Gifted - The Ultimate Barn Find - McIntosh 240 and an MX110

Barn Find - McIntosh 240

This summer a friend purchased a new home.  It was quite a nice home, large with a barn in the back yard.  We payed the family a visit one summer day to help them move around a few things and help out as much with the move as possible.

While he was conducting a tour of the barn, I see these old electronic "things" on the shelf up high under bird droppings, nest materials and other types of "dirt".  So we walk over and take a look and find a McIntosh 240 Amplifier and a McIntosh MX110 FM receiver/Preamp.  He asked me what I thought they were worth, and I threw out a number that was about 1/4 of what they would be worth clean and working as I really had no idea how much they were worth.  (He called me later on to let me know what he had found them to be worth, I was quite surprised and embarrassed!)  He offered them to me and I offered him money if he would take it.  He said no and I went about loading them onto my vehicle.  

It took hours to clean each of them.  I removed the tubes one at a time and cleaned around them trying to not rub off the tube identification letters that are imprinted on the chrome of the chassis.  It took a very long time as there was bird poop and all kinds of dirt caked on everything.  The tubes were covered with a mess too.  I would estimate a good 12 hours of cleaning for the 240.

Look at how dirty the controls are.

Top view, very dirty indeed!

 Filthy!

 Look at that contrast from the dirt to the chrome!

 Looking quite a bit cleaner now after hours of work!

Fortunately I have a great friend who agreed to help me restore this amplifier to life.  He did tons of research to find out exactly what we needed to restore it properly.  We replaced just about everything electrically inside that we could.  Most of the tubes needed replacing, it has the original McIntosh tubes still in there, but they all tested bad.  I just happened to have some Russian 6L6GC's that I put in there.  I had to purchase all the pre-amplifier tubes as they all tested bad.

The electronic work was on a cool day in the fall.  We worked on it for around 8 or 9 hours, lunch included, before it was done.  I found that I had neglected to receive or order one of the preamp tubes so we were unable to test it that day. He advised it was likely to have worked without all the components replaced and was very confident that it would work just fine when turned on, if it worked at all. 

About a week later I received the tube that I needed to complete the restoration.  I was a bit on the scared side as I hooked it up to some small speakers I have and a spare preamp to test.  I decided since Brian Wilson mixed one or more of the famous Beach Boys albums on a 240, that I would play Good Vibrations as the first tune played by this amp,  I was pretty stoked as I turned it up and sound came from the speakers.  I let it play for a while watching for smoke and checking for anything going on with a flashlight close in case it blew a fuse.  After about 10 minutes or so I disconnected it from the small speakers and my spare preamp and connected it to the main system, the main speakers and the McIntosh C27 preamp that is the control center for my main system.

I turned on the preamp, then the amp and sound came from my main speakers.  It was pretty glorious.  Unfortunately somewhere along the way I blew out my tweeter on my Paradigm speakers, probably while changing connections while forgetting to turn the volume down.  Whatever it was, that puppy is silent, and they are hard to find - at least so far,  Ah well, first speaker I have blown in over 30 years, so I was overdue for a brain fart resulting in cash outlay.  

I have now probably passed the break in period and the sound is pretty terrific!  I am surprised at how awesome it sounds, and the staging and imaging are pretty impressive!  It gets hot and it is pretty cool looking at the tubes glowing, I run it without the cage on to facilitate cooling, and plus it looks pretty cool!

Due to the overall complexity of the MX110, I will be saving for quite some time to send it out to have it refurbished as there is allot going on there with the FM Tuner and a tube Preamp.  So in a couple years I should have saved enough cabbage and will be reporting on that.

That is pretty much it, listen often, reduce that stress.  Music is a big help!

Peace Out!

Jeff

Heat Generated During LP Playback - Does it matter?

I read something a while back and it had been bouncing around in my head for quite some time.  The subject was heat generated during playback on the record surface and the stylus could damage LP grooves if a record is played more than once a day.  A blog post I read asserted that this person would not ever play an LP a second time within 24 hours.  The theory put forth was that the vinyl was heated by the stylus and the stylus was also hot and it would act as a hot knife through butter, so to speak, if the LP was played back too soon and both surfaces were still hot.   It could cause undo damage to our records and promote premature record wear. 

I have some thoughts on this.  First off, I have verified that the record, indeed is warm after playing.  I have also verified that the stylus is also warm after playing.  My thoughts are this theory may have some credibility.  I have even gone so far as to think that possibly even using the stylus on a second LP, or even a second side may have negative effects on the grooves of a vinyl record. 

If anyone has any sophisticated heat measuring devices and can determine the temperature of the vinyl surface and the temperature of the stylus after playback, we may be able to calculate whether this is an actual risk to the longevity of our precious record collections.

For now, I am not playing the same LP side twice within 24 hours.  I am also changing the stylus out on my turntable after each LP.  I am considering in the future playing a single side with each stylus.  I know this is impractical for most people, I am fortunate to have a turntable that allows for switching out and re-balancing of head shells pretty darn easy.

I would be appreciative of any opinions out there, ranging from I am full of shit to full agreement.  I am very careful with my collection and record wear is never welcome in my house!!!  If I am full of shit, I am full of shit erring toward the lofty goal of minimal record wear.


What do you think?


Listening keeps the day just a little bit better.

Jeff