Sansui Tuner Size

[Old HiFi Guy]

I have four Sansui tuners, ten if you count the tuners in receivers. The four pure tuners I have are a tube T-70, TU-3900, TU-5900 and TU-517. Out of the 4 the 517 is by far the largest in physical size, T-70 is next followed by the 5900 and last is the 3900. I can understand the T-70 being the size it is being tube but the 517 & the 5900 occupied roughly the same place in their respective lineups of components but the 517 is double the physical size as the 5900. Both middle of the line tuners and such a size disparity. Am I missing something as the comparable matching amps are also larger, an AU-517 putting out less power than my older AU-7900 is also physically larger. It has always been kind of a mystery to me, maybe the different internals required a lager footprint?

 

[mhardy6647]

The big footprint was all about looks (matching an amplifier in size and cosmetics) and perceived value. So many 1970s SS tuners had lots of air inside the boxes.

Chagrined as I am to show it, here's a particularly egregious example from "Brand Y" :-(

CT610II by mhardy6647, on Flickr

 

[sregor]

+1 -most tuners are air boxes designed to match a certain amplifier, unless you get some of the fancy tuners (20B, Sequerra, early digital units, or most tube units).

 

[mhardy6647]

Well - I don't now about most

(borrowed image of a Fisher 80 AM/FM mono tuner)