F6 Amplifier

Our best source is Mr. Pass [earliest builder] who knows F5 and has been listening to F6. It is best to hear from him because he has the reference amps, loudspeakers and the experimental protocol to do a non-biased A/B comparison. Otherwise we may get conflicting reports!
labjr. Mr. Pass may separately A/B compare the performance of his F6 with the Old Classic. He may use the Delco design in post#1085 which is well detailed. Otherwise, will he and us ever learn whether F6 is an improvement? Was there a performance comparison between JLH and PLH?
 
Last edited:
Official Court Jester
Joined 2003
Paid Member
fact - Mr. Pass pre-published some things from article which is going to be published

as many times before - his article will show it's purpose

:devily:

be sure that our Japanese (and other , from Far East) friends will buy original F6 , without asking too much about comparisons

they'll hear it , or hear rumors , and they'll going to pay

:rofl:
 
fact - Mr. Pass pre-published some things from article which is going to be published

as many times before - his article will show it's purpose

:devily:

be sure that our Japanese (and other , from Far East) friends will buy original F6 , without asking too much about comparisons

they'll hear it , or hear rumors , and they'll going to pay

:rofl:
That's the way it is [no rumors].
 
all those WE , McIntosh , Altec , Tannoy , Lorenz , Garrard , EMT, ReVox ,Klangfilm , Telefunken ,JBL,RCA, etc. items aren't vanishing from west , based strictly on hearing them first .

they have a nose for romantic things :clown:
Quite an interesting [non-technical] analysis. The success of F6 may even spur DIYers and competitors of Mr. Pass to rejuvenate the Old Classic design itself with state of the art bjts and passives in Class A and AB flavours.
 
Official Court Jester
Joined 2003
Paid Member
it's already happening ;

anyway , we mostly don't have enough insight in things happening on East

all we are used is to brag how they're cloning things ....... but nada - Japan and China are more technically similar than we can imagine and they ........... naah ........ that's story too long to even mention , let alone start , in form of Off Topic in any thread .....
 
Just curious how many did you order?
Rush: Here is an option to operate lhquam's design without feedback as you asked earlier. Do not add the front end yet when you assemble it. Instead, drive the transformer's primary directly with the low impedance headphone output [volume controlled] of your CD player. It is a free front end. May also consider decreasing OLG [50s down to 10 or less] with higher source degeneration of the JFETs to lower Zout, and to simultaneously manage power output. Thus, you'll achieve the best gain structure, simplicity and quickly listen to your music.
 
Last edited:
Rush: Here is an option to operate lhquam's design without feedback as you asked earlier. Do not add the front end yet when you assemble it. Instead, drive the transformer's primary directly with the low impedance headphone output [volume controlled] of your CD player. It is a free front end. May also consider decreasing OLG [50s down to 10 or less] with higher source degeneration of the JFETs to lower Zout, and to simultaneously manage power output. Thus, you'll achieve the best gain structure, and quickly listen to your music.

Thank for the suggestion,. I will try lots of things. I haven't had a CD player in years. I use a Mac Mini music server to a QB9 to my tube preamp to a 2 way 4th order crossover to the F5ish amps and Snell "E" speakers. Soon to have the preamp and crossover in the same box. B1 all the way through, so the B1 output of the crossover could drive the transformer. I will try it both top and bottom. I also have a full range version of my speakers with crossovers in the boxes, so I can try it every way.
Can't wait to get these projects done so I can listen. Actually that is a problem, my system sounds very good now, I find other things to do instead of finishing my audio projects. The F6 is a motivation though and by the time the boards get here I hope to have a working phono preamp/crossover.

Rush
 
Rush: Here is an option to operate lhquam's design without feedback as you asked earlier. Do not add the front end yet when you assemble it. Instead, drive the transformer's primary directly with the low impedance headphone output [volume controlled] of your CD player. It is a free front end. May also consider decreasing OLG [50s down to 10 or less] with higher source degeneration of the JFETs to lower Zout, and to simultaneously manage power output. Thus, you'll achieve the best gain structure, simplicity and quickly listen to your music.
My PCB board has the option for a pot on the bottom leg of the feedback network. With that you can easily adjust the closed-loop gain to a value up to the open-loop gain. I experimented with this today with my point-to-point breadboard and it works fine. Keep in mind that with low feedback factors, this amplifier has significant high frequency rolloff, primarily due to the inter-winding capacitances of the transformer. I measured it at -3.6dB at 20kHz open-loop.
 
Rush: Here is an option to operate lhquam's design without feedback as you asked earlier. Do not add the front end yet when you assemble it. Instead, drive the transformer's primary directly with the low impedance headphone output [volume controlled] of your CD player. It is a free front end. May also consider decreasing OLG [50s down to 10 or less] with higher source degeneration of the JFETs to lower Zout, and to simultaneously manage power output. Thus, you'll achieve the best gain structure, simplicity and quickly listen to your music.


When you do not use the buffer stage and input from headamp, there is still feedback! The feedback is, as I see it, the difference of the summing junction versus earth to the primary, the latter being 'fixed'. [Probably ZM can describe this better].

What is OLG - onlinegain?
 
interstage transformer coupled amp using opamp, Tango NN 500-30 and power mosfets

I was a subrscriber of the Japanese MJ magazine for many years. The attatched amplifier design is taken from the MJ magazine. I can not recall which issue, but was published somewhere the 90s.

The Tango is 500 ohm to 2x 30 ohm. I believe this was not a standard product of Tango.

I build two interstage coupled amps, but with tubes and mosfets. The enclosed circuit I did not try, but at least it omits the large capacitors in the outputstage. These capacitors can be 'heard', that's why I moved on to a circlotron output circuit.

Wim
 

Attachments

  • transformeramp1.jpg
    transformeramp1.jpg
    44.6 KB · Views: 486
Open Loop Gain

Closed Loop Gain

he probably meant on varying just resistor coming from primary bottom to gnd

if that resistor is 0 , then there is no overall feedback
Thank you ZM. OLG = Open Loop Gain used by lhquam. Also, there not any electrical connection between the output of the amp and the primary winding of the transformer. This winding stands alone. Thus, this transformer operates like a ground loop isolator.
 
I was a subrscriber of the Japanese MJ magazine for many years. The attatched amplifier design is taken from the MJ magazine. I can not recall which issue, but was published somewhere the 90s.

The Tango is 500 ohm to 2x 30 ohm. I believe this was not a standard product of Tango.

I build two interstage coupled amps, but with tubes and mosfets. The enclosed circuit I did not try, but at least it omits the large capacitors in the outputstage. These capacitors can be 'heard', that's why I moved on to a circlotron output circuit.

Wim
wimdehaan: Thank you for this interesting schematic. buzzforb, ZM and lhquam were inadvertently discussing a schematic like this actual one yesterday.

Rush and triode_al: Take the subject schematic and mentally disconnect the connection between the power output node and the inverting input to the front end Op Amp. The ouput stage nows operates open loop; or without feedback as Rush would like to operate it. The Op Amp and its input volume control is [like] a headphone circuit of a typical CD player. It is a free front end. It simplifies Conceptual F6 if one operates the output stage open loop. The amp operating open loop is characterized as transconductance or current source compared to a voltage source in the presence of loop feedback to the inverting input of Op Amp.
 
Official Court Jester
Joined 2003
Paid Member
....Thus, this transformer operates like a ground loop isolator.

some xformer based gadgets are made exactly for that ;

but , every other xformer based gadget (or part of bigger gadget,mix console for instance) is made with some other primary purpose and , depending how xformer is wired , can bring that virtue , or not .

so , in case of MJ schematic ...... it's not (real) gnd-breaker , because you have same gnd connected in circ on both sides of xformer