What have you been working on in 2020?

What have I been working on? Well, let's see....  

Sold a bunch of stuff, used the proceeds to buy Tekton Moabs, which I promptly tore apart and tweaked with Mats and Taytrow TDF. Coated all the system AC wire from the panel to the room, and parts of the meter box. Used almost a full sheet of fO.q tape on the Herron phono stage, inside and out, circuit boards and chassis, then coated all the tape and caps and tube holders with TDF. Taped a couple eCards in there as well.  

Some more Mats were cut up and shaped into tubes. These now cover all power cords, interconnects, and speaker cables.

Pulled the Conqueror tone arm, put a strip of fO.q tape running along the underside of the arm tube, counterweight, and a number of areas along the base of the arm. Coated the phono leads with TC, slid them inside battery grounding strap, connected that to a Michael Spallone modified MPC, and created my own Active Shielding.

Wrapped the Teres Verus motor pod (already previously modified) with TDF coated fO.q tape. Experimented with different materials under the Pits under the motor. And table.

Planning on opening the Moabs for a lot more, including adding fO.q tape speaker gaskets, basically a lot more of what has already been proven to work so well.

Now working with Rick on suspending my system on springs. We'll take a proof of concept graduated approach testing them first under subs, then Moabs, and we will just have to see how far it goes.

Eventually will take some new system pics, as these are getting a bit out of date. https://systems.audiogon.com/systems/8367

Mostly just enjoying the music but upgraded the computer I run my music servers on a few months ago. 
Also adjusted placement of the kef ls50s a tad and adjusted bass levels on Ohm F5s. 
Everything else is locked in so I leave it alone.   

I dust everything relatively frequently. I started using an old but unused set of Sovtek KT88s in my single ended amp...great sounding tubes...put better footers under my Heresy IIIs (Vibrapods on top of perfectly matched for size rubber/thick felt sliders...look great, work great). I took a fuse out of my amp, looked at it, and put it back. Not sure why.

That reminds me! Replaced fuses, Blue to Orange. Took system pics. Built some cable elevator risers to help dress the cables with better spacing. Put fO.q tape, TC and Mats on the drivers in the old Khorus speakers. Forgot about that since they are gone now. Got the Walker Enzyme cleaning system and cleaned a lot of records. Bought a slew of Hot Stampers. Had a couple audiophiles from Portland up for a listen. One of them, Michael, for a second time. Improved my turntable mat clamping system with fO.q tape. Went through a series of interviews about joining Petrolicious to write a series of audiophile oriented articles, but they were unable to meet my terms so had to pass on that. Started the epic Tekton Moab thread. 

Bought and built a Nelson Pass Amp Camp Amp kit and both the experience and the outcome were very satisfying. The marketing for the kit claims that anyone can build it. Since I had some soldering/kit experience, starting with a Dynaco SCA-35 kit more than fifty years ago and a few other very small projects through the years, plus a lot of time on my hands, I went for it.

It does require a decent soldering iron and accessories, good quality solder and an assortment of basic tools but anyone with those, some patience and the ability to carefully follow directions and not get in a hurry could do it.

It was a big success, no smoke came out when I turned it on. The casework is very attractive and the sound is astonishingly good for the price of less than $400, better than many of the amps I’ve owned at multiples of the price. It's not quite up there with my Raven Audio Blackhawk but you could buy ten of the kits Highly recommended as a way to pass the time with the addition of a great piece of gear.