A.W.O.L.

So the Peanut Whistle blogger has been missing in action of late. With the best of intentions, our little blog has been overlooked due to my real world engineering demands. That, of course, is a good thing. Right now we are in the midst of rewiring our control room. The current wiring is, ahem, substandard: pro XLR connections improperly adapted to consumer RCA hookups, bad wire splices. It’s all in a day’s work.

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The “Hi-Fi” project is over. We’ll make a return to that subject in a future post. You will be surprised at the results: guaranteed!

Stay tuned

Really Big Boombox

Ever bucking the trend toward miniaturization I’ve decided what it would take to make a (virtually) no cost entertainment system for my kitchen. As a stay-at-home dad, I spend most of my “workday” there. Seeing that music helps breeze the day away, I have come up with a easy solution to bringing my tunes into an often hostile environment:

Interface my old JVC car stereo/CD player to a pair of Yamaha  speakers which are already transplanted into a 50 year old GE console stereo we spoke of in yesterday’s post. Merging all my junk electronics into a Frankenstein’s Monster boombox gets this tinkerer’s creative juices flowing.

The old head unit runs on 12 volt power, so rain or shine, AC or DC; this huge system will play. I’ll keep you posted.

Stay tuned.

The Hi-Fi, Final Chapter

Appraisal

The project is underway first with the rat’s nest of wiring. The half century old harness is in surprisingly good shape; all solder joints still intact. Very little rust is present. Dust and grime are abundant. Using this unit daily would be problematic, so I choose to trash this fire hazard wiring.

When I energize the unit in 2009, the radio performs well on both AM and FM although the switching between sources is quite scratchy and inconsistent (volume, tone and selector switches need contact cleaner). The ancient tube amplifier powers the built in speakers just fine with more than acceptable fidelity. Audio out of the left side of the cabinet is distorted on bass sounds (I suspect a cracked woofer.) The left loudspeaker is water damaged beyond repair. I keep the right one for a souvenir. The automatic record changer is useless. Even when new it was not exactly state-of-the-art. By 2011, I need a new game plan as far as the electronics are concerned. I decide to purge the contents and start with an empty carcass. What is left concerns me.

Conclusion

On close inspection the hi-fi actually looks better than it is. The unit is made with birch plywood with a rosewood veneer, mostly ½” with a few ⅛” panels. The only solid wood appears to be a long board that reinforces the back and the 4 tapered legs turned in late ‘50 modern style. The top is distressed from years of storage and abuse. The finish has long lost its sheen. A peek underneath the lid reveals what the cabinet must have been in its former glory.

The deeper I dive into the console, the more I am convinced to scrap it altogether before drowning in an unrewarding money pit. Realizing that the old GE console is more of a family relic than a truly vintage representation of hi-fi art, my mission now is to find a better example then restore it. Better yet, I will design and build my own.

Stay Tuned.

The Hi-fi, Part 2.0

I have returned to my entertainment center as a project that combines my woodworking skills (or lack thereof), electronics knowledge, and radio wiring expertise.

This stage in the game is my planning phase: taking photos and making measurements. Some of the crazy things that I have considered for the 50 year old cabinet are; a complete restoration of the original tube electronics, dropping in new “guts”, replacing the old works with a professional grade turntable of the period, or just modifying the case for a more universal purpose.

Considering budget and the fact that the console was water damaged during long storage, the latter option was the preferred route. I intend to reinterpret the design and use the hi-fi as a home for my present am/fm receiver, speakers, HDTV, and Blu-ray player. 

Stay Tuned.

 

©2011 Neal Rhoden. The Peanut Whistle Weblogs. All Rights Reserved.

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Click on photos to enlarge in new window.

Restomod

I was inspired by car restoration hobbyists for my most resent idea: “restomod.” You see, some people actually have enough cash to turn a junk yard jewel (hint: sarcasm) and transform it into a true classic. Rust buckets all over the world have be resurrected. Purists insist on ground up restorations with “numbers matching” parts. In other words, these cars are returned to factory fresh condition with original parts.

Another camp of car enthusiasts subscribe to a different philosophy—modification and restoration or restomod. Basically, they obtain a donor car (usually just a body) and build it up with modern high performance parts. The resulting car winds up resembling the original, but it drives, handles, and performs on par with modern state-of-the-art vehicles.

On to my idea. This combines two of my passions, cars and broadcast radio equipment. What if I find an old fashioned radio mixing console, gut the electronics and replace them with today’s best professional audio components. Most of those old boards were very roomy inside, like a ‘57 Chevy, and would lend themselves to extreme modifications. The exterior would be restored to original factory fresh appearance and function; the best of both worlds, classic ergonomic design with stellar 21st century sonics.  I would fill my fantasy studio with such equipment, like the console pictured above. It’s an old Broadcast Electronics Spotmaster, the one I learned on. It was maintenance deferred, sounded like crap, but was easy to “drive.”

Recently, I stumbled on a guy who has done this. Here is a link to the site for photos and more information.

Stay tuned

© 2011 Neal Rhoden. The Peanut Whistle Weblogs. All Rights Reserved.