A good source for wood veneer?

[johnr]

No here in Spain. The woman lives about an hour inland from where I am (near Alcaucin/Vinuela) but she's English. Can't wait to get cracking on new projects once I finish veneering my turntable (although that may be delayed until at least Sunday now as tomorrow I'll be shifting all this gear with the help of a man and a van, and going through all my new goodies!)

Good news (for you!) about the dealer but don't sell everything

A friend (English, but in Valencia) asked me on twitter earlier "I bet you'd want one of these near you - http://t.co/9KNtOBAv5F"

Told him it's unlikely in the Spanish campo ... unless... I start one

[johnr]

DA - just blogged about my new turntable plinth and the tools I bought - http://www.johnrisby.com/2015/06/07/fin ... le-plinth/

[Devils Advocate]

Apologies John, only saw this half an hour ago.

Very impressed with the write up and equally impressed with what you've done to the 150, superb work and a great blog. I hope it is now playing and sounding as nice as it looks.....top job and an interesting read.
I'm struggling at the moment with Turntables and their set up, problem being old Edwardian British houses with floorboards and a metre cavity beneath equals a giant sub woofer. I have to set the kit up rock solid, speakers for instance (floorstanders and also stand mounts) need anchoring to the boards through the carpet and underlay (not a wife friendly thing to do I can assure you ).......as such the feedback so far on all the turntables I've tried has caused the speaker cones to bounce/flutter without serious damping. Only real solution is a wall mount as you say..........it'd be no problem in Spain.

What amplification are you using with this set up John? if you are not fully sorted yet then don't buy anything until you speak with me.

[johnr]

Thanks DA. I really enjoyed it and it is sounding wonderful. Going to be good to test it against a low-mass simple plinth too but I'm probably going to leave this as it is for at least a few weeks.

I feel your pain with the floorboards. Been there myself in the past. Not sure it will work but have you tried marble under stands? It *may* be more wife-friendly (or not, depending on your wife!). What are your walls made of? I'm guessing they are solid given the age of the house?

Because I use a pair of B&W DM5s I wanted some equally (sort of) older amplification. I went through a few different amps (a couple of NADs at least that I remember, gave one to my barber in the UK and have one here still). But I settled on a Pioneer A400 which came very recommended by many proper audiophiles (in that price range - quite fancied some NAIM gear but...) and it was the best of all the ones I tested . Combined with the Yaqin MS12-B tube pre-amp, it's a nice sound. But I'm always interested in seeing what else I can do to it

In fact that's the main problem, as I'm sure you appreciate - accepting it is good enough and stopping. Even yesterday I found myself thinking 'This is great, what else can I do to make it sound better?'. It's like a disease! And the other problem is you forget how good it does sound compared to the other things you've tried. Initially of course you go 'wow, that's a great improvement!' but after a while it just becomes the norm and you get used to it...

[Devils Advocate]

Interesting John. Did you need to get the A400 modified to run a preamp with it, ie isolate it's power amp for its internal pre?
Are you still using its phono stage or does the Yaqim have one?

None the less I bet your valve pre does give it the "valve sound" if it's all set up correctly. All good fun.

[johnr]

No, there's no mod on the A400. The Yaqin is a phono and line-in pre-amp, so I take the output of that straight into the A400 and don't use the phono stage on the A400. The Yaqin is a lovely pre-amp for the price (especially what I managed to get mine for!) but I replaced some of capacitors etc (I think based on this post - http://yaqin-ms12-modification.blogspot.com.es/ - and some forum discussions about it, although I didn't bother with the external case mod!)

[Devils Advocate]

Just started playing with valve pre's and valve phono stages myself John, again that link is interesting you posted..........we should resurrect the hifi thread in the other section if we can find it, and I'll post some pics of some gear........or maybe a kind mod could transfer this to there for us.

[johnr]

Yes, we've gone 'off topic' a bit here

[johnr]

oh DA - got to tell you this...

I've had a stereo balance problem for a few days. Vocals in particular to the left.

Tried everything. Especially on my turntable thinking it was the stylus, tracking, anti-skate etc etc...

Only today did I decide to tackle it properly... Swapped speakers, still the same.

Swapped pre-amp tubes, still the same.

Tried CD through the pre-amp, still the same (ok, so not the TT)...

Tried CD without the pre-amp, still the same (ok, so not pre-amp)...

So, after all that, it must be the main amp... Feck. That's all I need... And my amp doesn't have a balance control so that can't be it ...

But... what I didn't know until 5 minutes ago is my amp (Pioneer A400) has a dual volume pot! It's split in two and you can hold one party still whilst adjusting the other! I had NO idea!

I still don't know how I managed to do it in the first place, but zeroing them both and then putting them up together as normal re-centered my stereo!

Dumb as a bag of hammers

[Devils Advocate]

Ha Ha, nice write up John. At least you solved the issue though which is a great result, well done you mate!!

I'm just in the process of cataloguing a load of DIY gear, tubes, transformers, chokes, drivers and tons more gear. Advertised some of it on a hifi forum and have had about 300 emails about it........I don't understand any of the questions though, far to high brow for me

[johnr]

Be interested in seeing what you have!

[Devils Advocate]

Speed awareness course today what a con, so apologies for late reply John. I'll pm you tomorrow and give you an idea of what's here.

[johnr]

oh b*****! Never been caught speeding (which is frankly incredible!) but heard from a few people about how bad those courses are!

look forward to the PM.

[johnr]

oh actually, thats not true. I have been pulled over for speeding a few times but somehow always managed to get let off with a "well don't do it again, drive home more slowly"! No idea how at all