I was working on putting the basement back together when I spotted a record from 1968 that brought back some old memories.
I was in my junior year of high school in a vocational electronics program that ran for three hours a day for two years. The vocational wing of the school was separated from the regular class rooms in its own wing, partially due to noise. The metal shop was always making a racket cutting or welding something, the auto shop specialized in screaming engines, squealing tires, and the ultimate stink bomb, oil through the carb on a old POS Dodge with the exhaust backed up to the hallway. We were not exactly innocent either as we knew how to make guitar amps, and loud ones at that.
Homestead Air Force Base had donated a bunch of old electronics including several Stromberg Carlson PA amps from the 1940's that had 4 X 6L6GA's for output tubes. We didn't have any of them, so we put metal 6L6's in instead. We had a pair of these amps set up on a workbench with a turntable and some DIY guitar cabinets with 4 X 10 inch speakers in each one. I had just bought Steppenwolf The Second album and decided that the entire vocational wing of the school needed to hear it at about 7 on the Richter scale. Everything was set up and during lunch break we let it rip at full crank. Sometime into the second side of the record I had picked up the outer cover and was looking at it when IT happened. Suddenly the loudest rendition of the "F" word the school had ever heard came out of my mouth, the record jacket went flying across the room, and I was on my A$$.
The amps were never intended to use metal 6L6 tubes. The metal tube has pin 1 connected to the outer metal can. The amp used pin 1 as a tie point for the screen resistor, which was connected to B+ about 380 volts which was now applied to the outer metal shell of the output tubes.
As the ohmmeter shows, the album cover is conductive. Our workbenches were made of metal which was grounded. Iwas leaning across the back edge of this bench so I was well grounded and had the record jacket in my hand. The jacket touched the metal envelope of one of the 6L6 tubes applying 380 volts to my arm resulting in a launch of the record jacket.
This IS the actual record from that incident. It is currently playing on the TT.
I was in my junior year of high school in a vocational electronics program that ran for three hours a day for two years. The vocational wing of the school was separated from the regular class rooms in its own wing, partially due to noise. The metal shop was always making a racket cutting or welding something, the auto shop specialized in screaming engines, squealing tires, and the ultimate stink bomb, oil through the carb on a old POS Dodge with the exhaust backed up to the hallway. We were not exactly innocent either as we knew how to make guitar amps, and loud ones at that.
Homestead Air Force Base had donated a bunch of old electronics including several Stromberg Carlson PA amps from the 1940's that had 4 X 6L6GA's for output tubes. We didn't have any of them, so we put metal 6L6's in instead. We had a pair of these amps set up on a workbench with a turntable and some DIY guitar cabinets with 4 X 10 inch speakers in each one. I had just bought Steppenwolf The Second album and decided that the entire vocational wing of the school needed to hear it at about 7 on the Richter scale. Everything was set up and during lunch break we let it rip at full crank. Sometime into the second side of the record I had picked up the outer cover and was looking at it when IT happened. Suddenly the loudest rendition of the "F" word the school had ever heard came out of my mouth, the record jacket went flying across the room, and I was on my A$$.
The amps were never intended to use metal 6L6 tubes. The metal tube has pin 1 connected to the outer metal can. The amp used pin 1 as a tie point for the screen resistor, which was connected to B+ about 380 volts which was now applied to the outer metal shell of the output tubes.
As the ohmmeter shows, the album cover is conductive. Our workbenches were made of metal which was grounded. Iwas leaning across the back edge of this bench so I was well grounded and had the record jacket in my hand. The jacket touched the metal envelope of one of the 6L6 tubes applying 380 volts to my arm resulting in a launch of the record jacket.
This IS the actual record from that incident. It is currently playing on the TT.
Attachments
Full meaning the whole thing.....
I last listenend to my BEST OF MOUNTAIN record
Mississippi Queen... You Know What I Mean....
MORE COWBELL!
In '74, a friend of the family gave me that LP for Christmas.... like a fool I lent it in '79 to a friend of mine... I never got it back. ;-P
+++
The last LP I've listened to is Fleetwood Mac Rumours...
I got the Karousel upgrade to the LP12... and the SissySIT... about the same time... last week, so I've been listening to a LOT or LPs lately. It's blowing my mind how much more information I'm hearing from the records!
;-D
Last edited:
No you probably aren't, but.....
At this moment my basement is torn apart for some serious radon mitigation work. After building the lab that I always wanted in the 2000 square foot basement of the retirement home we had built 9 years ago, I found radon levels over 10 X higher that recommended. This is a serious lung cancer risk that must be rectified. This means moving everything that sits on the floor, 9 benches or tables, and all the carpeting that's under them to seal all the cracks that have formed in the floor some of which are quite large. The radon mitigation company installed the "under the slab evacuation pump" but quoted over $1000 to seal the concrete, and that was with me moving all the stuff in the basement.
For now the Technics SL-D2 that I bought new in the mid 80's after a cat killed my Garrard Zero-100 that I got from the Garrard sales rep in 1972 sits on a rolling table. It is plugged into a $20 Lepai "class T" digital amplifier from Parts Express which feeds some small Cerwin Vega speakers that I got from a thrift store. Somewhere in the early 2000's I built a small SMD phono stage using the circuit from a TI application note. It is mounted inside the TT base so that the TT can be plugged into any one of my amps.
Most of the "full albums" that I have listened to lately involve popping a CD into this PC and cranking up the plastic PC speakers while ripping the CD to the hard drive. The "plastic PC speakers" are IK Multimedia iLoud studio monitors which are pretty good as long as you don't try to play them too loud. This is why most of what I have played recently are titles that are not already in my music library on a hard drive.
My 70 year old ears have now degraded to the point that it doesn't matter too much what equipment I use. I have been dealing with Meniere's Disease which kills hearing and physical balance for 25+ years. I am now in the "burnout stage" where most of the balance issues have subsided, but hearing loss is severe and changes daily. My guitar playing ability has also degraded, mostly due to lack of practice, so only one DIY 4 watt guitar amp remains. I just plug the guitar cord into the Focusrite on the PC and dial up whatever amp sim I want.
What will I use when I put it all back together? Not sure at the moment because I now have the opportunity to "build it back better" (really poor quote choice though). As before there will be multiple playback systems. The TT will be somewhere safe out of the reach of curious grandkids connected to a computer for vinyl ripping and occasional payback. Most of my casual listening is from one of several computers, each with a dedicated purpose, and each with one or more amplifiers and speaker combo's.
Even the test bench where I design, build and test tube amps has a PC that can feed a benchmark amp and speaker set that can be swapped out, but it usually a TSE-II with 300B's or an SSE with KT88's feeding some Yamaha NS-10M Studio monitors. Why these? Because I have had the speakers for over 30 years. I know what they sound like, or should sound like. Ditto my older amp designs.
The system that I use for serious listening is a Ryzen 9 based PC that was built for video editing, audio recording and playback, and music creation. There are several amps connected up to a Focusrite Clarett 4Pre interface, there are several DIY amp and speaker choices plus the NS-10M's and a pair of the high end iLouds which are internally bi-amped. An UNSET based rack mount amp was under construction when the radon mess started, and a FETSET amp is planned.
It rained all day yesterday. I spent the day in the basement and Sherri was not home. Our power was out until about noon (not uncommon here) so no CD's met the computer until after lunch. Today's play list is uncertain, but yesterday's was:
Toad The Wet Sprocket - Dulcinea
Wishbone Ash - Argus
Moody Blues - Days Of Future Passed
Moody Blues - Every Good Boy Deserves Favour
Yikes. Congrats, at least you found it. From reading around it's actually surprisingly common. Granite is an emitter, so if you're in an area with a lot of it, get the checks done. In the UK there's a handy Radon map
Terry Pratchett had a good anecdote. He started working at a Nuclear Power plant and one day he became the first they'd ever had who set off the radiation detectors on his way in to the building. A team was dispatched and the source was his 'new' antique writing desk. In a former life it had been used by the women who painted the radioactive paint onto watch and instrument dials. The desk became radioactive waste...
To keep with the spirit of the thread:
Brian Eno & Harold Budd: Ambient 2: Plateaux Of Mirror
Camel: A Live Record
I know what you mean!I've also been hearing quite a few subtleties in LPs I'd never noticed before. My guess is that it's a combination of things, like a better turntable, better speakers, and actually listening. On a lark last week I purchased Fleetwood Mac's Rumours remastered on 45 rpm discs. An excellent recording indeed!
