Saturday, October 29, 2016

Silver Elmaformers

This is a new version of the elmaformers which uses a 47 position switch and seamlessly goes from -51.25dB to +5dB in 1.25dB steps.  It is essentially a linear version of the Chapman remote modules.
 It all starts with the weakest link and that is the pesky circuit board.  This isn't your everyday board but one made with .9999 silver and the traces are cut on a CNC milling machine.


The 4 deck 47position Elma switch mounts directly to the board and the wiper contacts are the silver of the board.  I have already run some boards through 20,000 switch rotation cycles without any issues so I am confident in the longevity of the units.


The silver boards are very time consuming to produce and will be reserved for the silver wound units.  For the more pedestrian copper wound units I am getting quotes for the hard gold boards per Elma's spec and will have them in the very near future.

12 comments:

  1. Very cool. Have you worked out a price yet? Any chance that there would be a remote control version?

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  2. Cool. (Wipes drool off chin)...

    Roscoe

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  3. Good to see that you finally got this together.

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  4. Super cool, Slaglemeister! Super cool!

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  5. What is the cost and availability of the unit?

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  6. Well, I guess you hit the ground running after returning from the trip. Good to see you at ETF. Nice work, Dave!

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  7. Speaking of way cool, had dinner with Dave the other night and took possession of the silver autoformers. The pictures don't do them justice. Dave gave me the full rundown on how he made these and the pitfalls along the way that he overcame. To say I am awestruck would be an understatement.

    Will be making a passive pre out of this in the near future. Also have the copper modules from the Intact site, and the hope is to compare the two.

    Stay tuned.

    Cheers, Crazy Bill

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  8. Sorry this took so long Dave.
    Finally have had some time to compare these to my previous passive pre, a PEC carbon pot.

    Since I still haven't started the 2A3 build w/ Dave's iron, I'm feeding the front input of my Decware SE84CS.

    The PEC has been out there awhile, and is highly regarded. Very smooth, organic ( for lack of a better term ), and musical. Never felt a need to go to anything different.

    This baby is, however, playing in a completely different league. It does everything the PEC does but better. And then does more. The detail that this allows through that the PEC doesn't is astonishing. It completely elevates my listening experience.

    While I expected different and a little better, I wasn't prepared for the drastic changes for the better.

    Well done Dave

    Crazy Bill

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