Supratek Owners Thread

Hi Markus,

As this thread is titled the owner thread and I thought my experience would be interesting to someone who owns a Supratek or planning to get one.

Don't get me wrong, I still like the preamp and it is good looking. And frankly my hearing could only tell a small difference between having the preamp versus not. That's why I kept it and continued to use for more than 10 years.

My intention was to present facts about my experience, which is the workmanship left a lot to be desired. And that caused actual issues in the sound. Namely loose wire and switched polarity of the electrolytic capacitor. It would be quite unthinkable that the original owner decided to solder the wires in opposite polarity. I am trained as an electronic engineer and tell the unit was not modded.

Anyway take it anyway you want, I still plan to work on the unit to further improve it. I'm looking forward to connect with fellow owners and trade ideas about tube rolling and modifications.

Last night I fixed the incorrect polarity and it corrected the volume imbalance issue on the Cabernet preamp. I plan to replace the electrolytic capacitor for the DHT filament and adds a film capacitor in parallel. Also planning to replace the TJ 101D with a set of Linlai.

Update on my Supratek Cabernet pre, it is packed down, ready to being shipped back to Mick for warranty repair. Hopefully I will have it back soon in full working order.
Will keep you updated.

@alpha_lam  gotta disagree with you on the  'if you plan to own a supertek, be prepared for a very involved experience',..   you bought a used unit and have issues, you are in the minority of owners out there.  If owning a Supra was 'involved' Mick wouldn't have a business. Especially a biz with tons of units out in the field an such a loyal following.   Yes, stock units will present issues from time to time and yes when I have repaired,  I have found a bad solder joint here and there,  it is not the norm though and honestly they have been much older units that have had some very obvious use and been banged around a good bit.  His soldering is excellent and rarely do I ever find bad joints though on occasion I will.   Regardless,  it happens anywhere in this business and more importantly Mick covers any issue on stock units for their LIFETIME.  That's pretty amazing considering the size of his operation.    I'm not aware of him using electrolytics in the cathode of the DHT, much less anywhere in the circuit save for on PS regualtors or B+ filtering in early models.  I have worked on these units with models going all the way back to 2005,..  always film caps and always one on each side of the DHT filament above the center tap.  It sounds as if this unit was modded and someone didn't know what they are doing based on your description.  When I repair a unit,  you would be hard pressed to tell that the circuit (solder joints)  are not original and had been repaired.   It is entirely possible the unit was modded (which it sounds like from your description).   Not to mention that when that unit left Mick's shop,  I can almost guarantee that it did not have the issues you experience.  That type of imbalance would have been easily caught while Mick QC'd the unit.    Anything is possible so I'll stop short of saying it isn't possible,  but I do want to correct you on your idea that Supra's in general require effort to own.  That is just not true as they are created and made correctly 99% of the time.  

Yes the alpha lam experience would seem to be far from typical.As soon as as read his post I thought to myself that sounds like a unit which had been messed with by some incompetent person.About ten years ago some people on the long Supratek thread were promoting swapping the standard caps for all sorts of more exotic and crazy alternatives.I suspect that is what happened to this unit except whoever replaced the stock caps also wired one in the wrong way round.Also the 101D Cabernets were my least favourite Suprateks and I have heard them all A bit too "characterful" for me although they might be great in the right system.Might be time to send that unit back to Supratek to be corrected and perhaps upgraded to the latest circuit/different DHT.

Also yes not all Suprateks have transformers in the chrome domes.It depends on the era/model.Both mine do. The domes were retained to  maintain a consistent aesthetic.