I'm crying right now indeed ;-). But taste matters of course. I would have preferred green or just amber lighting, because it is easy on the eyes, not distracting. But as always, thx for uploading this interesting educational video!
I have this tuner. It’s built like a nice piece of test gear from HP or Tek of that era. Sadly, the radio stations around me compress their signals so much that you can’t tell how good it really is!
Hi Tony, great work, it's interesting with those transistors, I've come across transistors that had parts of the legs covered with black plastic - as if when potting the transistor, part of the terminal was also covered, at the time I thought it was due to assembly - the lowest place above plate for cooling. If you are converting the backlight from light bulbs to LEDs with brightness control, you have to adjust the control so that the current is regulated, the change in the voltage of the LED does not have much effect. The biggest problem I had with this change was with my Tektronix 2465 - grid backlighting, I wanted to keep the original connection of the regulation and create a replacement so that it only connects to the PCB connectors. I created a resistive divider and connected an LED to this divider - it works perfectly, but the visible regulation is only in 3/4 of the path of the potentiometer, the last quarter is almost unchanged - while maintaining the regulation in the entire range of the potentiometer, there was already a huge power loss and the divider it burned like a stove - I chose the golden mean - visible regulation and reasonable power loss. If you are interested, I can send you the wiring of the divider by e-mail. EDIT: I liked the greenish backlight better, but now the indicator lights and scale indicator stand out beautifully 👍 Nice day 🙂 Tom
Anyone who has worked on Tektronix or HP test equipment from the 70s and 80s knows about the tin whisker failure mode of tantalum caps. Often the cap failure is a short which can take out other parts. Rule: replace them all in gear of this age and don’t look back!
I've seen the "creeping death" quite a few times..and I'd bet 75% of the time they were noisy. I have at least 2 AKAI reel to reel decks that have a shot noise issue. I guess those are very well known for that happening. I'll get around to servicing those someday. But for sure that's a thing.
I've had tantalums last, seemingly, forever. I think the biggest key to them is to ensure that the voltage rating is, at least, double that of the nominal voltage they are connected to. So, for a 15V rail, make sure you are using 35V caps, if they are tantalum.
With droplet Tantalus it's like in that joke - the Lord stands by the window, looks out, it's a beautiful sunny day outside and the Lord repeats out loud "Today it would be possible, today it would be possible...". His wife asks him "what would be possible today" he turns to her and answers "You recently thought that one fine day you would pick yourself up and fall out .......... yes today would be possible" Well, drop Tantalus is the same way, one day he will say to himself "It would be possible today" 😂 and it doesn't matter what his voltage is. Interestingly, I have yet to see a Tantalum fail in a stainless axial bushing.
The gray films can cause trouble especially when you touch them with the solder iron. A small touch and subsequent melt will short them out. I’ve read too about the unreliability of them and replace them. Its costly. The 300 power amp must have 20 of them installed.
I would heavily suggest aligning this tuner. Any tuner that is older than 10 years or so has drifted. I think you would be surprised how much better it works if aligned.
Were those purple Electrolytics in the Yamaha deck Elna caps ?? I have a handful of Yamaha NS K-960 & K-950 decks that I am going through in order to sell, just about all the small purple Elna Electrolytics had corrosion on their leads. Thankfully there was no damage to any of the boards.
I have this tuner and the matching preamp and amp. I bought them off Ebay. They've been sitting unused in my basement for the last 12 years. I don't know what to do with them.
Hi exraytonyb. I am working on a pioneer six- 737, and have an accident, while doing the procedure pin 1&2 which is the left channel they touched and I got a spark, and the unit stop powering on, while looking at the power amplifier board I noticed that there were two blown 150 resistors and tow blown output transistors, so I replaced them and now the lights in front are very dim, and my relay is not clicking on. What are the other things I can check for the problem?. Sorry for the long question.
Now you know why the skirl of the pipes echoing across the Glens bring a tear to the eye of us Scots. 😁😁👍👍👍👍
Cheers Eric
I'm crying right now indeed ;-). But taste matters of course. I would have preferred green or just amber lighting, because it is easy on the eyes, not distracting. But as always, thx for uploading this interesting educational video!
Purchased a T101 back in 1978. Still enjoying it nearly every day ! Lucky, Chicago still has WFMT fine arts station for quality audio and programming.
I have this tuner. It’s built like a nice piece of test gear from HP or Tek of that era. Sadly, the radio stations around me compress their signals so much that you can’t tell how good it really is!
Beautiful piece of electronics! Thanks for sharing Tony!
Great video! I was racking my brain playing Name That Tune in a couple of notes! It is Tom Petty's The Waiting for those wondering!
Accuphase is always good quality.
I feel like I should have paid for this video.
Thank you very much sir!
Hi Tony, great work, it's interesting with those transistors, I've come across transistors that had parts of the legs covered with black plastic - as if when potting the transistor, part of the terminal was also covered, at the time I thought it was due to assembly - the lowest place above plate for cooling. If you are converting the backlight from light bulbs to LEDs with brightness control, you have to adjust the control so that the current is regulated, the change in the voltage of the LED does not have much effect. The biggest problem I had with this change was with my Tektronix 2465 - grid backlighting, I wanted to keep the original connection of the regulation and create a replacement so that it only connects to the PCB connectors. I created a resistive divider and connected an LED to this divider - it works perfectly, but the visible regulation is only in 3/4 of the path of the potentiometer, the last quarter is almost unchanged - while maintaining the regulation in the entire range of the potentiometer, there was already a huge power loss and the divider it burned like a stove - I chose the golden mean - visible regulation and reasonable power loss. If you are interested, I can send you the wiring of the divider by e-mail.
EDIT: I liked the greenish backlight better, but now the indicator lights and scale indicator stand out beautifully 👍
Nice day 🙂 Tom
Anyone who has worked on Tektronix or HP test equipment from the 70s and 80s knows about the tin whisker failure mode of tantalum caps. Often the cap failure is a short which can take out other parts. Rule: replace them all in gear of this age and don’t look back!
The build quality is like military spec.
Great video as always . Can you talk about the lights you had to change out? What they were and where you purchase them?
Those flat gray film caps are known bad actors. I pulled a 1µF out of a Marantz 2325 that measured 310nF.
Thanks you 😊
I've seen the "creeping death" quite a few times..and I'd bet 75% of the time they were noisy. I have at least 2 AKAI reel to reel decks that have a shot noise issue. I guess those are very well known for that happening. I'll get around to servicing those someday. But for sure that's a thing.
I've had tantalums last, seemingly, forever. I think the biggest key to them is to ensure that the voltage rating is, at least, double that of the nominal voltage they are connected to. So, for a 15V rail, make sure you are using 35V caps, if they are tantalum.
Even the little blue ones ? I’ve seen them fail from time to time.
With droplet Tantalus it's like in that joke - the Lord stands by the window, looks out, it's a beautiful sunny day outside and the Lord repeats out loud "Today it would be possible, today it would be possible...". His wife asks him "what would be possible today" he turns to her and answers "You recently thought that one fine day you would pick yourself up and fall out .......... yes today would be possible"
Well, drop Tantalus is the same way, one day he will say to himself "It would be possible today" 😂 and it doesn't matter what his voltage is.
Interestingly, I have yet to see a Tantalum fail in a stainless axial bushing.
The gray films can cause trouble especially when you touch them with the solder iron. A small touch and subsequent melt will short them out. I’ve read too about the unreliability of them and replace them. Its costly. The 300 power amp must have 20 of them installed.
Just to add to the info on Tantalum capacitors - they are well known for failing on the 5V line on old IBM PCs.
I would heavily suggest aligning this tuner. Any tuner that is older than 10 years or so has drifted. I think you would be surprised how much better it works if aligned.
those knobs behind the frontcover seize up, also on the amps and pre amps, tough to get them turning again!
My wife doesn't need bagpipes.......📢
I didn’t need my ex-wife.
It’s much better now. 😊
The stile and build remind me of Mcintosh from that time..
Were those purple Electrolytics in the Yamaha deck Elna caps ?? I have a handful of Yamaha NS K-960 & K-950 decks that I am going through in order to sell, just about all the small purple Elna Electrolytics had corrosion on their leads. Thankfully there was no damage to any of the boards.
Do you have any equipment for sale
I have this tuner and the matching preamp and amp. I bought them off Ebay. They've been sitting unused in my basement for the last 12 years. I don't know what to do with them.
use them!
recapp and clean them and absolutly use them!
Hi exraytonyb. I am working on a pioneer six- 737, and have an accident, while doing the procedure pin 1&2 which is the left channel they touched and I got a spark, and the unit stop powering on, while looking at the power amplifier board I noticed that there were two blown 150 resistors and tow blown output transistors, so I replaced them and now the lights in front are very dim, and my relay is not clicking on. What are the other things I can check for the problem?. Sorry for the long question.
5 gang FM Tuner, Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm T101 is only 3.
It’s why I chose to get this accuphase instead of the T-101.. also am section
Thanks for this, that model is a holy grail tuner for me. I understand it has an excellent AM section. Did you test that and what's your opinion?