WOPL thoughts for a rookie and an introduction

Sptsmed78

New Around These Parts
Joined
Mar 23, 2022
Messages
4
#1
New to this forum but have been reading a good bit here lately. I am a certified card carrying member of Audio-aholics as my stash of musical instruments, car and home stereo, albums, CDs and high resolution files is way beyond anything I honestly need LOL. I recently visited a pair of speakers I first heard in the 90's to my best recollection, KEF 104/2 reference floor standing speakers and remembered how great they sounded, to my ears anyway, but the price tag on them for someone not long out of college was staggering.

I was first introduced to KEF via the car speakers KEF KAR of which I had installed in my car at that time and honestly have heard few car speakers to this day that sound better, I actually am still running vintage KEFS in my cars today. Looking at the specs on the 104/2 it was clear I surely did not have the receiver or amp in my possession that could feed those beasts the power they craved so the wheels in my mind started turning, which always ends up leading to spending money LOL. I reseached amps capable generating the amount of clean wattage they seem to desire, looked at older Naim, but don't have a kidney I can sell, McIntosh, Musical Fidelity, Marantz and more and then I though, wait Phase Linear. Yes I have heard the stories of flame outs, speakers burning, devastation of small towns, rivers flowing backward, dogs and cats living together etc, but I did remember a PL400 that a few friends had and how I always wished I had that in my rack so I started searching Ebay and other online stereo sales options and found a good number of older 400's and 700's I am certain in varied states of function and safety. Then I happened upon some forum posts on Audio Karma and Tapeheads regarding WOPL and my interest went to the red line.

My question, and I am sure it has been proposed relentlessly on here, but to me instead of buying one already upgraded I would love to know I was the one that brought the beast back to greatness. Upfront I am definitely a novice on these kind of efforts, yes I have cleaned the internals of several amps and receivers, deoxited pots and switches and tinkered around with a few car amps doing limited work, but I at least at this point want to give it a shot. Am I seeking glory that is not achievable to someone with limited experience at best? I just believe at least in my mind that the clear and powerful wattage it can produce when done running my KEF 104/2 speakers will be that much more enjoyable if I was able to perform the task at hand.

Great forum, full of knowledgeable people and it is a honor for a stereo gear junkie to make my first post here

System I want to run the WOPL with;
Pioneer SA-8800II as the pre-amplifier mainly based on the phono cartridge platform and its options
Pioneer TX 9500II tuner
Pioneer RT-909 R to R
Pioneer PL518 TT
Pioneer SG-9500 EQ
Oppo BPD
KEF 104/2
 

Vintage 700b

Chief Journeyman
Joined
Mar 13, 2019
Messages
741
Location
Wisconsin
Tagline
Fabricator
#2
Welcome Sptsmed78,
If you are looking to join the WOPL club, you are in the right place!
Welcome aboard, there are lots of great people here, and tons of experience. Enjoy the journey!
 

AngrySailor

Veteran and General Yakker
Joined
Oct 15, 2014
Messages
3,419
Tagline
---not quite right
#3
New to this forum but have been reading a good bit here lately. I am a certified card carrying member of Audio-aholics as my stash of musical instruments, car and home stereo, albums, CDs and high resolution files is way beyond anything I honestly need LOL. I recently visited a pair of speakers I first heard in the 90's to my best recollection, KEF 104/2 reference floor standing speakers and remembered how great they sounded, to my ears anyway, but the price tag on them for someone not long out of college was staggering.

I was first introduced to KEF via the car speakers KEF KAR of which I had installed in my car at that time and honestly have heard few car speakers to this day that sound better, I actually am still running vintage KEFS in my cars today. Looking at the specs on the 104/2 it was clear I surely did not have the receiver or amp in my possession that could feed those beasts the power they craved so the wheels in my mind started turning, which always ends up leading to spending money LOL. I reseached amps capable generating the amount of clean wattage they seem to desire, looked at older Naim, but don't have a kidney I can sell, McIntosh, Musical Fidelity, Marantz and more and then I though, wait Phase Linear. Yes I have heard the stories of flame outs, speakers burning, devastation of small towns, rivers flowing backward, dogs and cats living together etc, but I did remember a PL400 that a few friends had and how I always wished I had that in my rack so I started searching Ebay and other online stereo sales options and found a good number of older 400's and 700's I am certain in varied states of function and safety. Then I happened upon some forum posts on Audio Karma and Tapeheads regarding WOPL and my interest went to the red line.

My question, and I am sure it has been proposed relentlessly on here, but to me instead of buying one already upgraded I would love to know I was the one that brought the beast back to greatness. Upfront I am definitely a novice on these kind of efforts, yes I have cleaned the internals of several amps and receivers, deoxited pots and switches and tinkered around with a few car amps doing limited work, but I at least at this point want to give it a shot. Am I seeking glory that is not achievable to someone with limited experience at best? I just believe at least in my mind that the clear and powerful wattage it can produce when done running my KEF 104/2 speakers will be that much more enjoyable if I was able to perform the task at hand.

Great forum, full of knowledgeable people and it is a honor for a stereo gear junkie to make my first post here

System I want to run the WOPL with;
Pioneer SA-8800II as the pre-amplifier mainly based on the phono cartridge platform and its options
Pioneer TX 9500II tuner
Pioneer RT-909 R to R
Pioneer PL518 TT
Pioneer SG-9500 EQ
Oppo BPD
KEF 104/2
Go for it. I put a 700 series one together as my first venture into electronics with the plentiful help and guidance available here. Joes kits are top notch and comprehensive. Im working on a full WOPL 400 series one now (actually it’s sitting on my bench collecting dust because I’m crazy busy with shop stuff lately). If you’re not comfortable soldering the boards and back planes they’re available complete. Maybe build a smaller board to practice? I built my stuff with a chinesium $45 temp controlled solder station, you don’t really need high dollar stuff for one or two boards. Production guys might like a better station but I have no complaints so far. You will receive all the help/guidance and assistance you could ever want or need from the crew here. Oh, and welcome aboard.

Andrew
 

Sptsmed78

New Around These Parts
Joined
Mar 23, 2022
Messages
4
#4
Thank you for the response, I have a few of these I would like to do, one of these days, hopefully no time soon LOL my kids are going to inherit a lot of stereo equipment. I am thinking at least on my first go I would feel more comfortible puchasing the completed boards, and I guess doing the capacitors as demonstrated on a post I watched, that does not look terribly difficult and a minimal amount of soldering required, but yes if boards come completed and its a matter of installing a prefabricated board, or two I believe I would feel safer and better going that route for sure on my first run at this.
 

laatsch55

Administrator,
Staff member
Joined
Jan 14, 2011
Messages
74,124
Location
Gillette, Wyo.
Tagline
Halfbiass...Electron Herder and Backass Woof
#5
Welcome to Phoenix.

Start where you are comfortable and go from there.....your show so do it on your terms bud!!~
 

Elite-ist

Administrator, (and straight-up pimp stick!)
Staff member
Joined
Jun 12, 2010
Messages
9,777
#6
Welcome to our forum! That's a good compliment of audio gear. I'm into Pioneer and car audio gear, too.

Lots of practical knowledge is shared here for Phase Linear components which will save you lots of time and money in your endeavours.

Nando.
 

VSAT88

Veteran and General Yakker
Joined
Sep 7, 2017
Messages
1,798
Location
Phenix City Alabama
Tagline
Like my BlueTooth ?
#19
"System I want to run the WOPL with;
Pioneer SA-8800II as the pre-amplifier mainly based on the phono cartridge platform and its options
Pioneer TX 9500II tuner
Pioneer RT-909 R to R
Pioneer PL518 TT
Pioneer SG-9500 EQ
Oppo BPD
KEF 104/2"

Oh Yeah, Nice ! Good to have you around .
 
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