A few years ago, a friend who’s a vintage tube specialist and I discovered the magic of
’60s small-tube amps (notably Scotts). These small EL-84 output tubes had startling low
bass, unexpectedly clean and punchy, together with a soaring treble airiness. The bass and treble of the famous large tube (EL-34s, KT-88s, 6550s, etc.) sounded soggy by
comparison. Mesmerized, we spent a year honing mods to see how far we could take the little wonders. Our test-bed speaker was the demanding 6' tall Maggie 3.6. A year later, our hot-rod Heathkit and Scott prototypes were whipping $5,000 tube amps and $10,000 solid state amps: stunning symphonic crescendos; lovely airiness; in-the-room presence for voice, guitar, piano; and bass that rocks. We’ve replaced the factory pre-amp stage with our own passive that beats any external tube pre-amp up to $7,500. And, included is a superb Scott phono stage that we’ve further upgraded. We’re so proud of the results that we’re now turning out one or two of these fully restored, stem-to-stern modified integrated tube amps with a built-in passive preamp plus a sweet phono stage: $795 for Heathkit; $1175 for Scott. A few higher-power Scotts are available at $1,375. 30-day money back. 30-day money back.
To order or for more details, please call 410-867-7543.
For a customer with very limited space, we modded a 340 Scott receiver with the identical mods we use for separates. The hot-rodded receiver sounded just as stunning! I suddenly realized our single chassis receiver actually sounded better than an $11,000 solid state system I'd heard recently ($2000 tuner, $3000 preamp and $6000 amp). In contrast, the cost of the fully restored and thoroughly modded Scott receiver is $1495. A drop-dead gorgeous AM-FM version is available for $1775.
To order or for more details, please call 410-867-7543.
My vintage tube buddy and I had a marathon, three-month shoot-off with vintage FM tuners. As expected, the legendary Marantz 10B (a cool $3500 to $4000 today) was king of the heap, with warm, detailed, involving sound way beyond any solidstate tuner. Very unexpectedly, two little-known ’60s Scott tuners—precisely aligned and then modded a bit—sounded so good we couldn’t tell them from the Marantz. If you haven’t heard a killer tube tuner, you owe yourself that ear-opening experience. Testing our second prototype, I happened to tune in a live symphony concert. A minute later, it hit me: through the Scott, I was hearing BETTER-THAN-CD sound from a broadcast! Head-to-head our little Scotts’ sound quality has whipped new $4000 Magnum Dynalabs as well as every legendary solid state tuner. $495 for mono with astounding tonal purity, $695 for stereo. 30-day money back.
To order or for more details, please call 410-867-7543.
To beautifully enhance the Scott's great vintage look, we offer a gorgeous Amish-crafted solid walnut upgrade of the original '60s walnut veneer cover (the original can't be fitted over our maple rail chassis mod). Amps ordered with cases include an installed pair of stained-to-match, airdried maple rails grooved to support the walnut cover. Our design offers the best of all worlds: a decoupled cover eliminating the sound-diminishing chassis resonances caused by all stock covers plus the convenience of a beautiful case that lifts on and off like a dust cover. WALNUT CASE OPTION: $275 + Shipping
To order or for more details, please call 410-867-7543.
PURIST VINTAGE TUBE FM TUNERS
WALNUT CASE OPTION FOR SCOTT AMPS