Connecting a Mag. 185 to a 7504 tuner

[NCTubeLover]

Hi guys.

I was given a working 185-11 Magnavox 6v6 amp and I am trying to connect a Magnavox tuner to it.

I purchased a working 7504-00 Mag tuner.

I am looking over the schematics and trying to figure this out.
Also, I purchased a stripped Mag 88-02 amp for parts.

How complicated is this project?

I want to use the amp as a radio/tape player not a guitar amp.

Thanks,

Greg

 

[century tek]

Hi Greg,

Welcome to AK.

First off, Let's see some pics and/or the schematic. I or someone here can probably get you up and running. Those things are easy. Not to diss on your expertise or knowledge level, just letting you know that you have help here.

 

[wa2ise]

You'll need to have a volume control between or part of the tuner and the amp. Magnavox usually had volume and tone controls attached to the tuner chassis. Though sometimes they were separate modules, sometimes called "preamps" though I and others tend to think of a preamp as the phono RIAA equalizer/amplifier.

Anyway, a dual ganged "audio taper" pot of around 500K inserted between the tuner and amp would be what you'd need. The amp is fed by the pot wipers. The tuner feeds the "top" connection, and its ground connection is connected to the RCA cords' shield. Holding the pot in you hand with the shaft pointing at your eyes, and the terminals at 5 o'clock, 6 o'clock and 7 o'clock positions, 7 o'clock is ground, 6 o'clock is the wiper and goes to the amp, and 5 o'clock is the connection fed by the audio from the tuner. For stereo, it makes no difference which section ("clock face") front or back is left or right, as long as you are consistent.

Hope this helps, as I don't know how familiar with audio electronics you are.

 

[NCTubeLover]

Magnavox 185 amp and tuner

Hi ,

Here are the pics of the amp and tuner.


Greg

 

[century tek]

The AMP 185 was the amplifier used in Magnavox consoles that only had the turntable w/passive preamp controls.

Your tuner/preamp has a molex connector that got its power from the power amplifier like a 175, 8802, or similar.

Your 185 amplifier does not have the molex connector to power a seperate tuner preamp. It can be done but, I think the 185 power amplifier does not have the electrical current requirements to run anything else except its own tubes. You might have to build a seperate power supply for that tuner preamp, or find the original amplifier that went with that particular tuner/preamp.

To use a tuner/preamp with the 185 amp, you will need to remove the (I believe) 6EU7 tube and associated phono RIAA circuitry from the amp.

 

[NCTubeLover]

I have ordered Molex connectors and a new WEL51 soldering iron.
The old soldering gun would not even melt the solder on the amp.

Will keep you posted.