Stop calling the Sansui Eight Deluxe the "Engineer's Receiver"

Never heard a 7K, but it is a cap coupled amp, so my bet is it will sound more like like it's cap-brethren the 2, 4, 5K's. The single digits are all direct coupled which usually lend itself to a bit less blooming aka tight sound.
 
These are always subjective calls. I listened to both the Eight and the Deluxe on same Wharfedale Diamond 8.4's - rated at 6 Ohm. To my ear the Deluxe is a tad more refined at the at the high freqs but perhaps the biggest difference is it seems faster and more "light footed" for a lively rhythmic presentation. My fully restored Eight weren't no slouch, so we are talking finer nuances.

Was your 8 even sounding in the bass and midrange with the 8 deluxe? When restored did you replace or have all the original resistors changed?
 
Only my Eight was restored. Full recap including all signal transistors. Later I also re-placed the output and drivers with faster onsemi. This gave it better HF reponse. My Deluxe which I have today is only cleaned and adjusted. My Eight would beat it head to head, being restored and all, but the inate qualities of the Deluxe are easy to recognise, even through its tired caps. It will sound very very nice one restored. The Eight, however, remains the king of the single digits in my book.
 
I don't think it is worth getting worried about which is the Engineer's receiver. Both are great amps, with some differences. Is it my favourite Sansui amp... not even close (although I should mention none of my single digit receivers are rebuilt).

FWIW a Sansui engineer told me last year that both the 8 and 8D, and receivers in general, were not prized by Japanese.

"Receiver(Amplifier with AM/FM tuners) is mainly export model. In Japan, customer purchase amplifier and tuner separately in accordance with their preferences. Single digit receiver series(SIX, SEVEN and EIGHT) is the successor of 5000. Sansui receiver 5000 is one of the best seller model especially for US military persons(at PX). " He went on to tell me more about their attempts at removing output caps from receivers/amps, and similarities in topology of Eight to particular Sansui integrated amps but I have not asked permission to share all of our conversation so I just leave it there for now.
 
These are always subjective calls. I listened to both the Eight and the Deluxe on same Wharfedale Diamond 8.4's - rated at 6 Ohm. To my ear the Deluxe is a tad more refined at the at the high freqs but perhaps the biggest difference is it seems faster and more "light footed" for a lively rhythmic presentation. My fully restored Eight weren't no slouch, so we are talking finer nuances.

Hi was your 8 modified and had its transistors or resistors changed? Or all original
 
At this point it would be tough for my Eight Deluxe to beat out my Z-5000X. I am putting a parts order together to update the Eight Deluxe and will go from there.

With tone controls flat, the two sound very similar.

Rob
 
Lol, read this old post. My take, I guess the engineers didn't care that the push buttons were plastic and had paper nameplates that would fall off, never to be replaced again (yes, I own an eight).
 
I was stationed in the Philippines for a couple years back in the 1970s. The Japanese hifi manufacturers loved us GIs in the Far East (Japan, Okinawa, Korea, The Philippines, etc.) because they could cheaply introduce their new gear to an American test market with little financial risk, before mass producing and exporting their product to the US. The average GI has much the same tastes as the average American so if a certain model sold well to GIs overseas then the order was given to ramp up production and export it to the US. If sales were poor then chances are that model didn't get the okay for a big production run and exportation. Less risk for them and a nice perk for the GI (no customs or duty fees, Uncle Sam paid for the shipping back to the World, and prices were a lot cheaper compared to Stateside prices). A good example is the 7000 - when those fusible resistors smoked (They must have had a bad batch) and burned on several units sold to NEX, PX, and BX customers, word got out fast. "What makes a 7000 work? Smoke! When you let the smoke out, it quits working". I don't think Sansui even bothered to export the 7000, they doubled-down on the Eight instead.
Anyway, I've owned a bunch of Sansui gear over the years since the '70s. Several years ago I contacted Jim Showker (R.I.P. Jim) to restore my QRX-9001 and after I got it back and was really impressed with the results, I also had him restore and recap my QRX-999 and QRX-8001. When I asked him to do my Eight, I also sent him some scans of old Sansui brochures I had from the '70s. He told me about AudioKarma and suggested I join and share the scans with other Sansui enthusiasts. When I found out he passed away a couple weeks ago, I decided I should follow through with his suggestion.
Here a a couple pages from a Military Exchange (PX, BX, or NEX) from about 1971 or 2. I have some more pages from this brochure I can share if anyone really wants to see them, more receivers, amps and other items from this brochure and also a couple more Sansui brochures from other years in the '70s. I'll start another thread but these pages relate to the subject of this thread - the Eight and 7000
At the time of this brochure, the 7000 was the TOTL and first page and the only receiver in the brochure to get a full page.
qnAKcOM.jpg


V0vp12H.jpg
ckZ4tN9.jpg
 
I was stationed in the Philippines for a couple years back in the 1970s. The Japanese hifi manufacturers loved us GIs in the Far East (Japan, Okinawa, Korea, The Philippines, etc.) because they could cheaply introduce their new gear to an American test market with little financial risk, before mass producing and exporting their product to the US. The average GI has much the same tastes as the average American so if a certain model sold well to GIs overseas then the order was given to ramp up production and export it to the US. If sales were poor then chances are that model didn't get the okay for a big production run and exportation. Less risk for them and a nice perk for the GI (no customs or duty fees, Uncle Sam paid for the shipping back to the World, and prices were a lot cheaper compared to Stateside prices). A good example is the 7000 - when those fusible resistors smoked (They must have had a bad batch) and burned on several units sold to NEX, PX, and BX customers, word got out fast. "What makes a 7000 work? Smoke! When you let the smoke out, it quits working". I don't think Sansui even bothered to export the 7000, they doubled-down on the Eight instead.
Anyway, I've owned a bunch of Sansui gear over the years since the '70s. Several years ago I contacted Jim Showker (R.I.P. Jim) to restore my QRX-9001 and after I got it back and was really impressed with the results, I also had him restore and recap my QRX-999 and QRX-8001. When I asked him to do my Eight, I also sent him some scans of old Sansui brochures I had from the '70s. He told me about AudioKarma and suggested I join and share the scans with other Sansui enthusiasts. When I found out he passed away a couple weeks ago, I decided I should follow through with his suggestion.
Here a a couple pages from a Military Exchange (PX, BX, or NEX) from about 1971 or 2. I have some more pages from this brochure I can share if anyone really wants to see them, more receivers, amps and other items from this brochure and also a couple more Sansui brochures from other years in the '70s. I'll start another thread but these pages relate to the subject of this thread - the Eight and 7000
At the time of this brochure, the 7000 was the TOTL and first page and the only receiver in the brochure to get a full page.
qnAKcOM.jpg


V0vp12H.jpg
ckZ4tN9.jpg
Good info! More scans please :)
 
If the 7000 and the Eight were in the same brochure, the cost of the Eight pretty much puts it at the top of the heap. If those prices were from mid 1971, $258 dollars then would be $1,586 in 2018 dollars and folks stateside probably paid more. Moreover the Eight has a significantly more advanced amplifier than the 7000.

Pretty sure there were no fuse resistors in the 7000. They didn't start showing up until the mid 1970s. Any resistor is a "fuse resistor" if too much current passes through it. The 7000 is likely to have had circuit problems because several boards were redesigned during production. You typically didn't see major re-design during production unless they had problems.

- Pete
 
I have two Eight Deluxes. Both have engraved faceplate lettering (although I know not all of them have engraving). The knobs do have plastic inserts though. A pic of my faceplate can be seen in my thread here.
I have 6 right Deluxe all engraved
 
Can you post the serial numbers for the database? Click on the link in my signature block.

- Pete
 
The back of my 8 is quite impressive
 

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Lol, read this old post. My take, I guess the engineers didn't care that the push buttons were plastic and had paper nameplates that would fall off, never to be replaced again (yes, I own an eight).

You really think anyone actually asked the engineers about their preferences regarding the cosmetics? They probably had to fight like hell to get the design they wanted and the best parts, and didn't want to die on the cosmetics hill.
 
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