Chunky Monkey - JE Labs 300b Part II

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I got all the components put together on their respective chassis. No wiring yet, but that's the easy part. They look alright. Wish they were a little less chunky. I got all the workout I need for the day, lifting weights. Here are some pictures (I put a MKIII for size comparison):

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There will be top metal covers for each chassis to hide all the screws later on. I am going to hook up 16 ohms taps to 8 ohms speakers for effective 3.5k primary impedance. These 6137HSs have 7K primary. -Min

[SteveH]

They look fantastic ! I kinda like the chunky look; plus smaller footprints will make them easier to 'live' with. I can't wait to see the finished product and your listening impressions...

[TomMcNally]

Hot looking amps Min ! Nice job.

[crispycircuit]

Excellent! Custom amps! A lot of money, time, thought, energy, and desire.... Your almost done. I can't wait to see how they compare? Jame's outputs are on my list of possible trannys for the next project. So give your your unbiased opion. (pun intented)......

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Thank y'all for your kind words. I wired one of the monoblocks today. This is by far the easiest one to wire of all the amps that I got to work with. It's easy when everything is mounted on top and have all the space in the world underneath.
Apparently, I need to get bypass caps with higher voltage rating. They were popping on startup (saw voltages rise and pass the limit at the same time) and intermittently after. I didn't have a whole lot of options on Black Gates.
Didn't get to do some critical listening. I will report my "unbiased" listening impression when I am done with them. :)

Under the hood:

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[dhuebert]

Man, those things are nice lookin! All you need is some hammertone paint for the top plates and you're a pro.

Don

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Thanks, Don! The top plate will not be painted, instead, there will be a stainless steel or powdercoated cover over it (yes, it will have correspending holes for tubes, irons, etc. to go through) to give it an Audionote 300B amp look to it. You can't see it on the pictures, but the wood base on top has grooves around the edges to accept the additional cover. I was originally going to do polished copper as the cover, but Euphonia was out of JS6123HSs in black. -Min

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Ok, the amps are done and I was able to listen in stereo mode for the first time today. As far as construction of the amps go, these are by far the easiest amps that I got to wire so far. Even easier than Darling amps. It's a very simple and elegant design.

The 300B are biased at about 80 mA with 425VDC at the plate. Everything runs very cool. Those mammoth of PTs aren't even break a sweat after an hour of operation. I think a lot of parts that I put in there are really overkill. At least nothing will pushed to its limit, ensuring longevity.

How does it sound? I am very happy with these amps. They really groove to the music when listening to rock or pop music. Great textural rendition and rhythmic integrity when listening to complex ensemble. 9 wpc is plenty for my listening level and the efficiency of my speakers, but it's still just 9 watts. They do seem struggle a bit when I try to push the full power of orchestra through them. All in all, their dynamic performance is amazing for most music I have CDs, mp3, and records for.

Will I build these for myself? Probably not, mostly because of its size and the cost of construction. I think the same caliber of sound can be achieved using other designs in stereo at 3/4 of cost or less. -Min