20 years! 20 years since Steve organised the first meet up in the function room at Eggborough power station, Eggfest. The power station closed in 2018, and demolition concluded in 2022; Steve has suggested this might be the last meet up he organises too. This would be very sad but all good things come to an end eventually. But hopefully not for a while yet though.
Since the last meet up two years ago Owston had changed hands, or maybe just name, to Dario's. This is a bit of a blast from the past - Dario's was an Italian ristorante in town maybe 30 years ago. The lunch buffet today unsurprisingly enough was pizza, and decent thin crust Italiano pizza it was.
After the customary catch up with old friends and new Steve gave his customary welcome, and hinted this might not be the last. Sadly there were far too many missing this time, so let's hope there is another.
First away was the double act of Nigel and Greg who had made the long journey from the south west.
Nigel had brought an interesting Edwards Audio turntable with unipivot arm and £35 (I think Nigel said) MM cartridge. WD Pre III and Phono III, and WAD 2A3 PP amp.
Greg's WAD KLS3 speakers. These originally held the gold Audax tweeter that had a habit of deflating. They've been replaced with Seas Millenium tweeters.
Next was Chris, who had to leave early for a professional job. Here he and Brian were scientifically setting up the satellite speakers.
The tiny Genelec satellites went surprisingly low. Each has two amplifiers inside with various configurations available externally.
I was next up. Funnily enough no photo by me of me introducing the system. I only brought a DAC and amp, Steve had graciously allowed me to use his speakers. On arrival I plugged in and had an initial test to make sure it worked, which it did but sounded pretty poor. Fortunately a good warm up period transformed the sound. Phew!
Soekris dam1021 R2R DAC and a 45SE amp. Source was my phone into a JL Sounds I2SoverUSB card in the DAC allowing high res.
The amp is a Gordon Rankin Bugle, made famous by Sound Practices back in the 1990s. After more recent correspondence with Gordon I changed the two dual LC HV power supplies to two dual LCLC supplies which Gordon strongly recommended.
Steve was next, starting with his MoFo amp.
The MoFo is the amp on the left. The driver stage are 1930s ACHL triodes (I think Steve said) IT coupled to the MoFo.
The speakers are a hybrid open baffle/ported, very clever really. I tried a similar build a couple of years ago but just couldn't get any deep bass from them. Steve's have a drop of magic about them. They have Beyma AMT tweeters, Fane 12" mid range, and 18" Fane bass driver. Around 99dB.
After a hearty lunch of garlic bread, pizzas and chips Ian was next with hot-off-the-press speakers, Jeff Bagley's Helios. These had been made by the other Steve and Ian had installed the drivers the night before and had never been used until this moment!
Preamp was the WD Pre II borrowed from Nigel, source was a RTZ DAC that Tony had worked on, I think? Amp was Steve's Purify class D.
Ian's RTZ DAC
Then a switch to Tony's RTZ DAC which I think was said to have upgraded clock and output stage compared to Ian's version.
Brian was next with his extraordinary Ikea bowl speakers. I think he'd brought these before, but following "young person intervention" the original drivers were replaced with Dayton ND90s.
Source was Reaper on his Mac, through a Focusrite audio interface, into a Fosi Audio ZA3 amp.
Then we went back to Steve's system to listen to his PX4 amp with 41MP driver and ITs.
And that, ladies and gentlemen, is your lot. A super do, looking forward to the next...
