Projects: what are you all working on?

stangman67 · December 2023

Figured we could get a “What are you working on thread” going. Whether it’s a house project, audio related, or something else, post it up!

I’m working on building a mini bike, completely not practical but I’m having a blast modding it and building the engine. It’s like working on the mustangs but so much cheaper! After this I’m moving on to the 69 Mach to get it back on the road after an engine and transmission rebuild

Started as this

Few progress pics in no particular order

xschop · December 2023

Love the build. Maybe you can take it for a spin? ...I'm Finishing up the integrated dial on my minimalist amp case design. Agree, ALOT cheaper than building a 450hp street rocket.

Toolfan66 · December 2023

Super cool, I really don’t have a project at the moment, the wife wants me to build a new stand/bed thing for the cat, so that may be the next one, but definitely not as cool as that..

bcwsrt · December 2023

Last year was the Year of the Projects for me, so nothing to talk about at the moment. But, great thread topic and I look forward to everyone else's reports.

Is that a '69 Mach 1 under the car cover, though?! I'm not seeing fastback lines.

stangman67 · December 2023

bcwsrt wrote: »

Last year was the Year of the Projects for me, so nothing to talk about at the moment. But, great thread topic and I look forward to everyone else's reports.

Is that a '69 Mach 1 under the car cover, though?! I'm not seeing fastback lines.

Under the cover you can see in that photo is my 67 coupe. On the other side of the garage is the 69 Mach 1!

bcwsrt · December 2023

Love it! Thanks for taking the covers off and letting us see 'em! 😉👍

stangman67 · December 2023

xschop wrote: »

Love the build. Maybe you can take it for a spin? ...I'm Finishing up the integrated dial on my minimalist amp case design. Agree, ALOT cheaper than building a 450hp street rocket.

Been following your build. You are a magician, wish I had access to the tools you have and the knowledge to make the kinds of stuff you do with them!

ChrisD06 · December 2023

I'm currently working on designing a new TV stand made out of 1" MDF boards all around. It'll be custom made to all of my A/V gear and will have built-in shielded cable management conduits for running my A/V cables, along with the bottom of it having two 16-outlet surge protector bars mounted to it.

It's gonna be expensive and I'll need to take a lot of time to learn some basic carpentry. I'll probably veneer and stain it. Will be sure to use lots of paper towel.

Right now it's just like 5 pen sketches on graph paper, and it'll probably stay in the design stage for like a year until I can save up for it. I've stopped my spending mostly until July, when I go to the Netherlands for 2 weeks. After that I'll treat myself to some nice new things. Been working extra to fund my shenanigans.

honestaquarian · December 2023

I'm taking my sweet time swapping out my Onkyo PR-SC5509 pre/pro/tuner for a Marantz AV-8805a pre/pro/tuner. Plus a Sony XDR-F1HD HDRadio tuner.

honestaquarian · December 2023

honestaquarian · December 2023

Can you say “Rats nest” of wires boys and girls??
I’m going from 8.4 to 6.4.2

honestaquarian · December 2023

stangman67 · December 2023

That is a lot of wires! Gotta be not fun keeping everything straight!

stangman67 · December 2023

I had a 5509 back in the 2014 timeframe. Wasn’t my favorite piece of equipment sound wise, I always found Marantz warmer sound lended itself better to music reproduction. Beast of a unit for dedicated HT though.

honestaquarian · December 2023

@stangman67 The 5509 in it’s original form was extremely detailed. Excellent bass as well.
Howevah
The mids and highs were in your face, bright, strident and glassy as hell. I had it upgraded by the Upgrade Company and it transformed the sound! [* it also was the fuel for a whole lot of controversy on this forum and still causes certain individuals to swoop in every time I mention the Upgrade Company and start their foolishness all over again to this day (and this was over a decade ago)let the snark begin boys and girls*]
The detail remained along with the great bass.
Gone were the brassy, glassy, bright, forward mids and highs!

honestaquarian · December 2023

I have enjoyed that pre/pro for many years, but the left rear channel has gone out. Plus it’s pre Dolby Atmos/DTS X. So time for a change.

pitdogg2 · January 1

honestaquarian wrote: »

I'm taking my sweet time swapping out my Onkyo PR-SC5509 pre/pro/tuner for a Marantz AV-8805a pre/pro/tuner. Plus a Sony XDR-F1HD HDRadio tuner.

Excellent little tuner, I still kick myself in the bottom for not buying one when Best Buy closed them out at $80!

honestaquarian · January 1

@pitdogg2 You can still get them on eBay. Butcha gotta be careful what you get. These tuners are KNOWN to run extremely hot. Which of course shortens their lifespan.
Check this guy out. He upgrades them and installs cooling for them. I put myself on his waiting list to get mine done.
https://www.xdrguy.com/tips-for-ebay-buyers.html

pitdogg2 · January 1

honestaquarian wrote: »

@pitdogg2 You can still get them on eBay. Butcha gotta be careful what you get. These tuners are KNOWN to run extremely hot. Which of course shortens their lifespan.
Check this guy out. He upgrades them and installs cooling for them. I put myself on his waiting list to get mine done.
https://www.xdrguy.com/tips-for-ebay-buyers.html

Yep we at the fmtuner group had many threads for upgrading and such.

honestaquarian · January 1

I looked for quite a while (*Meaning years*) on and off before I came across one that was NOS-New Old Stock-and pulled the trigger. This coincidentally happened just as I had put a deposit on the Marantz.

stangman67 · January 9

Made a bit more progress on the mini steed. It runs, not great but it runs. Need to rejet the carb, sounds like a little powerhouse

https://youtube.com/shorts/PA5xJ_q_aT8?si=IDc4a5ZyQJKqrNJm

honestaquarian · January 25

I finally pulled it out of the box 📦
It’s definitely smaller than the Onkyo.
Now to deal with the rats nest of wires. I’m going to do the Dolby Atmos/DTS X-which means I can no longer use the multi channel analog outs from the Oppo. I already had the HDMI cable in place. Who knows. I may or may not be selling some extra MIT cables here.

pitdogg2 · January 25

Why can't you use the analog outputs on your music side, SACD DVD-audio? The oppo 205 has one whole saber dac for just that.

honestaquarian · January 25

@pitdogg2
Ivan The Oppo has an excellent DAC yes.

Howevah

It only has a back surround output. If I want to take advantage of the Dolby Atmos/DTS X capabilities of the Marantz, I cannot use the Oppo's DAC. I MUST run HDMI and disconnect the RCA analog outputs from the Oppo UDP-205. Once they are connected the Oppo automatically mutes the HDMI audio output. I found that out a few years ago when I hooked up the analog outs and tried to use the Onkyo's Dolby Pro Logic IIz processing and I couldn't access it. I contacted Oppo and they told me that the HDMI audio out was now disconnected because I was using the analog outputs. Dolby Pro Logic IIz (*AKA-Dolby Height*) is the predecessor to Dolby Atmos and isn't discreet object based like Dolby Atmos/DTS X/Auro 3D are. I am already set up with the height speakers in place and will continue to use them.

Just gotta use the HDMI now.

Since the Oppo UDP-205 has Jitter reduction circuitry for the HDMI audio out (*one of the reasons why I decided to buy it instead of the UDP-203*) then I will hopefully still have a good experience sound-wise.

Audio/music-wise I still plan on using the XLR outputs for the stereo DVD-A, SACD and MQA CD's.
I'm curious to see how the system will sound with the TIDAL and Qobuz. I have a long USB-B cable running from my computer in the bedroom to the input on the Oppo to decode MQA coming from Tidal. Too bad they are phasing it out. It's still available for now though. I use Audirvana from my Desktop computer to stream Tidal and M connect lite from my phone to stream Qobuz and Tidal.

pitdogg2 · January 25

Gotcha !

honestaquarian · January 25

Just doing initial testing with the HDMI. My network sees it and the remote app does as well.
Okay done for now.
More later as I wade through all of the cabling.

pitdogg2 · January 25

Geesh I hope you're not stuffing that beast back into that hole, you'll suffocate that poor thing.

honestaquarian · January 25

@pitdogg2 It has been many years since I had a preamp in that rack. As a matter of fact it was my very first surround preamp/processor. It was a Parasound AVC-2500.

I loved that unit. It had some upgrade paths that you could do yourself or have the dealer do them. One of them you had to send it back to Parasound to get. That was the High Definition video upgrade (I didn't do that one) Obviously this preamp was Pre HDMI. I got it used and HDMI 1.0 had just appeared when I had it. It was a helluva preamp though. I did the back channel surround upgrade for Dolby EX and DTS-ES. It was an external box that also allowed you to add a second subwoofer to your rear channels. That is how I started down the path to multiple subs.
There was also a card you could insert into the unit. I can't recall what that was for. Something about the volume control. If anyone had this unit and did that upgrade maybe you can remember.
ANYWAY after this one I got an Integra DTC-9.8 along with Oppo's first universal DVD player that had HDMI. They allowed you to play SACD over the HDMI and the Integra would decode it. That one was too big for the rack and so it went on the floor in front and I put my turntable on top of it. Every pre/pro that I have had since then (and they were all Integra or Onkyo) has been on the floor in front of the rack, because they were too big to go in the rack.

This Marantz might just fit in the rack (or not) but I am not going that route.
You are absolutely right Ivan AND tryna run all them cables again to another place in the back of the rack is suicide!!

honestaquarian · January 25

I discovered a VERY interesting feature on the Marantz when I was going through the initial setup menu. For the Dolby Atmos/DTS X/Auro 3D height speakers, it actually asks you if they are installed in the ceiling or high up on the wall near the ceiling (like you were supposed to do with Dolby Pro Ligic IIz-AKA-Dolby Height) or the modules that go on top of your left and right stereo speakers. Like the Polk L900's. I wonder if there is a difference in the processing depending on which one you have/choose. I have the ones high up on the walls that I put there for my Dolby pro Logic IIz setup with my Onkyo pre/pro.
Also it asks you for each channel if you are using the XLR outs or the RCA outs. I have never seen this before on any other preamp/processor that I've owned.
Because I have three different amps I am using both. So I found this very interesting.

honestaquarian · January 26

pitdogg2 wrote: »

honestaquarian wrote: »

@pitdogg2 You can still get them on eBay. Butcha gotta be careful what you get. These tuners are KNOWN to run extremely hot. Which of course shortens their lifespan.
Check this guy out. He upgrades them and installs cooling for them. I put myself on his waiting list to get mine done.
https://www.xdrguy.com/tips-for-ebay-buyers.html

Yep we at the fmtuner group had many threads for upgrading and such.

@pitdogg2 Just curious.What are your thoughts on AM stereo? I know it still exists even in the world of HDRadio. I also know that Sangean's HDT-1X HDRadio tuner has an AM stereo tuner that they do not advertise. What I don't know is how many stations are still broadcasting AM stereo and where. I was thinking about getting one for the bedroom system when I eventually make some changes there.
I owned a Carver TX-11a years ago (EXCELLENT tuner) Before that I had an AMC Concord (remember American Motors??) that I had installed a digital tuner that I had gotten out of an AMC Eagle that had AM stereo capability. It has been a very long time since I have come across AM stereo though.

pitdogg2 · January 26

AM stereo?, geesh I must be way out of the loop on that one.

Projects: what are you all working on?

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