Hello! I JUST joined the diyAudio community. Thank you for having me! I have a couple of projects that I’d like to start, and this seems like the best place online to start some research and ask some questions.
I have an old (1959/60 I believe) Fisher 660A power amp that I acquired years ago that I absolutely love the sound of. I had NorCal tube amp guru Skip Simmons (google him if you don’t know his rep and work, its A+) go through the Fisher unit about eight years ago, and it has been running wonderfully since, powering a variety of vintage KLHs, Advents, And JBLs, as well as some M&K and KRK/Focal passive studio monitors.
Today, I was lucking enough to score an entire old Fisher console for $10 with everything in it, from a second 660A (with all original tubes) to the Garrard turntable. As much as I’d like to restore the entire unit, I’ll at least start with the somewhat simpler task of just the new 660A amp. I’d like to match it as close as possible to my existing 660A in order to use them both together, as either a pair of mono blocks, or as a pair in a bi-amp configuration.
I thought I would post here to see if anyone has any experience working on these power amps, and if they could recommend any possible mods or upgrades to the design or the circuit, perhaps just simple things like upgrading caps, bare wire plugs to bananas, on/off switch, etc. I’m an electronics novice, but I know my way around a soldering iron and schematic well enough to do a bit of audio gear troubleshooting, and have fixed a number of guitar pedals and upgraded a few audio mixing consoles with new transformers, IC chips, caps, etc. Not rocket science by any means, but enough to have some fun, burn some fingers and curse a lot.
Thanks for your time and input!
-Tim
I have an old (1959/60 I believe) Fisher 660A power amp that I acquired years ago that I absolutely love the sound of. I had NorCal tube amp guru Skip Simmons (google him if you don’t know his rep and work, its A+) go through the Fisher unit about eight years ago, and it has been running wonderfully since, powering a variety of vintage KLHs, Advents, And JBLs, as well as some M&K and KRK/Focal passive studio monitors.
Today, I was lucking enough to score an entire old Fisher console for $10 with everything in it, from a second 660A (with all original tubes) to the Garrard turntable. As much as I’d like to restore the entire unit, I’ll at least start with the somewhat simpler task of just the new 660A amp. I’d like to match it as close as possible to my existing 660A in order to use them both together, as either a pair of mono blocks, or as a pair in a bi-amp configuration.
I thought I would post here to see if anyone has any experience working on these power amps, and if they could recommend any possible mods or upgrades to the design or the circuit, perhaps just simple things like upgrading caps, bare wire plugs to bananas, on/off switch, etc. I’m an electronics novice, but I know my way around a soldering iron and schematic well enough to do a bit of audio gear troubleshooting, and have fixed a number of guitar pedals and upgraded a few audio mixing consoles with new transformers, IC chips, caps, etc. Not rocket science by any means, but enough to have some fun, burn some fingers and curse a lot.
Thanks for your time and input!
-Tim