a hopeless salesman and promoter, but I know how to delight ppl with
music gear. But anyone who does connect themself to
my product does so at their expense and risk, and
so should they like to see better cosmetics on the amps then *they*
have to pay for that, and take steps to be able to make the amps more
saleable and do all the trawling around and promotions work.
I would never let anything out of the workshop unless i get
what I want from the making of the product.

When i had sample amps in a local hi-fi store they wouldn't
spend a single cent on promoting anything and still wanted 50%
of the retail price which had to be cheap like Jolida amps.
I gracefully withdrew having amplifiers in their shop
and strated a website especially when i learnt they used my amps as work
horses to demonstrate to
ppl visiting the shop to point out the benefits of tubes and then convince
ppl to buy the cheaper priced Jolidas, or Golden Tube Audio, etc.

Meanwhile, after having amps in shops with my name on it and with a flyer
for 2 years, only 2 ppl ever had the panache to find out who i was
and contact me directly to negotiate a sale privately to avoid the
horrendous shop mark up.

I got used by the emporium, ignored by the fickle public, but
luckily a small band of locals hear the benefits of what i make.
But to pay the bills, most of my work is fixing crap.

Patrick Turner.


I will agree with you about production, but when it comes to retailling the
finished product, YOU are in control, you tell the retail outlet, what YOU
want, you also tell them what there cut will be.. And if it does not suit
them, Fine . You can go elsewhere, with your product. They are stuck in one
place. BUT you must stay in control.

While you might have no love for me, I can understand where your coming from
with your Amp's , you live with them, you take pride in what you make, and
you expect the buyer to also have the same respect for YOUR product. Time
does not matter, your not running a production line, your building a product
that will last , and you build in
one or possable two at a time. And when someone asks . how long will it take
to complete the thing.. You reply, "it will take as long as it takes"
A couple of us build speakers, out of real wood, not compressed cardboard,
and plastic veneer. We build 3 or 4 pairs a year, we don't take orders, when
there finished , there finished. It takes me weeks to hand sand the
cabinets and apply 10 coats of Oil. When there finished there like Glass,
but it takes time. Production costs would be astronomicial, if I was running
a production line, But when the Scan Speak's are fitted, they sound , like
your Amps, worth all the Time, trouble and sweat, that made them.
And you cannot put a price on that..

Perhaps, Just perhaps you should advertise your web site, there are people
out there, that don't have the opportunity to obtain, that something a bit
special, simply because they don't know it's there

bassett

bassett wrote:

"Patrick Turner" wrote in message

But the products these ppl make are 3 times the price of mine,
and mine are as good or better performing, ( a feat any really
serious DIYer can acieve BTW.)

All these names have been around for 30 years+ and have come into
existance with an enormous amount of $$ spent on product promotion and
investement in manufacturing plants.

You don't pay for the all the cosmetics and promotion and
factories when one orders and eventually receives a hand made
amp from me.

I have had to service mu hi-end audio gear by top names.

The excellence and reliablity and ease of servicing is a complete myth.
What a concept.

One can only guess at what an amp may sound like that could be described
as being "bull pricked" .
Just place hands over ears and hope you don't get facialed.

Yes but he must have had other people around him who helped
to run his business and finance it all.

I have had utterly no help from anyone at any time.

Nobody thinks that forming a group to build tube amps in Australia
would in any way succeed like it did for ARC and CJ after decades of
market exposure.

As for the SS amp makers, let me say they will all secumb to digital amps;
they will be the first dinosaurs to perish under the impact
of the digital meteor heading their way.

I will leave a legacy of a few happy owners.

When i worked in the construction industry I left a legacy
of happy ppl. I am no less a man because I didn't build a hundred homes a
year;
I used to specialize in design and construction of house extensions.
I had and still have the ability to carefully access a persons needs, and
build something for him.
I only had to do about one large job a year and thus keep out of jail and
off the streets.
I never had a fight with a client during 20 years of woking in my own
business.
Most other tradesmen had wives who did the books and answered phone calls
and the housework and cooking.
I never found a woman prepared to commit herself to all that so guess who
had to do all those hard yards.

I am happy to be what I am, and if i were to become
more "successful" ie, turn out quantity as well as quality,
then I would need to have equally committed people
surrounding me and prepared to be dedicated to the product
and not finacially greedy, ie, prepared to work long hard hours for SFA
like me until headway is made, if any at all.
I am a hopeless salesman and promoter, but I know how to delight ppl with
music gear. But anyone who does connect themself to
my product does so at their expense and risk, and
so should they like to see better cosmetics on the amps then *they*
have to pay for that, and take steps to be able to make the amps more
saleable and do all the trawling around and promotions work.
I would never let anything out of the workshop unless i get
what I want from the making of the product.

When i had sample amps in a local hi-fi store they wouldn't
spend a single cent on promoting anything and still wanted 50%
of the retail price which had to be cheap like Jolida amps.
I gracefully withdrew having amplifiers in their shop
and strated a website especially when i learnt they used my amps as work
horses to demonstrate to
ppl visiting the shop to point out the benefits of tubes and then convince
ppl to buy the cheaper priced Jolidas, or Golden Tube Audio, etc.

Meanwhile, after having amps in shops with my name on it and with a flyer
for 2 years, only 2 ppl ever had the panache to find out who i was
and contact me directly to negotiate a sale privately to avoid the
horrendous shop mark up.

I got used by the emporium, ignored by the fickle public, but
luckily a small band of locals hear the benefits of what i make.
But to pay the bills, most of my work is fixing crap.

Patrick Turner.


I will agree with you about production, but when it comes to retailling the
finished product, YOU are in control, you tell the retail outlet, what YOU
want, you also tell them what there cut will be.. And if it does not suit
them, Fine . You can go elsewhere, with your product. They are stuck in one
place. BUT you must stay in control.

Rubbish.
You obviously have no expereince with the retail industry and the
agreements they insist upon.

The want 50% commision here, and 60%+ isn't unusual elesewhere.

So if I want $4,000 in my hands for an amp equal say to a
McIntosh 275 retro re-issue that sells for about $4,300 in my local stores,
then the retail price for mine has to be $8,000.
Chinese amps worse than Jolida are also in the same store for $2,400,
so I just cannot survive in the shops.

ME never sold amps in shops, and VAF won't sell speakers in shops.
**** the middle men.





While you might have no love for me, I can understand where your coming from
with your Amp's , you live with them, you take pride in what you make, and
you expect the buyer to also have the same respect for YOUR product. Time
does not matter, your not running a production line, your building a product
that will last , and you build in
one or possable two at a time. And when someone asks . how long will it take
to complete the thing.. You reply, "it will take as long as it takes"
A couple of us build speakers, out of real wood, not compressed cardboard,
and plastic veneer. We build 3 or 4 pairs a year, we don't take orders, when
there finished , there finished. It takes me weeks to hand sand the
cabinets and apply 10 coats of Oil. When there finished there like Glass,
but it takes time. Production costs would be astronomicial, if I was running
a production line, But when the Scan Speak's are fitted, they sound , like
your Amps, worth all the Time, trouble and sweat, that made them.
And you cannot put a price on that..

Perhaps, Just perhaps you should advertise your web site, there are people
out there, that don't have the opportunity to obtain, that something a bit
special, simply because they don't know it's there

I have never got around to E-bay selling, but that looks mainly like a bargain
hunter's
bazzar and anyone selling something handcrafted and worth each cent gets
mainly ignored.
Only old brands get the good prices because resale value will stay the same.
Its stupid blind loyalty to brandnames, but then its the cowboys which
have given "hand crafted" a very bad reputation.

Selling anything handcrafted to the masses is not easy.
They all think it takes 5 minutes, and a trip around
some of the art and craft bazzars where the most appalling lot of **** is for
sale
is an indicator that nobody can make something beautiful for someone else
and get paid well unless they have invested hugely in creating a name
and a myth about the goods, likr Halcro did.

Patrick Turner.



bassett

Basset wrote :-

While you might have no love for me, I can understand where your coming from
with your Amp's , you live with them, you take pride in what you make, and
you expect the buyer to also have the same respect for YOUR product.

Well It may be true that love for you isn't part of my psyche.

But I do not have any grudges or major axes to grind with you.

You are not like a certain other poster at Aus.hi-fi
who nobody loves at all.

That we clashed over that new forum you promoted at aus.hi-fi doesn't mean much.

You mean well, and so do I, but neither of us will get
our own way; I have set out my objections to taking part
and maintain all of them; if things were to change to accomodate my reasons for
interest and taking part, i'd be there, but it doesn't mean we cannot
discuss matters on other subjects.

Patrick Turner.

"Patrick Turner" wrote in message
bassett howled,,,
I will agree with you about production, but when it comes to
retailling the finished product, YOU are in control, you tell the
retail outlet, what YOU want, you also tell them what there cut will
be.. And if it does not suit them, Fine . You can go elsewhere, with your
product. They are stuck in one
place. BUT you must stay in control.

Rubbish.
You obviously have no expereince with the retail industry and the
agreements they insist upon.

It's not rubbish at all, and for the record I grew up in the retail Rag
Trade, I can still remember my Mother booting me under the market stall,
when I was about 2 years old, and told to stay there.
My point is regardless of what your selling, you own the product, and IF
the retailler , does not want to agree on what your going to get for your
product, you can leave, without a problem and go elsewhere..
If your carefull you can create a market where there is none, simple by
creating a demand where there is none.. Let me explain how this works.
You go into a shoe shop and ask for Black Leather shoes with brown leather
soles, You do your homework and you know before you go in that they don't
hold them in stock. The salesman explains that they can order them in ,
Blah,Blah,blah. Now this is important. You must ask how long it will take to
get them in.. Your told 14 days.. During that time, you get your friends to
also go in and ask for the same thing, with the same result...Explaining
that it's a considered change in school uniform requirements. At the end of
the 14 days, he has a complete range of sizes of Black Leather shoe's with
Brown soles, that no-one wants.
A product is a product, is a product. You go into a HI FI retailer, and
ask if there interested in your amps, Bags of Spuds, whatever.
They say no, or yes and they want 80% of the purchase price, You leave,
leaving your details.
Then over the next few months. You get people to enquire if they have a
better quality amp, Bag of spuds . Do not rush, this takes time. But over a
few months your creating a market for something , your retailer can't
supply, and he can see all that profit going out the window.. You then call
round and tell the guy, that you have reconsidered, and really don't care
what he makes but you want X amount for a amp, or bad of spuds. and would he
perhaps reconsider his offer..
When he begs you for stock,, You then ask, what he's prepaired to do for
his money,, Promotion, advertiseing, introduction evenings, Blah,blah,blah

The want 50% commision here, and 60%+ isn't unusual elesewhere.

Doesn't work like that, You tell him what YOU want for the product, if he
insists on more , leave. and institute the above.

So if I want $4,000 in my hands for an amp equal say to a
McIntosh 275 retro re-issue that sells for about $4,300 in my local
stores, then the retail price for mine has to be $8,000.
Chinese amps worse than Jolida are also in the same store for $2,400, so
I just cannot survive in the shops.

asked and answered..

ME never sold amps in shops, and VAF won't sell speakers in shops.
**** the middle men.

While these conserns might not sell in retail outlets, they do considerable
advertising, in the Hi Fi magazines, At least VAF do.
Forget the other mob, there rat****. They also supply
products for testing, and lets face it , if your spending big dollars on
advertising, the reviewer, is not about to give you a **** review.

If you want to **** the salesgirl, we can discuss the rates that might be
applicable *grin*

While you might have no love for me, I can understand where your coming
from with your Amp's , you live with them, you take pride in what you
make, and you expect the buyer to also have the same respect for YOUR
product. Time does not matter, your ..not running a production line,
your building a product
that will last , and you build in one or possable two at a time. And
when someone asks . how long will it take to complete the thing.. You
reply, "it will take as long as it takes"
A couple of us build speakers, out of real wood, not compressed
cardboard and plastic veneer. We build 3 or 4 pairs a year, we don't
take orders, when there finished , there finished. It takes me weeks
to hand sand the cabinets and apply 10 coats of Oil. When there
finished there like Glass, but it takes time. Production costs would be
astronomicial, if I was running
a production line, But when the Scan Speak's are fitted, they sound ,
like your Amps, worth all the Time, trouble and sweat, that made them.
And you cannot put a price on that..

Perhaps, Just perhaps you should advertise your web site, there are
people out there, that don't have the opportunity to obtain, that
something a bit special, simply because they don't know it's there

I have never got around to E-bay selling, but that looks mainly like a
bargain hunter's bazzar and anyone selling something handcrafted and
worth each cent gets mainly ignored.
Only old brands get the good prices because resale value will stay the
same.
Its stupid blind loyalty to brandnames, but then its the cowboys which
have given "hand crafted" a very bad reputation.

E-bay always seem to get High prices, until it your turn to sell.

Selling anything handcrafted to the masses is not easy.
They all think it takes 5 minutes, and a trip around
some of the art and craft bazzars where the most appalling lot of **** is
for sale is an indicator that nobody can make something beautiful for
someone else and get paid well unless they have ?nvested hugely in
creating a name and a myth about the goods, likr Halcro did.

Patrick Turner.

It really is all about how you market something,, If you spend 25 grand a
year on advertiseing, your Amp, bag of Spuds, will be considered, the worlds
best, and get Amp of the year, If you spend nothing on advertising, the
mag's will not even consider reviewing it.
"What Hi Fi" is a good example of this.
Promotion of a product is everything, If Jo Blog's tells people on his
Radio Show that he uses Fred's Spuds, every one that hears the show
considers that Fred's Spuds must be the best around cos,
Jo Blog's uses them .

As for our little Audio site, as I explained, I just have a small section,
and no-one is going to reconfigure a complete working forum, just to
accomadete me. But by the same token, it's there, There is no reason why
you can't advertise your stuff in the "Audio Exchange and Mart" section,
with pictures of your products. And if you only sell one Amp, does it really
matter if you don't like the construction of the site.
As my old dead Mother used to say,, Business is Business, geet under the
stall, and don't come out.

But back to WGA audio section, The site will be out , for a couple of days,
we apoligise for this but the server is updating everything
bassett
http://www.wga.plt-hosting.com/register.php?do=signup