Nikko TOTL NR-1415 takes it all off after restore!

Nikko TOTL NR-1415 takes it all off after restore! 175wpc

Hi All, I have never started a thread before, but then I didn’t think I have had something, anyone might be interested in. So here goes, several months ago I picked up a Nikko NR-1415 in a package deal, at the time one channel (left) was not working, but with the encouragement of several people here, I began to restore it myself. Unfortunately on one very calm quite winters night while working my way through service manual test points (I have one if someone needs one by the way) … one very startlingly loud phone ring and a slipped probe and poof … I needed to find someone to bail me out of the problem I just created. In Burton Michigan (a suburb of Flint) my white knight appeared ok not a white knight, but a white haired Electronics tech by the name of Mark Horsman, a veteran of a long life time of Electronic Tech work. And with what I would call, one of the most meticulous workshops I have ever seen (a precursor of the work he did for me as well) was recommended to me by a friend who had a Carver cube and David Halfer amp repaired with great results and fair pricing. I got more than I asked for, and you are about to see what.

He took time to explain to me and point out each and every change he had done, to explain to me the things he had seen, on his work benches he had a Pioneer SX-850, a Kenwood KR-9600 and had recently worked on the SX-1980 and an old McIntosh .. he had them all open and was generous to compare and contrast between the items.
Note: one of the pictures has blue numbers all over it, those blue numbers correspond to the item numbers below so you could better see the Mods and upgrades (i added a MUCH larger version in post #8 http://www.audiokarma.org/forums/showpost.php?p=6636306&postcount=8 and changed the hard to read blue numbers with Red on a white background )

Things done to this Nikko NR-1415 Receiver

1. Replaced bad protection circuit relay, this was also modified he modified the circuit because the 4 contacts in the relay were divided up as follows, one for red protection LED indicator, one for Green protection LED indicator, one for left channel, one for right channel. The higher currents running through the amplifier circuits had been a bit much for for the 2 contacts so he adjusted the transistor (beefed it up) to support the triggering of 2 relays, added a very small relay to control the LEDS and used the large relay to have 2 contacts for the left and 2 for the right doubling the capacity
2. Replaced the burnt t03 outputs of the left channel
3. Replaced the 20 gauge wire that ran between power caps and the various circuits and those (I believe its 14 gauge high strand count)
4. Replaced the grounding bridge on the power caps and rectifier bridge with 14 gauge from 20 guage
5. Replaced the smaller wire feeding the amplifier AND the output wires from the amplifier with Analysis Oval wire .. I forget which specifically but a very thick braided copper wire really opening up the paths where higher currents run and out to the speaker connection terminals including the run up to the speaker selector switch (for A channel only) so the full output path for speakers A is built on Analysis Oval.
6. Validated values for all caps replaced anything that was not very healthy and beefed up or added high temperature higher voltage where he could see that caps had heat sources near by or where the cap exhibited signs of having heated up
7. Did the same as 6 for diodes and transistors .. and replaced all oxidized (black leg transistors and diodes weather they were in spec or not)
8. Cleaned all the components he could.. (it was very clean to start)
9. Took off the glass on the front and cleaned it inside and out and where there was a bit of original roughness on the glass edged buffed it a bit to reduce a small wave of prism I could hardly see when he pointed it out
10. Used an aluminum polish/deoxidizer on the face carefully avoiding the lettering and then waxed the entire face to seal in the nice bright face
11. Adjusted all values to spec as per the service manual

The saying if you want something done right you have to do it yourself.. not true here .. I am obviously a proud Nikko NR-1415 daddy today but on my very very best days, I would have came up short of the work he did.

I am especially greatful for the time he took to walk me through some of the other vintage gear he was working on and to educate. Gotta love a craftsman who is meticulous AND so willing to share his knowlege as he walks you through. He is proud of his work and really adopted my vintage receiver as his own, its pretty cool when the tech is as excited about the gear as you are!

Hope you all enjoy the pix!!!! and sorry I was soooo long winded.. just excited I guess .. .i will post more close ups of the guts in my reply the first picture has the number codes to the comments above

I had forgot to mention: the receiver had been worked on previously with the original owner during that repair a few years ago the main power caps were replaced,

More of the pics

As promised

Pic ending in
13_900 and 14_900 are the left and right channel amps
15_900 is the tuner section
16_900 is the full Ventral View
12_900 is the full Dorsal View
18_900 Ventral lateral over i think, right channel amp and power supply

More Face pics

19_900 is the Protection Circuit

I love it..... Really, I do love it.
You are one lucky guy to have such a fine beast. Enjoy and thanks for the pics.

Bucky thanks . your 1090 is a really good looking beefy receiver too! I am really happy with how low the sound floor is on this .. on classical pieces and on some digital media it is almost wisper silence inches from the speakers between tracks and such .. .. I am impressed for sure with what i have heard so far ..

I found the 1415 to be extremely classy, very well composed, and having the balls to back up what ever was thrown at it. It was no sweat for the 1415 to sound authoritative and in control of any type of music I wanted to play. But why am I telling you what I was hearing, tell us what you think.

I am in envy of you and want to have another one.
Don't take this thing for granted. It is a gift.
Enjoy.

Bucky, the face plate is a pretty deeply smoked glass on these .. I am thinking i am going to cut and drill a couple new glass face plates .. a clear glass for sure and maybe a couple different colors .. then I can change up the look. The glass cover over the dial and lights is held on by 4 allen screws and the tuner knob ... could reallychange up the look (as long as i keep the original safe of course)

I redid the guide picture with easier to read ref numbers

As some of your PM's pointed out LOL the light blue on black reference numbers AND the small size of the 900 x 640 max resolution of a .jpg file made it too dang hard to actually see anything .. Sooo by request lol I posted the full size picture and replaced the blue modification reference numbers with a white box with red number. Again I tried to place the number right over the modification ... see the attached PDF file it is clear enough to read the numbers on the boards and numbers on caps ;-) that should make things a bit more clear


Zoom to 200 or 300 percent on the PDF file and you can read the boards clearly. if someone has a need I have the Service Manual and schematics etc as well in PDF

Bucky Badger said:

It was no sweat for the 1415 to sound authoritative and in control of any type of music I wanted to play. But why am I telling you what I was hearing, tell us what you think.

I am in envy of you and want to have another one.
Don't take this thing for granted. It is a gift.
Enjoy.

Click to expand...

I sure will i have only done some small listening at this point i wanted to give it a good time to burn in i am doing some low level listening right now.. just used some Howards Feed and Wax on the exterior it buffed out beautifully!

Have you looked at some of the mods? I suspect your reciever will need some of the same .. especially the 20 gauge wire being exchanged for high strand 14 or 12 gauge and the amplified section (speaker selector and to the speaker terminals) that can really make a difference. and again if you have the same smaller wire in the power supply circuit it may might help you out a bit Yours was authoritative ;-) at 175wpc and the large to3's capable installed capable of well over 200 a piece there is some headroom

PS i forgot to mention Holy Cats i have a NO antenna on this thing and i get stations clear as a bell from all over .. I suspect that maybe back in the 70's and 80's the hay day of FM that maybe they put a lot more love and care into tuner sections back then. The new equipment i have seems to get nothing not a single station without an antenna ... ZERO

:tresbon: Poor lil thing took all its clothing off and no love ;-)

Well FM was a big deal back then and the receiver wars weren't just about power output.

Oh for sure FM was the shizzel back then ... last night i got paged and turned the thing on and I was listening to an FM station from CLEVELAND in DETROT it was fuzzy but CLEVELAND !!! I would have assumed curve of the earth would have been too much but there was just enough shooting across the lake.. must have been on one heck of a hill they put that tower on! Its not that far straight line distance over the lake but .. still pretty cool! I have several systems including 2 new AV systems a Denon and a Yamaha AV receivers both new enough to have HDMI, they can’t even pick up Detroit stations without at least a piece of sire plugged in. and that’s all I was using for an antennae last night,

Another listening note: I plugged in a decent Sony CD player and the amp is whisper silent at the half volume mark on the silent pieces of some of the tracks I was listening to. I know before the restoration I had one channel working and there was a noticeable hiss at almost any volume, and the FM tuner seemed to bleed through, amazing what a decent cleaning and some new caps will do, the sound floor is as low as my Carver and NAD power amps in my main system!

Thanks!!!

mhardy6647 Thanks! This is way cool is that something you had and scanned! .. very cool

Lots of weirds stuff in my "collection"

Enjoying my 1415 as we speak. I'll keep this thread in mine should the need to repair it ever arise.

@Olds hit me up with an email and i will send you a copy of the service manual for that NR-1415

michigannick said:

mhardy6647 Thanks! This is way cool is that something you had and scanned! .. very cool

Click to expand...

Yep very cool, very good prices for back then too!

I agree the price was pretty good for back then .. (although still pretty expensive
http://data.bls.gov/cgi-bin/cpicalc.pl?cost1=830&year1=1978&year2=2013

830 back then yeilds like $2,955.49 today ....good thing electronics get cheaper as time goes on, I would bet if there was a market for it they could build something identical or pretty close for a grand today or less ...

What i find weird are those price points .. kind of weird not solid price points like 150, 199, etc the MSRP prices in that ad are $, $220, $270, $310, $830 just seems weird to me

Good Bones - needs work! NR 1415 for me

Nick, Posting this here because your write up has already been great help and I just started to pull my project 1415 apart.

I pulled a 1415 off ebay last week, and it is here... The shop that posted it on ebay did some work that undermines the power. Along with repairing the repairs, a general upgrade will bring it along nicely.
The case and front are in very good shape, maybe 8/10. Interior needs a good clean and some investigation, but its still very manageable.

Again, thanks for your help so far, I'll follow up with some pics etc. at a later date.
Sasklite