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The Headcase Stax thread


thrice

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Nope. Only US 117vac and 100v Jap primary AC windings are present.

 

Padam, can you take some pictures of the wiring from the RCA inputs to the switch? I need it as a guide so I can finally rebuild my SRA-3S.

 

Any some pics as promised last week since my last post.

 

ECR-400 drivers disassembled and whatnot:

 

DSC_0071_zpszbkugvzt.jpg

DSC_0070_zpscyrge50o.jpg

 

This is why one side was not working:

DSC_0069_zps99ekqqio.jpg

 

 

Dual pentagonal spacers. Mylar is tensioned and epoxied to one side of the spacer while other is sandwiched when secured between the stator and housing assembly. Each spacer is approx 0.20cm's thick. Need monster bias level to drive them to acceptable levels.

DSC_0068_zpsadgsajtg.jpg

 

Roll of mylar purchased from ERAudio Australia. They specialise in Quad, Final and ML speaker repair kits. Ready to convert the ECR-400 to a full E-stat:

DSC_0056_zpsdhtf73n2.jpg

 

Only thing I'm waiting for now is Nylon non conductive M2 screws with M2 bolts and grab some pro-bias cables. The ECR-400's one is held together by brass ones but I don't want arcing as the screws going through the 3 holes shown above on the spacers. Isolation is key here.

 

Anyway here is a pic of the PWB Electrostat I received over 2 weeks ago, this is the 4th PWB set I've owned and since I've gone back to collecting vintage E-Stat headphones, all 4 sets are different to each other one way or another from housing type used to transducer variations, it seems Peter W.Belt was more experimenting then solidifying a single product without so many damn revisional changes here and there. He was a bit of a audio lunatic like Patrick82 but back in the 60-70's.

 

There are basically 4 versions of the PWB stats:

1. Same as below but white housing, same drivers (SR-3 New based) came with single headphone output socket on the adaptor. Maybe Peter W.Belt had a license or deal directly with Stax to use SR-3 New drivers, who knows?

 

2. Yellow housing (shown below), SR-3 New based drivers or unknown black drivers, mostly came with the dual headphone output socket adaptor like the one that I received, no different to early Stax adaptors except bigger step up output trafo's used and thicker internal wiring. The PWB's that used the Stax driver operate on the Stax standard 230vdc normal bias, the PWB's based on black drivers (nick n on Head-fi posted some pics some years ago) supposedly would work on Stax NB as well but I don't own my pair with black drivers so not sure. The design concept is not really different to Stax drivers and this was before pro-bias. Way before.

 

3. Black housing, late pairs may have hand written serial number inside the baffle, baffle holes are similar to Stax SR-5 baffle but black. Uses Stax SR-3 drivers. These are early pairs after yellow/white housing production units.

 

4. Black housing, different logo, electret driver straight from Stax SR-40 units. Avoid these ones because they are not true ESL's and sound like shit as Peter Belt overdamped the open back of the drivers preventing any room for drivers to breathe. The Stax SR-30, 40, 50 and 60's are damped but only a single cotton disc. If you stumble across a pair most likely one channel is dead with heavy imbalance.

 

 

One side removed:

DSC_0033_zps5xfkrbzd.jpg

 

Driver:

DSC_0041_zpse8m8xqjs.jpg

DSC_0050_zpsapuu2gen.jpg

 

Stax SR-1/2 style baffle, no angled groove like later SR-3, 5 units, the earpads had no foam inside and was double sided taped to the baffle. DSC_0054_zpsdsfgmrwn.jpg

DSC_0035_zpshhuw3nij.jpg

 

So while this pair worked there was overblown bass and heavy distortion on low end passages, problem was the mylar was over-driven throughout the headphones life and loosened itself from the original spec'd tension, so had to dissemble driver and re-mylar both sides and make a new dust filters using mylar (not scrunched):

 

DSC_0053_zpsd0jlbcgx.jpg

DSC_0051_zpssiytahab.jpg

 

Old mylar, double side taped between sandwiched spacers:

DSC_0055_zpsdz8lps0h.jpg

DSC_0048_zpsfe38oi7s.jpg

 

How do they sound? It's all about the mids. Quite nice and lively.

Edited by DefQon
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stateside they are going for 1200 to 1500 so

 

Doesn't surprise me.  The Sigmas are getting pretty rare as are good buys of them.  About 8-9 years ago I got a low bias Sigma, in excellent condition for $175 along with this cool poster.

 

 

post-2765-0-27978500-1423776041_thumb.jp.

 

 

  A year or 2 back, I turned down $1,950.00 from an unsolicited buyer for my original Sigma/404.  They are just not for sale.

Edited by edstrelow
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Yes - my thinning the herd sale resulted in selling the Sigma/404's for AUS$1800, but not before some drongo from Europe PM'ed me on Ebay saying I was selling a fake which wasn't as good as the original Sigmas and then asked me what I wanted for them. I suggested he might like to fuck off.

Edited by John Buchanan
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Yes - my thinning the herd sale resulted in selling the Sigma/404's for AUS$1800, but not before some drongo from Europe PM'ed me on Ebay saying I was selling a fake which wasn't as good as the original Sigmas and then asked me what I wanted for them. I suggested he might like to fuck off.

A fake Sigma/404 - good one!  I saw a post which talked about how Stax had made them at one time.

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One time, a long time ago I used to smoke and work retail.

There was this cashier who would smoke like 5 packs of cigarettes a day. He was NOTORIOUS for bumming cigarettes off of others. I'm not saying I'm a saint, and I eventually took to buying PACKS of cigarettes for others to hold (no joke) to stop but this guy was a menace.

So, at this job you got 2 10-minute breaks, one before lunch, one after. Pretty standard, I guess. This guy, the cashier would show up to work early, CHAINSMOKE like 4 or 5 cigarettes, and then take the absolute first 10-minute break. He would regularly smoke 2 cigarettes in 10 min, and could probably do 3 if nobody was looking. Anything he could do to get another cigarette - he was on it. Need someone to gather shopping carts when its like 50 degrees below zero, and windy as fuck - he would be happy to go.

Anyways. One day, I'm out there having my lunch, sitting on a fire-exit, having a Marlboro Red cigarette and lunch with one of my other co-workers.

And, wouldn't you know it but this guy walks over and asks "what you smkoking" Just like that while holding a pack of (some green who knows whats) and we tell him "Marlboro Reds" to which he replies, in one single breath: "Uggh, Reds? Those are disgusting! Can I have one?"

Yea, we gave him a cigarette.

The story above about someone telling you your shit is fake, and in the same breath asking to buy is made me think of this. I apologize for not being as good of a story teller as Alex.

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Yes - my thinning the herd sale resulted in selling the Sigma/404's for AUS$1800, but not before some drongo from Europe PM'ed me on Ebay saying I was selling a fake which wasn't as good as the original Sigmas and then asked me what I wanted for them. I suggested he might like to fuck off.

Ha i was going to mention that you sold your sigma 404s on ebay as i messaged you about why you were selling your Stax. Anyway that drongo happens to be on headfi offering repair services to any imbalanced pair of Stax Omega 1`s. A buddy of mine tipped me off when he got the same story from some Euro guy saying my ex Sig pros were fake and all he wanted was lowball the price. I would`ve told him straight to get fucked.

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I have not been too tempted on the 009's, in part because many reviews have been somewhat equivocal: things like you need both an 007 and an 009. At any rate I am sending large monthly cash transfusions to my 2 girls who are both in college in the San Francisco Bay area. This soaks up most of the free money for new phones.

And then I have also been playing with sorbothane damping on my various Staxen as I have reported on the other site. This is a cheap and fairly easy way to fiddle the sound of these phones. I am coming to the conclusion that probably all headphones suffer from a lack of damping. You just can't do the things with phones that you can with speakers, i.e. make heavy, rigid boxes, spiked to the ground. Accordingly there is a lot of coloration which I only realized when I tried the damping.

I have good results now with the Lambdas(404 and LNS), SRX3 pro, SR 003 and most recently the 007. I have still not come up with a good way to damp the Sigmas, partly because there are few locations to attach the sorbothane. I have been particularly pleased with the damped Lambdas and these and the SRX3 pros have been getting most of my listening for the last months.

I will be at the big headphone conference in Orange County California at the end of March with 2 or more set-ups to show these tweaks. For those not familiar with Southern California, this is about 20 miles from LA and close to Disneyland.

Edited by edstrelow
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Ha i was going to mention that you sold your sigma 404s on ebay as i messaged you about why you were selling your Stax. Anyway that drongo happens to be on headfi offering repair services to any imbalanced pair of Stax Omega 1`s. A buddy of mine tipped me off when he got the same story from some Euro guy saying my ex Sig pros were fake and all he wanted was lowball the price. I would`ve told him straight to get fucked.

 

Funny thing about his SR-Omega repairs.  A few weeks before his ad appeared he asked me the most basic and stupid questions about this stuff so yeah, not a fountain of wisdom that one. Certainly not the first person to offer a service he hasn't got a clue about. 

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I recently bought a Stax SRM-600 Limited Edition amplifier from a guy at that other forum. It just came in today...

 

His listing described the amplifier as a "like-new" SRM-600LE. He was asking $1350 for it.

 

I'd always wanted to hear this amp and so I contacted the guy and bought it. I had recently sold my SRM-323S, as I'm considering going back to dynamic or higher up the electrostatic chain but thought, "what the fuck, man? I can try it for a month and then re sell it pretty easy on Audiogon or Ebay").

 

His ad mentioned NOTHING about modifications, BTW ... 

 

The amp came in today and when I saw a tube slightly at an angle, knowing my OCD would rape my brain until I straightened it, I opened the amp up to do just that and upon removing the lid, this is what I see:

 

...

 

10419976_10153695024089068_5603466569939

 

...

 

"Da fuck are the green things?" Was my first thought ... it certainly didn't look like the internal shots I was familiar with from various online research.

 

Then I started digging around that other forum, searching like a fiend and found some really old posts in that other forum's Stax thread regarding this very same amp, namely, the fellow who I purchased from simply posting an image and saying he liked his new amp (he also quite plainly mentioned it had capacitor modifications).

 

Then I immediately read some following comments, one among them being from Spritzer (who I don't know but definitely respect if only from osmosis and in regards to "things Stax") ... and suffice it to say, I didn't like what his comment revealed: that the person who did the mod probably had no clue what he/she was doing and that the work was ridiculous.

 

Long story short ... I honestly don't feel confident re selling this amplifier as, unlike the guy I bought it from, I most certainly would not be okay with just selling it as an "like new" SRM-600LE ... with no mention of modifications that he most assuredly knew about ... 

 

And so I've quickly PM'd the fellow (who otherwise has been a very stand up guy and has decent trader rep) asking for a reversal of the transaction based on the fact that his description was obviously not accurate (and since he was obviously aware of the modifications, even misleading).

 

Whether he will agree to that is anybodies guess. If he refuses to reverse our transaction, I don't think there is much I can do about it and will certainly be stuck with this "monstrosity" ... I think somebody used that term before to describe the mod work ... LOL ...

 

So if stuck with it ... how difficult would it be for a skilled person to reverse that shit?

 

???

Edited by s1rrah
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I recently bought a Stax SRM-600 Limited Edition amplifier from a guy at that other forum. It just came in today...

 

His listing described the amplifier as a "like-new" SRM-600LE. He was asking $1350 for it.

 

I'd always wanted to hear this amp and so I contacted the guy and bought it. I had recently sold my SRM-323S, as I'm considering going back to dynamic or higher up the electrostatic chain but thought, "what the fuck, man? I can try it for a month and then re sell it pretty easy on Audiogon or Ebay").

 

His ad mentioned NOTHING about modifications, BTW ... 

 

The amp came in today and when I saw a tube slightly at an angle, knowing my OCD would rape my brain until I straightened it, I opened the amp up to do just that and upon removing the lid, this is what I see:

 

...

 

10419976_10153695024089068_5603466569939

 

...

 

"Da fuck are the green things?" Was my first thought ... it certainly didn't look like the internal shots I was familiar with from various online research.

 

Then I started digging around that other forum, searching like a fiend and found some really old posts in that other forum's Stax thread regarding this very same amp, namely, the fellow who I purchased from simply posting an image and saying he liked his new amp (he also quite plainly mentioned it had capacitor modifications).

 

Then I immediately read some following comments, one among them being from Spritzer (who I don't know but definitely respect if only from osmosis and in regards to "things Stax") ... and suffice it to say, I didn't like what his comment revealed: that the person who did the mod probably had no clue what he/she was doing and that the work was ridiculous.

 

Long story short ... I honestly don't feel confident re selling this amplifier as, unlike the guy I bought it from, I most certainly would not be okay with just selling it as an "like new" SRM-600LE ... with no mention of modifications that he most assuredly knew about ... 

 

And so I've quickly PM'd the fellow (who otherwise has been a very stand up guy and has decent trader rep) asking for a reversal of the transaction based on the fact that his description was obviously not accurate (and since he was obviously aware of the modifications, even misleading).

 

Whether he will agree to that is anybodies guess. If he refuses to reverse our transaction, I don't think there is much I can do about it and will certainly be stuck with this "monstrosity" ... I think somebody used that term before to describe the mod work ... LOL ...

 

So if stuck with it ... how difficult would it be for a skilled person to reverse that shit?

 

???

 

http://www.head-fi.org/t/677809/the-stax-thread-iii/570#post_9896950

 

I'm sorry to say that you got fucked over with a mediocre sounding amp (better options available), ripped off at that price and you received something modded by a clueless somebody.

 

You should leave a negative feedback on his head-fi profile if he doesn't sort the "not as described shit" for you. Guess he didn't want to mention mods because somebody would dig up the posted pics of that mess and post it all over his F/S ad.

 

SRM-600LTD you can buy for easily less then a $1k shipped from Yahoo Japan auctions or any other distributor from Japan. Pretty much a T1/T1S but bit more modernised. 

 

With $1.3-1.4k buy a used SRM-007t or 717/727 easily when available. 

 

Usually I'd say if it sounds good, keep it regardless of mods or not. But it seems the seller charged you extra for the modded components used, not to mention it devalues the amp significantly if you decide to sell it off. 

 

Which comes to another point I don't buy anything modded (unless by somebody who is reputable knowledgeable on what they are doing) by the clueless fuckwits on head-fi. 

 

Only clueless dickheads like "pchan" from head-fi would encourage this sort of behaviour (the same idiot who use ramble about 5000 hour burn-in magic with Stax earspeakers being the optimal set in time for ESL headphones, adding Audio Note capacitors to Stax amps and recabling Stax headphones with silver cables in the old Stax thread). 

Edited by DefQon
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https://www.dropbox.com/s/bch1sv5bpgp3gl5/20150216_212647.jpg?dl=0

 

Let me know if the dropbox link doesn't work. Any leads appreciated!

whats the total length, and the thread size. I assume m3?

length of thread, and length of the head, and diameter of the head?

 

should be easy to find a hex screw the same size, then slot it in a mill

 

as far as the srm600 disaster, the green things replaced .1uf caps i think, 

2 in the middle, and 3 along the outside edge. You can buy parts to put

this back to original. And same thing with the doubled resistors that are the

plate loads. (black things, 2 in series) Those caps are on the power supply

lines, and would never change the sound in any way.

 

another clueless idiot. This may have been done by duncan7 who is an 

utter and complete moron.

Edited by kevin gilmore
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