Tag: LCR impedance bridge

cx-112a DHT preamp

Introduction

This was one of my first DHT preamps. I found a quartet of NOS CX-112a Cunningham (globe) back in Buenos Aires many years ago and built one of my first DHT preamps. I loved it. I played with it before I moved into the 26 and then started the long exploratory journey with DHTs. 

The CX-112a can be easily fit in an existing 01a preamp. Take a look at what Thomas Mayer recently blogged about this valve, worth reading it. 

Well, you can get more current drive than 01a (nearly double) but no thoriated tungsten filaments. Anyhow, the gain is slightly higher but is very easy to adapt to my gyrator-based circuit, that I couldn’t resist to take the quartet out of my valve stash and make them sing again after so many years.

Continue reading “cx-112a DHT preamp”

Refurbishing an LCR bridge

Recently I acquired a second-hand and untested TF2700 LCR bridge from Marconi. This is a fantastic piece of engineering and a superb LCR bridge that can only be beaten by an expensive impedance analyser, something I can clearly not afford.

Matching Russian NOS capacitors
Matching Russian NOS capacitors

 

This bridge is perfect for selecting accurately capacitors for a RIAA network with extreme accuracy. In fact, the 1% precision can be improved down to 0.25% by replacing the main bridge 0.5% resistors with 0.1% ones as suggested by Morgan Jones in his “Building Valve Amplifiers” (Second Edition) page 330 and 331.

Continue reading “Refurbishing an LCR bridge”