One of my sisters now owns my A&R A60 together with Quad 11L speakers and a Linn Axis turntable. It’s probably about 48 years old. Many years ago it developed a fault which i think was a rather scratchy volume knob (sound wise) and it sounded rough as well. It was brought back to life by Darren at Class A. I think he did the work while they waited ie went shopping and had lunch. I do recall one of the hifi magazines running a series on classic kit from the past. I think this could be at least 8 years ago and the comment at the time said it would cost around £800 to get a similar amp.
I used it with a Linn Sondek and Mordent Short Festival 3 speakers. Happy times with many hours spent listening to vinyl.
YIKES!! I once heard of someone finding a pair of original Avantic Beam Echo DL -7 35 tube monoblocks sitting in a dumpster behind the old factory. He took them home, cleaned them up and retubed them and they played fine. I only wish your Naim/Ruark system had faired as well.
I have a 42.5/Hicap/110 in mint cosmetic condition. I need to get the 110 repaired so that the 42.5/Hicap/110 can be put back into service with my SYSTEMDEK IIX and Linn Kan I’s.
It’s worth noting that the CD input has a high frequency roll-off added (much like the 328 and 528 boards that Naim developed) to make the amp sound “better” with CD players of the era.
I think the input impedance on that input was lowered too for the same reason. Tuner input is the best as the Tape input has presets internally to adjust the input level which was to allow for seamless tape monitoring without a change in level. Impressive attention to detail by the designer.
It had some odd design elements too. The weird switch second set of hot speaker outputs. You could in fact use this for biwiring with the grounds shared. And it had very tube amp like preference for higher impedance speakers of 8-16 Ohm. It really isn’t happy with even a 6 Ohm nominal load or anything with a reactive crossover.
That said, it is still great and Arcam have service manuals that describe how to do not just a rebuild but also annotations on improvements that should be made that were not practical at the time like swapping out variable resistors for a different type.
Mine has been on the bench awaiting TLC for a couple years now. Insects have made a nest inside. The caps are a bit gooey. The case is in bad shape and I’m hoping to get a new one made with some hand engraving. The person I was going to ask for help on that passed away last year and woodwork isn’t my forte. I may have to scale back get someone with a CNC machine to make one out of a solid block with the engraving as part of the CNC file.
My first stereo was a A60 with a Rega 2, Arcam CD player and A&R speakers. The CD player died and I sold the others a few years ago, as they were not being used. When I read these threads my first reaction is regret in selling the A60, as it would make a great retro system. Still, they are relatively easy to find if I wanted to go down that route.
My A60 also developed a scratch volume pot after around 6 years. I took it in to Eulipion Audio, who replaced it FOC. Why I’m not sure, since it was no longer under warranty.
Mine used to developer a scratchy pot ever couple years when in use. The solution was to patiently, with the power off, just keep fully rotating the knob left and right for 5-10 minutes. The wipers gradually clean the pot via gentle abrasion.
It wasn’t an A60 specific problem. Many pots of a certain age had this issue as the areas less used oxidized so you got a scratchy sound as you travelled through them.
I had one years ago. I attended a blind listening test of half a dozen integrated amps at one of the Harrogate shows back in the 70s. Can’t remember who organised it, might have been Martin Colloms. I was so pleased when I was able to correctly identify the A60 from all the other amps. I also recall visiting A&R at some point around that time. I think they were based in a windmill.
I believe there was an homage review in WHF or HiFi Choice comparing the A60 to a SN3.
While the the SN3 won, they found it was a lot closer than it should have been for all the decades of improvements in between. Certainly concluded the A60 as better than entry level amps of today if well maintained.
Which sort of tracks. When I upgraded mine in ‘94, I didn’t feel any current Arcam amps (Alpha 5, Delta 290) were massively better. I had to jump to either a Linn Majik or Nait3 for that “now this is a proper upgrade” feeling. I went with the Majik but obviously kept the A60.
Thanks for all your replies, it’s nice to see that this amazing little Amp is still loved and remembered so well. I still can’t believe how good it is against many much more expensive and modern amps out there. As I said in my first post, it holds its own against my Naim system and doesn’t disappoint. The previous owner said he did some minor servicing on it but not the main caps as they looked to be fine. I need to open it up and have a look myself. I have found a company on the web that does A60 servicing and am also interested in one of the post before that said Darran at Class A did some work on one. I will have a chat with him when he is back from his hols next week.
