Bigbottle Phonostage - MK3 Design, Pictures and More!

Oli where did you get the psu chassis with recess from, that's tidy?

The reference is WA46 MINI

www.aliexpress.com/item/32833050890.html?spm=a2g0s.9042311.0.0.66594c4dndvmML

Cheers Alan well worth the price given the cost of getting decent cnc done for a thick front panel

Cool are they in yet?

I take it that's an endorsement then! 🙂

Got my mk 1 board back btw I have pm'd you, thanks for the help.

Very interesting afternoon eeking the finest of performance gains from the BB project.
It has been like putting the icing on the cake, but a very fine cake to start with.

I never doubt the forensic capabilities of El Capitain's hearing, after all he is rather younger than I am.
What I have been hearing this afternoon has been captivating in the best sense of the word.

Oli has already experienced the benefit of using an EI transformer rather than a toroidal, it certainly improves the sound stage.
The biggest gain is using the BF861 fet rather than the BF862. The 862 is low noise and provides higher gain than the 861 but the design of the first stage provides lots of gain, so a slight reduction is perfectly acceptable.

What the 861 brings is a more balanced response and a tangibility to every voice and instrument, whereas the 862 is almost trying too hard and gives a thickening or denseness to the sound. Comparing the two you would always want the 861.

Fortunately when using the quad Fet board the BF861B is perfect and just as low noise as the 862, possibly slightly better.
What this gives now is a phenomenal sound projection and depth, this is a spectacular phono stage.

A quick comparison using a Russian 6N2P-EV valve in the centre position showed what a good performer this valve is for very little money.
Not quite as good as a quality ECC83 but a very viable low cost alternative, I was very pleased that this was the case.


A comparison was made to my Paradise phonostage, the differences were 'flavour' only, the BB3 is really on a par. No really!
The Paradise had greater image width but the BB3 had greater image depth, figure that one out.
The Paradise was clean and forensic whereas the BB3 had solidity and texture to the individual instruments and voices.

Voodoo Chile from the original Electric Ladyland album via the BB3 got the hairs standing up all over.

I suppose I am in an enviable position, once my BB is up to the same standard, EI transformer and BF861B fets, I shall be spoilt for choice with the best phono reproduction at my fingertips.

I feel i must expand a bit firebottle

The differences between your Paradise and my BB3 were very much "flavour" One was Rum & Raisin and the other was Mint Chocolate CHip. Both Ice Cream, but one is my favourite and i wouldnt put the other on an injury to bring the swelling down. What matters here is that they were both Premium Ice cream. Hagen Das....or whatever you pick as your fave brand.

When the Paradise first visited me here, along with Simon, it was evident that even though there was a barrel full of performance in a pint glass with the BB3, it was still a few steps of sophistication behind the Paradise. I knew that i had to do a proper build and get a better PCB layout to stand a chance of getting on the Paradise's level.

I learned lessons from what i knew about the construction of the Paradise. "Matching Matching Matching!!" stuck in my mind. Quality components are put in the Paradise...Zfoils etc....There is NONE of that in my BB3 and today i feel that i was right to listen to Angus. Ignore brands and pick the right values for the job. I meticulously measured (as best i can) every single resistor. I weeded out every single dud and only installed the exact required value. None of this 0.1% crap...they are exact!!

I couldnt match the FETs as you know, but i was determined to not leave any stone unturned, so i invested in a clamp for the BF861's and with a bit of your help, i had the tools i needed to finally put together a completely accurate and channel matched phonostage.

Obviously, what happened next was by chance. Paul at RFC acquired an EI transformer and sent it up to me. I was gutted when i saw it lol I hadn't expected an EI...i thought everyone used Torroidal these days. Anyway, i put it in and instantly knew this was a huge improvement, regardless of the hum. Getting out of the box made things absolutely beautiful....then i took the whole thing apart again and I tried the MultiFET we had just made, with thanks to Simon and Russ, who helped get them over the line.

The BF862 didnt sound right to me...despite Alans insistence that they were great because of the gain!! lol. I wanted to try the BF861C and we just could not get them to play ball. I ordered 40 BF861B and then ran out of cash.

The BF862 sound bloated...or heavily leaning on the midbass and LF...I just couldnt get on with the sound.

Luckily, i have a very committed customer base and one of the guys offered to pay in advance for his upgrades...in advance of receiving his fully built phonostage ill add lol...What a legend. He's now classes as an investor so he is very important now Hahaha (in joke)

Today has totally justified the mad scientist approach i have taken with this build.

The Paradise is a fantastic phonostage. It got stunningly clean lines, the separation is awesome and the sound is totally none fatiguing. I do like it very much and in all honesty, i wasn't really looking forward to doing a bakeoff. Recently, there was a bakeoff between Alans BB3 and his Paradise. By a neutral party i must add.

The outcome was "the BB3 sounds like you're in a smokey room but the Paradise sounds like someones opened all the windows and let the smoke out"

I was well pissed off at that....no point hiding it. I was gutted.

Today, we did a bakeoff of the two BB3's first. Mine Vs Alans and the honest truth is, you would not say they were the same phonostage if you heard them blind. My BB3 was streets ahead. The reasons for this are down to the build. Alan has a very petite case, with torroidal inside and he's using BF862's on the MultiFET boards. Quite simply, it's stifling the transparency.

We then tried ALans 6N2P-EV valve in my BB3 and the sound was great...what a stunningly good, cheap little valve. I have 4, and they arrived today. I have one in now and its stunningly good. I believe mine are the "silver" variant, whatever that is.

Anyway, the BB3 went up against the Paradise today and i think it's fair to say.....there was no fucking smoke!!!

The Paradise has a monsterously wide soundstage. It's engulfing and is not bothered by how big your room is. It will always be wider than your speakers are. The background is silent and the detail and resolution is phenomenal...seriousy, the Paradise is endgame and thats for very good reason. We use 2 Yellow tracks for the comparison.

I decided i wanted something that fills me with enjoyment. I commented to Alan that it's a shame we don't have Electric Ladyland here....Ha! but we do said ALan.

On went Voodoo Child (not Chile) which is a 10 minute exercise in absolute guitar mastery and recording triumph. The opening lick started and i felt a little rise of the hairs on the back of my neck. We did about 2-3 minutes and i said it was time to try the BB3.

On went the same track and instantly i had hair on end on my arms, legs, neck and my scalp...albeit they are very small there lol I looked at Al and he muttered "fucking hell"

It was at that moment i knew the BB3 was at that level, the level to play along with the Paradises of the phonostage world.

I'm not going to get into the particulars of whats what, or whats better etc, i'm just happy to know that on a gloriously sunny day in Dudley, the Bigbottle finally arrived and i was justified in my relentless pursuit of the ultimate build quality.....for now. The next task is a Zfoil build. Remember, there is nothing fancy in the BB3...what happens when there is?!

Sounds awesome, well done all 👏

Wow this “investor” sounds like an absolute legend of the highest order. I bet he’s really handsome and funny too 😜

Fantastic news that all of your hard work has paid off mate and hopefully we might get an idea in the next week or two of wether using fancy parts makes any difference when my full cream clarity caps finally take to the field . Im a hopeful believer that using the best cream can really improve the Hagen daz.

Just in case anyone here is interested, there is a GB about to launch for the MultiFET boards.

docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1UNaHNPLyaTUZYWs2zrWMaqukiSZnUK2uLCGyCKuKtAg/edit?usp=sharing

There will only be 20 spaces at the moment.

Sure.

My thoughts on this was to solder the wires to the board because there's "plenty" of room, thread the wires through the main PCB and solder from underneath.

Did you try to solder from above, ie small board side as I can imagine that being a right old pain in the arse?

Of course what you really need is a MK4 board with all this in it 😉🤣🤣

Nearly there with the latest build. Just waiting for the transformer.

Hoped up to mine for a quick listen and I think I need a pair of these mossive Clarity Caps lol

Loving the perforated lid