Custom Sherwood S-7310?

[aaronth3fish]

Hello, My name is Aaron and have a Sherwood s-7310

I recently acquired this amplifier from a girl I know's dad. He gave me the amplifier and I have been using it for a while now with a record player, and recently the left speaker stopped working and I realized the fuse broke so I did some research on this model to figure out what fuse to use and I stumbled upon something quite perplexing. My unit has an ON/OFF button to the right of the Left-Right nob. On all the pictures I have viewed there is no button here and I read about how the Volume is actually supposed to turn it on and off and how they usually break.

Does this mean my Amplifier has a Custom On/Off button on it or did it come on some models? And if someone did put a custom on/off button it, it was probably restored recently by a professional, right?
What do you think about this? it works perfectly and I was wondering the button add to its value? I just didn't know what to think about it, Thanks!

 

[Mamrak1]

Someone customized it for sure. They added that ugly red button to the right side of the receiver. To me it deters from the way the Sherwood should look. It seems half ass to me. There is not much you could do about it at this stage.

 

[aaronth3fish]

Someone customized it for sure. They added that ugly red button to the right side of the receiver. To me it deters from the way the Sherwood should look. It seems half ass to me. There is not much you could do about it at this stage.

Yes, I was thinking about painting the red button to a matte black to minimize it's out of place look.

 

[rkgren1]

Hi Aaron,
Welcome to AK.

Failure of the ON/OFF function on Sherwood's combined power/volume switch is apparently very common.

You cannot complain about a free Sherwood, but it's a shame such an ugly replacement was retrofitted.
I would check the size of the hole and find a better looking replacement to fit, or alternatively simply make peace with it.

Even with the hacked power switch you have a very nice receiver.
It's all about the listening anyway.

I would not count on the power switch implying any history of professional service.
It's probably an amateur repair.
If it works, it works.

The old Sherwoods are very favorably regarded by many on this forum as high quality, well built hardware of modest power specification, excellent warm sound quality, with truly excellent tuners.

Search around and you will see.

You have a very nice receiver there.

I am listening to my S-7100A as I write this, and it is sweet.
I bet your Sherwood is too.

 

[srinath]

These really don't have any real value, so you didn't get negatively affected.
Painting red button to matte black will double its value for sure, sadly the paint would cost 3 X its value.
Volume knob with on/off setting in the start can fail, however those speaker selector+on off knob's are much much worse.

Cool.
Srinath.

 

[Mamrak1]

My father had many Sherwood products in his day. They made wonderful receivers with a nice warm sound and a top notch tuner. I just hate seeing some amateur doing a hack job on any piece of audio equipment.

Sorry srinath. These Sherwoods do have 'real value' for those in the know.

 

[rkgren1]

Srinath is right about the resale value.
I paid $15 for mine in a thrift store a few months ago.
Since it is a charity I told them that it was high quality gear and that $15 was a steal.
The volunteers there thought I was an idiot for buying it.

Regardless of the monetary value, I can favorable compare my S-7100A to my fully refurbished Pioneer SX-950, which is presently probably worth somewhere around $400 to a motivated buyer.
Honestly, at any sane listening levels I don't think the Pioneer leads any in sound quality.
It's not pretty in the same way that the 950 is, but the little Sherwood sounds great!

I have a Pioneer SX-1000TW, fully refurbished, in the same room with the Sherwood.
The Sherwood gets played more. I like it better, and the 1000TW is a fine receiver.

Aaron, you are off to an outstanding start in vintage audio.

 

[aaronth3fish]

Srinath is right about the resale value.
I paid $15 for mine in a thrift store a few months ago.
Since it is a charity I told them that it was high quality gear and that $15 was a steal.
The volunteers there thought I was an idiot for buying it.

Regardless of the monetary value, I can favorable compare my S-7100A to my fully refurbished Pioneer SX-950, which is presently probably worth somewhere around $400 to a motivated buyer.
Honestly, at any sane listening levels I don't think the Pioneer leads any in sound quality.
It's not pretty in the same way that the 950 is, but the little Sherwood sounds great!

I have a Pioneer SX-1000TW, fully refurbished, in the same room with the Sherwood.
The Sherwood gets played more. I like it better, and the 1000TW is a fine receiver.

Aaron, you are off to an outstanding start in vintage audio.

Thank you so much for the feedback, I'm glad to hear it is a very good receiver. Also here is another picture just because
I was also wondering about an upgrade to my floor speakers, they are probably from the eighties and are JCPenny brand. They came with the Sherwood and Turntable. I was wondering your opinion on some floor speaker to replace these. They are loud but I don't think they do the Receiver right.

 

[srinath]

Old silver face Sherwoods do sound awesome don't get me wrong. But they don't have the value of a comparable pioneer. IMHO pioneer's are over valued. Sherwoods remind me of the corresponding marantzes in sound.

Anyway Klipsch heritage series or EV/altec speakers from the 70's would mate up very well. Bigger the better, and of course your wallet decides how big. In that same space, you'd like not get anything bigger than a Heresy in.
Cool.
Srinath.

 

[rkgren1]

Aaron,
Good speakers can be had dirt cheap if you are willing to look for them at thrift stores, garage sales, etc., especially so if you are willing to replace foam surrounds (an easy job). I am not a speaker snob.

I have a pair of old Graphyx speakers ($10/pr) that sound great to me as do a pair of Realistic Optimus 5Bs($20/pr).
Both do the SX-950 full justice.

Many of the older Realistic Optimus and Nova speakers are very good and very cheap.

I had a set of old Fisher ST-series speakers (not expensive speakers even when new) at one time on a BOTL Realistic STA-430.
I thought that at modest listening levels the pair was fine together. I gave them away when better gear came along.

Like the Sherwood that little STA-430 was an outstanding little amplifier.
The tuner was whacked but the amp was a thing of 10W beauty.

My Sherwood plays thru a set of Infinity Entra II tower speakers, good, but not high end by any means.
My SX-1000TW is hooked to a set of Cerwin Vega D2 ($5/pr at a garage sale). Another modest quality speaker.

I have a pair of Bose 601s that I have seen panned on this forum on numerous occasions.
I think they sound awesome. $5 each at a yard sale and $30 worth of new surrounds for the 4 woofers.

So, don't get too hung up on brand names.
Learn to recognize well built equipment, though, by name and by sight.

Some of the JC Penney MCS equipment was really good.
Don't dismiss your speakers out of hand.
Give them a good listen and ask yourself if you like them.
If so, then good enough for now.

If you have the funds of course, you can buy your way to Nirvana in one leap.
Not an option for me, and I think I have had more fun on the longer road to good sound than I would have had with a deep pocket.
I have really enjoyed working my way up the audio food chain a step at a time, improving my system(s) incrementally as opportunities arise and resources allow, and enjoying the journey.

 

[Spe@kerBox]

I am a big fan of the early seventies Sherwood S-* series. To my ears they sound better than most of the Marantz receivers I have heard (more detailed than Marantz but with the warmth) and better than many in the Pioneer SX series (my restored SX-1250 beats them handily though). I work on Sherwoods as a hobby and have brought many back to life including the 8900A, 7310, 7300, 7210, 7200, 7100A, and 7110. My favorites so far are the 7100A and 7300. When restored these sound terrific! Right now I have an 7210 and 7200 on my bench. I replace the power switches with a nice push button switch with a silver cap so it matches the receiver.

 

[woodj]

I think I would raise the TT a little higher to allow better ventilation.