MY FRANKENSTUNNED BRAIN

[4krow]

Guys, a little worm entered my mind. I said, 'let's build a switchbox'. No problemo. It is now becoming a little more than that. If in fact, I have a switchbox, wouldn't it be nice to add a buffer stage, since I am not using a pre amp, and my cd player seems to do it's best with a buffer stage. Was using a Musical Fidelity X10 V3. Now I see the Quickie, and think, 'can that be used in this design? Love battery operated products. They are my favorite in some ways. And with the upgrade this might be a very cool project for me....even a revelation.  Your thoughts guys.

 

[jrebman]

Sounds like you want a preamp .  Let's see... multiple inputs, gain/buffer stage,outputs... yes!  That sure sounds like a preamp to me!   Put it all in one box, save money and sound degradation via multiple connections and long cables and viola!  I think you're on to something there.

-- Jim

 

[4krow]

Heh Heh, yah, juo said it Jim, But of course, not just any pre amp. I don't want to go hog wild, but I do want it my way. Looks like the Elna stuff is decent, and after seeing that fancy volume control, I just like the idea as a whole. At first I wondered if I wanted to use the Musical Fidelity circuitry, but no, it just doesn't seem to be cut out for such an adventure. Then I saw the quickie, and I am still considering something like that.

 

[4krow]

I might add that I will soon be working on an EP III to add some upgrades. This will undoubtedly help direct my decisions. I also worked on a SEX  2.1  and enjoyed what I would call truth in music. Harder to find these days.

 

[earwaxxer]

Hey Greg...  The Quickie is great for a pre/switch box! You can also play with different volume controls and such. My Quickie sounds much better than using my Transporter as a preamp. No comparison. You can also wire as many inputs as you want etc.

 

[4krow]

"Igor(Eric), stirs the pot, knowing that master will quickly break, and buy into this insane experiment" And why not? Sometime in the future, when all the batteries, connected in series, are leg go with the throw of a TRIPLE knife switch, it will heard,              "IT'S ALIVE! MY CREATURE, LIVVES!"

 

[Noskipallwd]

"Igor(Eric), stirs the pot, knowing that master will quickly break, and buy into this insane experiment" And why not? Sometime in the future, when all the batteries, connected in series, are leg go with the throw of a TRIPLE knife switch, it will heard,               "IT'S ALIVE! MY CREATURE, LIVVES!"

Ha, that's funny! Greg, the first thing that came to mind when I read your thread title was young Frankenstein. 'Igor what was the name on the brains case?' 'Uh abi something or other' 'Abi?' 'Yeh abinormal' That is not the exact dialogue but you get the gist. One of my all time favorite movies.

Cheers,
Shawn

 

[4krow]

"No matter what I say, no matter how I might scream, DO NOT open this door. For if you do, all that I worked for will be lost....Open the Open the door, Open th GD damn door. I was KIDDING. Don't you know a joke, when you hear one?"

    One of my all time favorite movies...

 

[earwaxxer]

LOL!

 

[4krow]

Waiting on my Quickie, and ordered some mono attenuators from Glassware as well. No, not the high priced ones, just the cheapies e/w 1% metal film resistors. So far, this is still just an idea to see if I want to go a couple steps up when I build the next kit. I may use optional batteries as suggested by Earwaxxer, but I don't want to get too far ahead of myself this time around. I do have to laugh at what I saw at Bent Audio. Pre-amps from Roswell, who knew? Not my thing, but I will give them high compliments for being different AND high quality.

 

[earwaxxer]

wow - mono attenuators - I suppose you will use a knife switch as well?

 

[Grainger49]

When I got out of school I went to work in an Alcoa mill that was built in 1942.  It was filled with Barclay switches that looked like those you pictured, only they were more flimsy.  They were awfully cheap!  Alcoa got over them pretty early on but a few thousand still existed when I went to work there.

 

[4krow]

Ok GUYS, One at a time. Maybe I just will use a triple knife, one for each input. Let me call GoldPoint," Hello, do you cary any FrankenstEEn, uh I mean, gold plated knife switches?"
Secondly, I used to weld AlCOA aluminum .020" thick for a pipe factory. It came in giant 7,000 lbs. rolls.
  Lastly, I doubt that you can beat the OLD Bell System switches, and other 'Frankenstein' equipment. I was fascinated by the gigantic batteries and insulators. Then the clicking from systematic relay sequencers. a clic, a clic, a clic-clic-clic, double-clic-clic like drum section of a marching band. Rythemic and never ending, it caught my OCD like a fly trap. And the tubes, God, the tubes... 

 

[Grainger49]

Greg,

I helped make those rolls.  We had a welder that welded the end tail of one roll to the leading edge of the next.  It used vacuum tube rectifiers, three phase and water cooled.  They were 1.5 to 2 feet tall.

 

[4krow]

NOW we're talking! Electricity never wanted to be bent to our desires, did it? We had to make giant, nasty, devices to put it in a headlock, and then it just created more heat in retaliation. Our rectifiers were so big, but we took another path. Rows of rectifiers all humming the same song. When they did their job, the buss bars took them to the batteries. Out of the batteries were GIANT buss bars made of thick, stacked copper plates(sorry, I'm talkin Mountain Bell, not welding pipe), that were probably 1 foot deep by 8 inches thick. I was in heaven. I LOVE electricity.
At the pipe factory, the seam welder for the pipe, ran continously until the roll was done. I don't recall how many feet that was, but I seem to remember the current for the welder was about 400 DC amps. GOD, I love electricity. I ran a welder that fused the collars on the end of the pipes. If I remember correctly, I was running between 190-200 amps. Every day was fascinating to me as they used batteries of cells to smooth out the current. THOSE were the days, weren't they?

 

[earwaxxer]

cool stuff Greg! - Its fun to read about what other people have done - especially the stuff from the 'old days'. Much different then! - I was shaking my head the other day when I remember driving a milk truck for my dad when I was 12. No seat belt let alone air bags, and of driver side door was always open.

 

[Grainger49]

Yup.  The smelter at another local Alcoa plant runs 23k amps through the pot line.  The 5kV line is transformed down to about 1200V, rectified with some HUGE solid state rectifiers, thousands of them, and then sent out to smelt the Alumana ore into Aluminum.  The smelter is pretty close to Hell!  The closest there was in my mill was the remelter, 1300 degree liquid aluminum.  I worked the remelter when I first went to work for Alcoa.

 

[earwaxxer]

wild stuff Granger! - We dont make anything here anymore. All that stuff is happening in China!