[alpharadj67]

Hello again.

First of all my sincere apologies for taking so long to report back. Thank you all very much for your responses – believe me they are so much appreciated.

Techman I have tried your suggestion - running the player for several minutes whilst monitoring the temp of the capacitor can and it remains completely cool at all times (also keeping well clear). The resistor which bridges the reservoir and smoothing sections also remains cool – the first photo gives a (better quality) image of it. The resistor (shown in the second photo) is the one which heats up and it continues to get very hot. It links one of the pins of the UY85 valve to the reservoir capacitor. There is no sign of the wire wound type you mention (I could visually identify this from looking at other threads on the forum) so I assume this must be an alternative type. Naturally the valves get very hot – too hot to touch - but presume this is normal. The output transformer appears healthy. I tested this using the 9 volt battery technique (disconnected from mains of course) and got some loud ‘clicks’ through speaker. This technique I found on a thread about a similar Tellux valve model. Finally, the good news is that the amplifier now works well – again from looking at the same thread I was able to run a test by connecting headphone output of my cheap cd player with the tone arm wire terminals beneath the deck and the audio output is good (in line with the grade of machine this is, of course!).

Edward – thanks for your remarks and advice on the X5H. In line with what you say they are nowhere to be found for sale – old or NOS! Here’s the low-down on this side. When I connected the cd player, I found that the uninsulated leads of two ceramic capacitors mounted to tone arm wire tab beneath the deck were shorting. They are not too well installed, in fact very untidy, and although my ‘tinkering’ may have caused the shorting, it was definitely a problem waiting to happen. The long and the short is that, with the said leads now separated the cartridge works – with great output! I certainly concur that tonal quality is not hifi standard on this record player but it has made a good start for me. Also, not having to replace cartridge is a major relief. Will always bear in mind what you say about the availability and expense of these for future purposes though.

Will probably start to tidy up the work I have done so far now. There is a very slight buzz on the amp which increases/decreases with volume adjustment. I presume I’m getting into realms of replacing capacitors here and also I’m a little concerned about that hot resistor. Any comments would be welcome on this.

Again, really grateful to you all for the great help and kind comments. So sorry about the delay in responding – this is due to house-hunting!

Best wishes.