The Heavy Artillery!!

Ladies and gentlemen....

After months of brain-wracking, finger-burning, eye-straining, solder-smoke-inhaling, parts-sourcing, nasty-chemical-exposing, and getting-damn-near-electrocuted mayhem.....

I bring you The Heavy Artillery Vacuum Tube Mic Preamp!

Since, during its development, I kept referring to it as "Heavy," owing to its use of large transformers, that nickname sort of morphed into "Heavy Artillery."  So I figured, what better housing for it than a 50 cal. ammo box?

It sounds great!!

Special thanks to Ian (aka ruffrecords), as well as a few others, for all your help on this.  I could NOT have done it without you!

8)

8)

Gives milspec a new meaning.

Nice build. Well done. Should be great for on location work.

Cheers

Ian

ruffrecords said:

Nice build. Well done. Should be great for on location work.

Cheers

Ian

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I can't wait to put this thing to work!

She's a beauty Curtz,looks bomb proof,

Theres a buddy of mine who uses a large ammo  box as an enclosure for his pedal board , its all foam in the lid and a wooden tray lifts out with all the pedals stuck onto  it . Its got him some strange looks from security over the years too .
Dave Royers original tube mic projects were housed in them ,there a grand sturdy box for any project , I was going to try and build a guitar amp into a 50 cal before alright , but it was just marginally small for wanted I wanted to do .

Tubetec said:

....there a grand sturdy box for any project , I was going to try and build a guitar amp into a 50 cal before alright , but it was just marginally small for wanted I wanted to do .

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My dad used one for a tool box in his truck for years.

The 50 cal. is a bit tight for a guitar amp, and I'm not sure how the sheet metal would make a speaker sound.  Maybe one of the much larger wooden ammo crates would work.  Might have to glue up some joints a little better to keep it from rattling, but its construction would be a lot closer to that of an actual cabinet.

Wooden crate is a very good idea for recycling. They don't sell such things here, guess it must be very cheap in the US.
Is this from your schematics, which tube did you use to get good input and output stage in one bottle? 12WD7 or lower gain input? Regulators look like some from Ian, they helped me too when needing a lot more current than usually.
I like it a lot because so many things are hardwired, easy to mod or repair and will last a long time. Good job.

My3gger said:

Wooden crate is a very good idea for recycling. They don't sell such things here, guess it must be very cheap in the US.
Is this from your schematics, which tube did you use to get good input and output stage in one bottle? 12WD7 or lower gain input? Regulators look like some from Ian, they helped me too when needing a lot more current than usually.
I like it a lot because so many things are hardwired, easy to mod or repair and will last a long time. Good job.

Click to expand...

Yes, 12DW7.

LS!