ggn71
New Member
Hi all,
I just received a beautiful Classic Series 2050 that I bought a couple weeks ago from a Maryland based professional seller who said the unit was working good. Very few details on the unit, whether it has already been restored or left untouched. The tubes appeared to be all original EICO branded, untested though.
These units are pretty rare, especially here in Europe, so I decided to go on and buy it.
Seller's photo
Thanks to the seller and his bulletproof packaging, the unit arrived completely intact.
All tubes are EICO branded, they all tested very strong on my TV-7/U. Westinghouse 7591, Mullard 5AR4, 7247 and 6EU7. Date 1963-64.
With the bottom cover removed, I can see that this unit has probably never been serviced nor restored.
All original caps, resistors, power cord...
All of the resistors values I checked were within specs, as well as small capacitors.
I removed the filter can caps from circuitry to check for capacity and leakage, they all tested very good being within specs by less than 5%.
I also changed the power cord for a 3-wire one and removed the death cap.
With these basic steps achieved and the unit safe to operate, I checked operating voltages against normal values and the results were pretty good. They didn't precisely match the specified operating voltages, but were still pretty close.
Now hooked to a pair of Cabasse Sloop, the Eico is ready for a listening session.
Level at zero to let the thing warm up, no hum can be heard. From time to time I can hear a faint static noise in both speakers. Once warmed up, I tried a few vinyls and digital music via aux input.
To be honest, as is, the Eico is far from sounding as good as my fisher 400, nor my Tronola modded ST-70.
It is less detailed, lacks bass and sounds somewhat muffled.
From the very little information available I've read about the 2050, I know that it is very similar to the ST-40 and that both are very nice sounding amplifiers.
What do you guys think I should do to get the best sounding experience out of the 2050?
Change PECs for discrete components?
Which values, per 2050 schematic or would ST-40 values be a better choice?
2050:
ST-40:
Would it be also a good idea to change the biasing from cathode bias to EFB? How?
Any inputs from you guys would be greatly appreciated.
I just received a beautiful Classic Series 2050 that I bought a couple weeks ago from a Maryland based professional seller who said the unit was working good. Very few details on the unit, whether it has already been restored or left untouched. The tubes appeared to be all original EICO branded, untested though.
These units are pretty rare, especially here in Europe, so I decided to go on and buy it.
Seller's photo
Thanks to the seller and his bulletproof packaging, the unit arrived completely intact.
All tubes are EICO branded, they all tested very strong on my TV-7/U. Westinghouse 7591, Mullard 5AR4, 7247 and 6EU7. Date 1963-64.
With the bottom cover removed, I can see that this unit has probably never been serviced nor restored.
All original caps, resistors, power cord...
All of the resistors values I checked were within specs, as well as small capacitors.
I removed the filter can caps from circuitry to check for capacity and leakage, they all tested very good being within specs by less than 5%.
I also changed the power cord for a 3-wire one and removed the death cap.
With these basic steps achieved and the unit safe to operate, I checked operating voltages against normal values and the results were pretty good. They didn't precisely match the specified operating voltages, but were still pretty close.
Now hooked to a pair of Cabasse Sloop, the Eico is ready for a listening session.
Level at zero to let the thing warm up, no hum can be heard. From time to time I can hear a faint static noise in both speakers. Once warmed up, I tried a few vinyls and digital music via aux input.
To be honest, as is, the Eico is far from sounding as good as my fisher 400, nor my Tronola modded ST-70.
It is less detailed, lacks bass and sounds somewhat muffled.
From the very little information available I've read about the 2050, I know that it is very similar to the ST-40 and that both are very nice sounding amplifiers.
What do you guys think I should do to get the best sounding experience out of the 2050?
Change PECs for discrete components?
Which values, per 2050 schematic or would ST-40 values be a better choice?
2050:
ST-40:
Would it be also a good idea to change the biasing from cathode bias to EFB? How?
Any inputs from you guys would be greatly appreciated.