NAD: Ceriatone Chupacabra 50w (pink & blue)

[2dor]

After having received my King Kong 100W last year in November, I quickly realized that I wanted a Chupacabra too.

Fast-forward a bit and this "wolf in sheep's clothing" made it to my door.
This has a custom shorter and not as tall headshell as well as a buffered loop.

Shipped on Wednesday from Malaysia and made it to Romania on Friday; released from customs this morning and delivered by the fine folks at FedEx without delay.

My "tech"'s installing tubes and doing a bias on it atm.

Will post more pics, sound samples and impressions once she's fired up.

 

[2dor]

First impressions don't look good to be honest.

I ordered their buffered loop and it's doesn't seem to be there (my KK100 has a Return level control on the back panel).

Other thing that's bugging me (a LOT) is that during the build me and Nik exchanged some messages and he was troubleshooting some hum issues with the amp - said he wasn't sure what the culprit is and he suggested adding another filtering cap.

I respectfully declined and suggested they take more time with the build so that it turns out right instead.

Today, much to my surprise, when I take the back off to get tubes in, I see an extra cap in there which pisses me off tremendously as I feel I've been handed a build with a fucked up Power Trannie which got an extra cap in there to sweep things under the rug.

 

[HotRats]

ouch!

I always wanted a chupacabra I guess I want it a bit less now.

Are you sending it back?

 

[2dor]

ouch!

I always wanted a chupacabra I guess I want it a bit less now.

Are you sending it back?

Not sure what to do yet; I reported it now and I've received a reply saying that I wasn't billed for the active loop (even though it was in my initial inquiry to be included) but they wired it in but without the Return control on the outside.

That thing with the filtering cap though - don't feel too good about that....at all.

Just got a reply saying they added that one in to separate filtering between the PI and cathode follower which should make it better for noise purposes as well as tightness (just slightly).

 

[2dor]

Buffered loop is indeed in there as Nik says. So looks like that'll be the standard folks!

 

[2dor]

The build is immaculate.

Need to finish biasing the beast and give it a whirl - slowly calming myself the F down now.

 

[2dor]

Gut shots here. She's a looker.

 

[SKU]

Gut shots here. She's a looker.

Looks clean AF!!

 

[2dor]

Looks clean AF!!

It's a really impressive thing to behold for sure.

Biasing atm - curious to get it plugged in and out for a spin.

 

[2dor]

Fired up - let's see how she fares.

She's dead quiet!

Everything at noon, Master at 8 out of 11 (lol yeah it goes to 11), no clipping engaged and I see no noise in Reaper

 

[2dor]

Master Volume @ 8 (out of 11), no clipping (so ERA is in the middle), both Bright switches engaged (left), Gain 1 and 2 @ 6 and noise only peaks at 46.3 dB in Reaper through the Suhr RL.

Sound sample:

 

[gearJunkie]

Congrats! Glad to hear your initial worries with the build turned out to be non-issues.

Still waiting on my KK50. The seller is away on travel, but his amp tech is supposed to be shipping it out this morning via overnight service. If all goes well I'll have it tomorrow.

 

[2dor]

Congrats! Glad to hear your initial worries with the build turned out to be non-issues.

Still waiting on my KK50. The seller is away on travel, but his amp tech is supposed to be shipping it out this morning via overnight service. If all goes well I'll have it tomorrow.

Thanks buddy. Yes, Nik is a great guy - once again proven.

The amp can get very aggressive and the noise is stupidly low given the gainiac character.

 

[2dor]

Some more extreme settings:

Noise floor is at -57.9 dB in Reaper which is silly given the clipping, Presence and Bright switches.

 

[2dor]

Some even higher gain settings; noise is at -49 dB. Not worried anymore.

 

[gearJunkie]

Is that gray box going into the input an isolation transformer, a re-amp box, or something else?

 

[2dor]

Need to test the loop next. So far, I like the tones coming out of the Chupa over the King Kong. They're not one better than the other.

The King Kong is more "fat" / heavy, while the Chupa is more aggressive

 

[2dor]

Just ran my Synergy SYN-1 with the Salvation Audio Camerock module through the loop.

Loop sounds amazing, no noise or tone suck at all.

All in all, great build and just a case of communication issues. Would have probably not freaked out about the extra cap if that conversation would have been lengthier.

 

[2dor]

Is that gray box going into the input an isolation transformer, a re-amp box, or something else?

It's a SignalArt Reamp Box

 

[JiveTurkey]

Some even higher gain settings; noise is at -49 dB. Not worried anymore.



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So you're Lasse Lammert!