Crap 
I wonder if Mainline’s on sale. That may be too much temptation.
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So it does work on the Mainline. Save $194.85.
Yeah I noticed that 
will have to wait till next year though…I bought some pricey cans.
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It’s officially been 1 month since I received my Bottlehead Crack Speedball. The stain and paint both have settled well and darkened slightly…it looks even better now IMO.
After tons of listening time, I can say without a doubt that my favorite tube combos are the Bendix 6080WB with the Matsushita 12AU7, or the Mullard CV2984 with the Brimar CV4003.
Anybody that owns a Sennheiser HD650 or HD600…the Bottlehead Crack should be a mandatory purchase, lol.
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It is really where the name crack comes from! There’s just a certain magic that happens. Like having a piece of chocolate with a glass of port. Or sharing a bottle of liebfraumilch and a quart of spicy Szechuan beef. Or a good stilton with a schmere of fig jam on a water cracker. Magic combinations that you just can’t mess with, regardless of the price.
This post made me hungry.
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Pizza and beer
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Let me know when you get upgraditis please. Along with some favorite tubes. You had a really solid build and good looking amp made:+1: 
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BTC w/speedball. Where would the unity gain lvl be at for this? Using an Alps Blue Velvet pot.
I had a brainstorm of an idea that I can’t believe I hadn’t thought of before. Will be feeding the BHC SE out from my Freya +. Additional bonus is that I get a remote control volume out of it and don’t have to fiddle with changing switches or cables from the DAC.
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I haven’t seen unity mentioned anywhere - you’d need to ask on the BH forum. I did however used to have the volume on my Crack bypassed when I was using a Saga as a preamp. If you want to do that, I can tell you the resistor values you need to use.
I’d like that just to have as an option. maybe I can even wire it up as something that I can remove and install with spades so I can have the option.
Just looked at my notes and I guess it’s simpler than I remember - if you take the pot out, you need a pair of 100K resistors from input to ground.
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A lot of my guitar work would have pots that had a push pull that may work. Or some, i believe Hamer had them specialy made, had it so when you pushed to 10 there was no wiper and was basically a bypass. Its technically going through the pot still so some say its not a true bypass but it was damn close with still giving you controls.
Thia was all mono guitar work, not sure the options for stereo
I’ll poke around in the BHC forum and see. The do nothing approach is preferable but I do like the idea of removing the pot functionality altogether and just using the preamp.
A small misunderstanding on the finish but the cost of 2 beers and getting to see an old friend will smooth it over. The finish isnt the transparent tinted black i wanted, but now ill keep it more piano. Box and plates are back fromm finishing and powder. The natural binding edge looks great and i feel like i should put an edge on more things or find gold lettering for this before going forward.
The alder soaked up so much sealer, and its the old school oil based laquer above it and some clear. Its thin enough you can see the wood grain through it all.
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Looks good! Btw…I have that same motherboard on my pc. 
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Thank you, the natural binding makes it but is hard to photograph. Its a trick that has been used on very high end instruments for a long time. Apply color, scrape it back, and the natural wood underneath shows its grain and contrasting color. It works well since so many tops are made of bright maple.
The mobo is for the pc to be. Waiting on stock of mostly everything else. I want to do a full custom loop but parts for those are even a few months backordered. Probably will settle on the artic liquid coolers.
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I love this amp. Brought new life to my headphones. My jan sylvania 6080 and rca clear top 12au7 are a great pairing for my darker sounding dt880 with dekoni suede pads and tygr filter config, NDH20, and amiron home. The jan sylvania tube I have brings out the highs a bit more, less warmth, and it really made these headphones sing but with a tiny bit of grain. So nice, so fun. But, my ears feel like they are being stabbed when using stock dt880’s with this combo.
Currently like my Tung-Sol 6080 paired with everything else that isn’t too dark or warm in tuning. Sounds like a nice step up from the GE 6080 tube. The Amiron Homes sound bloated on this tube compared to the jan sylvania.
The tube rolling collection begins now I guess… Have my eyes on an RCA 6AS7G
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Has anyone run the DT 1990 Pro on the Bottlehead Crack? If so, how’d you like the pairing? Wondering about it …
I don’t think ever shared my finished Crack. Personally I think the brushed aluminum looks quite good as is. So if you’re lazy like me, you can just do the wood.
Also does anyone have new recommendations for affordable tubes? I’ve tried a couple different power tubes (Tungsol 7236 and RCA JAN-CRC-6AS7G), but I wasn’t into how they changed the tuning. So right now I’m still using my stock RCA 6080.
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Looks good!! I run Tungsol 12AU7 and Chatham 6AS7G. They are around $20.
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