As a school boy I made my own electric guitar. The “Rod Special”.
After lying unused for several years, it’s come out of the cupboard. A bit of TLC is in order. Continue reading “Renovating the Rod Special Guitar”
Renovating the Rod Special Guitar
Turntable Isolation Plinth from Silestone
My turntable is a three point suspension type, so is quite well isolated anyway.
Every little helps though. No harm in trying to improve things, especially if it isn’t costing you anything. Continue reading “Turntable Isolation Plinth from Silestone”
Digital record play counter gets a facelift
My obsession for monitoring the life of my turntable stylus was satisfied when I built my “Play Mate” monitor. It did the job but boy it was ugly.
Only now have I got around to making an aesthetically pleasing version. Continue reading “Digital record play counter gets a facelift”
PlecRec RCM II. Updated Record Cleaning Machine
Back in 2018 I built my own record cleaning machine. It did the job, but wasn’t pretty.
I recently acquired a better donor turntable and have built a new machine, addressing some of the annoying quirks of my original. Continue reading “PlecRec RCM II. Updated Record Cleaning Machine”
Skip diving for parts. Motorised pots and a headphone amp
This was a sorry looking set of separates lurking in a builders skip. Missing parts, dents, scratches and broken plastic aplenty.
It’s always worth a look, so I recovered a very sorry Technics SL PS670D CD Player and RS-BX501 cassette deck. Two Sony TA FE370 amplifiers completed the haul. Continue reading “Skip diving for parts. Motorised pots and a headphone amp”
Digital Streamer now with Volumio on Raspberry Pi.
For a while now I have been using a raspberry Pi to stream music from my NAS to my vintage HiFi through an Audioquest Dragonfly DAC.
Originally my choice of hardware and software was dictated by performance considerations. I now have a new Synology DS220+ NAS, which is quick. Time to re evaluate my streaming system and do things a different way. Continue reading “Digital Streamer now with Volumio on Raspberry Pi.”
Play Mate digital record play counter and timer
Figuring out when a stylus or cartridge needs changing depends on many things. Condition of record, how well your system is set up and how may hours use it has had.
Recording needle time is a useful thing to do then, but precision of 10th of a second isn’t really necessary. So why did I create this fancy automatic digital play counter called the “Play Mate”? Continue reading “Play Mate digital record play counter and timer”
Output Buffer Amplifier for Mission Cyrus
My Mission Cyrus One amplifier is a very simple affair, which is indeed one of it’s strengths. With the exception of the phono stage the pre amp is purely passive.
Normally this is a good thing. However In my system I want to connect several devices to the tape-output sockets simultaneously. This just won’t work well. Continue reading “Output Buffer Amplifier for Mission Cyrus”
Turntable work stand
Working on old turntables can be like stuffing an octopus in a string bag.
I built this to help. Continue reading “Turntable work stand”
VU Meter Bridge. Take 2
My system sounds great, but it’s lacking a little something aesthetically.
A cassette deck, which was otherwise beyond repair, had a lovely pair of VU meters. Maybe I can do something with those?