Restoring Vintage Stereo Gear

  • Thread starter Thread starter getuhgrip
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getuhgrip

getuhgrip

Bring Back Transfat!
Santa can be a really cool dude when he puts his mind to it!
Sometimes his mind shows it's age, though.
I think this year he musta found my Xmas list from '75 when I was in high school and dreaming of a serious stereo system.
Ok, so he's 'bout 30 years late, but hey......I'm not gonna complain.

I guess Santa's also got some strong connections over at ebay too, cause all this stuff started showing up from all over the place. The first package to arrive was a Yamaha CR-1040 receiver. Not a major power-monster, but a respectable and attractive piece. Gonna need to re-string the tuning dial. The string is there but appears to have been cut. Also needs some lamps that light the tuning and VU meters. All controls are a bit scratchy, so I guess I'm gonna need to do some cleaning.

The next delivery contained a Marantz 6300 turntable. I really wanted a Garrard Zero 100, but the 6300 is a more feature-packed choice. The strobe lamp is burned out. Once I get the little bugger outta there maybe I can find a replacement. I need to review what cartridges are still available that won't destroy my LPs. Motor seems to waver a bit. Don't know if it's a sealed unit or something more serviceable. We'll see.

Then two heavy boxes hit the door. Holy-moly! Bose 901 Series lV speakers!!! No stands or equalizer, but who cares! All 18 of those little 4" drivers are gonna have to be re-foamed, so I bought a kit and will make this one of my winter projects. The cabinets and grills are mint, but I might see about having the grills dry cleaned.

Ol' St. Nick didn't stop there. The week before Xmas he dropped off a Sony TCK-7II cassette deck and a Fisher ER-8125! How many of you old geezers know what the ER-8125 is?

The sony deck needs lamps for the VU meters and just a general cleaning. Here's irony for you.....the Fisher "mystery machine" is the only thing that everything works on! Lights, motor all perfect!

Anyway, I have some questions about servicing all this stuff:

What's a good source for finding all these little lamps?

What's a good brand of electronics cleaner for rotary knobs?

Is the tuning "string" a special material when looking for a replacement?

Anybody familiar with the 6300's motor or strobe lamp?

What's a good "medium quality" phono cartridge these days?

Finally, any tips on re-foaming these speakers would helpful.


I'm having a blast finding sealed LPs on ebay. Most of the collection I had as a kid is still available at reasonable prices, but I've got to get this turntable tuned up before I play any of them.

Thanks in advance for your help, folks.

Rick :cool:
 
Hey Rick....
Congrats on the retro gear scores dude....

I gotta tell ya...
back in 1981...I bout a pair of BOSE 901 series 4 speakers....
they came with a box called an equalizer but, in reality it was some kind of power/signal interface.....
I am not sure if this is true or not, but I remember reading in the manual that if you used the speakers with out this "box" with any amp other than a BOSE amp (which supposedly had this thing already built in to them...) that it could damage either the speakers or the amp............or both......

those speakers are long gone man....
pawn shop in the South End of town....
damn...I wish I still had them....they were awesome....
set up the right way.....it could almost sound like the musicians were right there in front of you...and to the left...and to the right....and back a bit...nice....

The BOSE company is still in Framingham Massachusetts....
They might have something on their shelves that will work for you man...

Good to see you on the boards man,
Joe
 
Congrats on the vintage gear for Christmas!

Now on to some of your questions.
What's a good brand of electronics cleaner for rotary knobs?
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I use a product from Caig Laboratories, www.caig.com
It's called De-oXit and it works like a charm at cleaning all types of switches, contacts, jacks and rotary pots quite nicely. Just spray a bit in, work the pot back and forth a few times and in most cases, it good as new.

Is the tuning "string" a special material when looking for a replacement?
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From what I have seen of it, it would appear to be a specialized piece of rope that has the right grip factor as well as it not stretching too easily compared to household string.

If you can find the right stuff without too much of a hassle, I would seek it out. Otherwise, try it the cheaper way and hope it holds with regular string.

What's a good "medium quality" phono cartridge these days?
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Because of the DJ market still using vinyl, Stanton is about the most readily available cartridge out there these days with Shure running a close second in availability. I would check stores or websites that cater to the DJ market to find them.

The Stanton 680EL is a radio and DJ standard just like the Shure SM57 & 58 microphones are to the PA and recording world.
The 680 can usually be purchased in a kit which has the cartridge and a spare needle included for around 100 bucks or less.


Finally, any tips on re-foaming these speakers would helpful.
Click to expand...
Joro was on the right track about contacting Bose for the re-coning kits that you will need for those 4" drivers.

Generally, a re-coning kit will have the entire cone assembly including the voice coil and support spider that gets glued to the top of the magnet sandwich.

You will need a spacer guide that gets inserted into the magnet so that the voice coil doesn't rub while you are inserting and re-gluing the kit in place.

After the glue is set, you remove the metal guide by pulling it out and then gluing on the dust cap to the center of the cone.

It's a bit of a messy job and a tedious one with so many drivers to change.

A word or two about the 901 eq that you don't have;

Get it!

Without that equalizer, the speakers will sound like crap.

The Bose 901's, because of their use of small, supposedly full range speakers which in fact are far from flat or full range, depend enormously on that eq to reshape their specific design short comings and this eq is correcting around 4 or 5 curve response problems in the speaker.

You might be able to get by without it if you have a spare 1/3 octave eq to assign to the 901's through a tape loop on the amp but, life would be easier for you if you score the eq somewhere.

If you find one, make sure it is from the correct series of 901's as they have been through no less then 6 versions since their introduction to the market in the late 60's.

Good luck and have fun getting your vintage stuff back up and running!

Cheers! :)
 
Hey Joe, Ghost.....I noticed the same warning is printed on the bottoms of the speakers about not running them without the equalizer. I'm picturing Homer Simpson whining sarcastically, "Oh yeah, Mr. Bose Super Speaker Company doesn't their let speakers work without their Super Special Speaker equalizer thing! Doh!" :D

Guess I'll have to hunt one down.

The cones look to be in pretty good shape. I think replacing the surrounds ought to do the trick. Ever heard of that stuff called "wet look" for speaker cones? I wonder if this stuff is a good idea. If not, what would be a safe way to treat speaker cone paper so as to get a little more life out of them?

I'll probly look for someone in the area to re-string and calibrate the tuner.

Thanks for the link Billy, I'll check it out.

Thanks guys. :cool:
 
I am not sure if you can replace just the "surrounds" as you call them. I think the technical term for them is the "suspensions".;)

Check with Bose to see if they sell just that part and the glues needed to do the repair. Odds are, it is only available as a kit or "re-conning Kit" which has the suspensions already attached to the paper cones and voice-coil as one pre-fab'ed assembly.

As for treating the paper cones, your own statement answered your question. You said the paper is still in good shape. Therefore, no treatment of the paper is needed unless you are going to subject the speakers to some wild humidity and temperature extremes.

Cheers! :)
 
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