Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[Goonybird]

Having liked, owned, and loved, a number of valve** audio amplifiers in the past (Leak,Quad,Radford et al), I picked up an old Rogers Cadet power amplifier recently. Output is about 10 Watts RMS per channel. Not the best but a good sounding basic amp.





Then you see where it is installed: 



Powered by a 300W inverter which is supplied via a 30 amp relay triggered via the stereo on, in conjunction with the sub power amp (both hefty 30 amp fused supplies from the battery.
Audio phono input from rear speaker output via a speaker to line level adaptor.
12v Blue LEDs fitted under each valve base.
Lovely smooth sound as it should be.

Thanks for previous advice from DaveDND and others.

** for US readers Valves = Tubes

[Steve 1564]

Ahh yes... Thats more like it -

"Valves, sound great & keep you warm"
Tempted to do the same with my old Armstrong....
Does anyone know if a Garrad sp25 will fit in the glove box ?

Just need to get some tannoy 12's in the doors...

Other modifications include :-
* Twin Trembler coils
* Sir Patrick Hopkirks patent gasoline enhancement apperatus
* removable picnic hamper...

.... The grand old days of 12 litre engines & rod brakes

Love the Blue led's...
looks like EL34's being overdriven....

Nice Job

[Dishevelled Den]

Indeed so GB, I miss the friendly glow of the Quad valve units although I still have a 44/405 unit still working through B&W DM2A speakers 8-) 8-)

Nice installation by the way  8-) very  8-) indeed

[Kevin Wood]

Very nice, although I think I'd appreciate it more in the living room, personally.

Kevin

[Steve 1564]

Indeed so GB, I miss the friendly glow of the Quad valve units although I still have a 44/405 unit still working through B&W DM2A speakers 8-) 8-)

Nice installation by the way  8-) very  8-) indeed

Ahh quad.. 44 was the best sounding pre amp quad ever made 303’s were sonicly better than the 405’s but lacked any real current delivery, i remember modding (or trying to) back in the late 80's... changed all the caps & matched the fet's on the phono stage - I couldn’t tell (or measure) the difference but the customer would swear it was better ! emperor’s new clothes i guess… (that & the fact that we had just charged him £150!!)
What about a valve buffer (unity gain preamp) for big car installs…
Sold out lately – current system is AV… Harman AVR745 Celestion C3 front C4s & C1’s rear oh and a sub or two (that’s home not the car)… Mind you I have an ITL MA120 & AE101 + a TD125 super in the loft – maybe it’s time to fish em out?

Steve

[KW]

Very nice, although I think I'd appreciate it more in the living room, personally.

Kevin

Agreed.

You'll never beat a valve for sound quality, but (ignoring the fact you'd spend £100's on getting a car speaker to even get close to a home jobby) bouncing it around on the rear parcel shelf isn't going to do it any favours.


PS

Listen to the 10W your amp is providing, then listen to the so called 100W that the transistorised piece of crap you were using before can deliver 

[Mr Skrunts]

Many years ago I had a fiat uno and stuffed a pair of wharfdale speakers behind the seats (cant remember the model) but by far was the best I have ever heard music in a car, and yes I have had some decent stuff over the years.  One of the nicest standard equipments was the Clarion in my Sylvia turbo.

Plus in my spoerts hatch I had All the Pioneer component stuff when it came out..

KEX73, TSW203 SUBS, TST3 tweeters, GM40 + GM120 Amps and amp balace units.  Not powerfull by todays standards as this was 1981/2 but was crystal clear and the bass still shook the car whilst travelling at 1**mph  unlike some of the carp I hear these days.

[Sixstring]

I've been a guitarist playing most weekends semi-pro for the last 35 years, and nothing will convince me that anything other than a valve will give me the smooth, tone and sound I require, although I do have a hybrid tube/transistor amp that tries hard to reproduce the sound of my marshall lead 100 amp and does a passable job until I need to crank the volume up, and then only ECC84s and EL34s can cut it.

[Elite Pete]

And valves are dead easy to fix, anyone can do it. I remember my old man banging the tv with the flat of his hand in the 70's, it never failed

[Radiomarko]

Fantastic set-up!

Brought back many memories, I too used to put decent speakers in cars, if there was room in "modern" cars Id still do it now from preference. The best effect iirc was from a pair of small BBC/Rogers units sometime in the 70's - used to freeze pedestrians with those..... cant remember which car for sure perhaps a Volkswagen 1600TL Fastback - wish I still had that 

[Steve 1564]

... 3rd Harmonic distortion,
put the blues in Chicargo & the Punk in rock....

And some go up to 11 !

Power Guide 10 Valve watts =

100 Bi-Polar W
120 Mos-fet W (or 270W if its an Mc2 )
240 Japanese W
22,684 Chineese W (or 1million argos watts!)

--- Sixstring... Is Steve Cornell still building head amps?
Recorded one some years ago at Bob Ross studios - sounded fantastic 83's and 34's (quad push pull) through hand wound TXs - a real class build

[Sixstring]

Yes, mate. he's only build-to-order these days, and not cheap.
try Jesse James (really!!)  just off the feeder rd in Bristol, top man, does fantastic things with valves, got mine to nearly double its normal output, and oooooh, what tone!!

[david_omega]

something a little different for the forum and generated a lot of interest, i think it looks cool, question is, next, will you have a large valve powered television set replacing the stereo?

[Sixstring]

I wanna see the size of the hole he has to cut in the centre of the dashboard to fit it...................................!!

[Goonybird]

Thanks for the positive feedback.
I want to do something at the front. but not much room so came across this:

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=330423566739&ssPageName=STRK:MEWAX:IT



Maybe have to save a bit. But will have to wait for next car, as difficulty fitting a double din into early omegas.