Radio Cures

You may have noticed the addition of a link in the sidebar. That's my friend John. John and I know each other from back at the Academy, and were active in writing and producing radio dramas at one of my favorite radio stations of all times. He and I have been kicking around the idea of writing some scripts again. I think that would be just grand.

Also, as promised, I've attached some sound clips from the amp I was fixing, pictured above. Please disregard my playing in the clips, I wasn't really trying. The amp is an old Voice of Music amp, probably an old mono for a turntable or somesuch. It has an interesting tone-contour section that will be a real hell to repair should it ever need it. Anyway, I had to replace some capacitors, and I spent a while this afternoon selecting tubes for it from my collection. Still needs a bit of a tuneup and maybe some circuit modifications to make it a little higher gain. It runs on two EL84 power tubes, probably at no more than 12 watts. Preamp is a 6AU6 and a 12AX7. Might rewire it to take a 12AX7 up front and get me another gain stage. I swapped the 5Y3 rectifier for a 5AU4 to calm it down a bit. The amp is dirty, in a bluesy way. Sounds like the power transformer is on its last legs, confirmed by the rusty-ness of the transformer's casing. But it's a beater blues amp, and for $30 thats all I wanted it for.

+ Clip 1

+ Clip 2

(my main rig, for anyone interested, is a re-tubed Fender Hot Rod Deluxe. It's not perfect, but it's seven different amps in one, and with a properly tubed preamp, its the best amp on the market for the money, IMHO)