Leak Stereo 20

In 2018 the second Leak Stereo 20 from 1961 was bought....one of the best 12Watt EL84 amplifiers in my opinion. 

The set was bought from closed down recording studio at Skalbakken in Vanløse .....the Varislope preamplifier and Stereo 20 have not been treated well. Several holes have been drilled in the Stereo 20's chassis... ...probably for a protective grille, as the amplifier has probably been moved around the recording studio. 

For us vintage people, it's a horror to look at. 

An attempt is being made to repair the chassis without welding-splatters and annealing the metal. A paint shop near Copenhagen had a whole shelf full of acrylic car paint from Motip. 

The Stereo 20's antique-gold-bronze color is not easy to match, but this spray can with Motip color number 55930 should, according to a professional, come very close to my color sample :p .....it was a happy man who drove home with the spray can. 

A little info for those of us who don't know the whole story about Leak: I told another Leak owner on Vintagehifi that my preamp was called "Point One Stereo", but when I looked closer it said "Varislope Stereo"?.......thanks for the saved old pictures......The old pictures of my first Leak preamp showed the name "Point One Stereo" printed on the front plate, and then I had to figure out the difference which comes here: 

"Post by Tom_I , 03 May 2009, The Leak Point One and Varislope preamps were not the same. The Varislope models included a low-pass filter with switchable turnover frequencies and variable cut-off slope between about 5 dB and 50 dB per octave. Point One models didn't have this feature." Answer: "@ Tom You are correct, of course. You do have a Varislope II as well. Mono of course. It's got control selectors for equalization and a variable filter which I use for 78's.....Then as you mentioned, there was the Varislope which looks like the Point One. Have to put on my thinking cap to see if I can improve things with the Point One. Perhaps the guys on the NZ site will have some ideas. ?"

I do have the Varislope, but has never thought about renovation because the reputation of the Leak preamp with the EF86 penthode have not been at the top like many other preamps as Conrad-Johnson PV-5, "The Aurora" , "Röh-1" and Marantz 7 that all uses 7025/12AX7/ECC83 triodes.

Note all the 3 ~ 3,5mm drilled holes besides GZ34, RCA inputs and +B capacitor mounting holes 

What to do with the drilled holes?

With all the drilled 3.5mm holes in this Leak Stereo 20, there were four options: 

1. You could weld the holes, ruin the chassis with sanding and a complete repaint...that's a no-go! 2. You could cut 4mm threads in all the holes and put machine screws in, which wouldn't be decorative! 

3. You could leave the holes as holes, and live with it! 

4. You could countersink the drilled holes from both sides, put tape on the bottom of the metal plate, and fill the holes with epoxy. 

The fourth option was the solution, so that the chassis didn't have to be welded, or that the threads had to be cut.                             See drawing.... 

After cleaning and paint inside the bottom of the chassis...don't know why all the white dot is visible

New gold plated RCA connectors...all resistors changed....all wires cleaned and re-soldered...Note the almost invisible hole closed... seen besides the red right RCA connector!

Note the 100R / 3W which is the internal "fuse" if something goes "wrong"

The 100R resistor should solder itself out...... 

1.000 Hz