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Leak Stereo 20

Forgive me for resurrection but I just bought Mike’s that was for sale.

I can say a word about original finishes, on cars, and especially antiques, presumably also vintage amps, guitars: keep the original paint/finish or you’ve knackered the value big time.

I don’t care. I’ve bought Mike’s as something to enjoy not as an investment but anyone who wishes to make money/preserve value think very long and hard before you refinish.
 
I’m so much the record collector, guitar geek etc that I’m with Alex. One of the reasons when I made the decision between my 301 and 124 was that the latter had perfect original paint, the former was a refinish. It is also why I waited several years for a second TL12 Plus to come up in exactly the (remarkably good) condition and colour as my first one. I am pretty obsessive about this sort of thing, but it comes from knowing the guitar market. I know it’s dumb, but I’m totally programmed! Alex being in the antiques restoration business is likely even more conditioned on this.

That said Mike’s rebuild is of a truly stunning quality and you have a fabulous amp there for sure.
 
Absolutely Mike. This wasn’t any kind of dig at you, just a general comment that relates to collectors. In any case, there’ll always be people like me who just want a beautiful amplifier. And yes, I am up already - I have to drive to Sheffield!
 
Yes. I learnt this before but the idea that valve amps are for Diana Krall and a bit of Lionel Hampton are utterly wrong. If you have efficient speakers, the punch and dynamics are absurd, with any music. With the S20 anyway. Nick Cave’s red right hand is scary.
 
They are amazing things Leak 20s, I had the quietest ever vinyl playback when I owned one rebuilt by alsnowman. I found my one an absolute pain in terms of ground loops though. My mate’s one was the same - we both had ground loops with our Croft 25 preamps. I found the way to avoid it was by only using double-insulated gear and a passive preamp with it, or removing the earth wire from the mains plug (not advised!). Which all tends to restrict equipment pairing options. I’ve got the Leben 300 here which uses EL84 valves but I do wonder whether a Leak would be even better with my Klipsch Cornwalls.

Has anyone managed to use a Leak 20 with an active preamp without incurring a ground loop? If so, how did you do it? Is there a mod that can be done to make the Leak work nicely with other equipment?
 
I've never had any ground loop problems myself but I do use a passive pre.

The ST20 is the absolute perfect partner to a passive.
 
Mike P said:
I've never had any ground loop problems myself but I do use a passive pre.

The ST20 is the absolute perfect partner to a passive.
Click to expand...

They do work well together indeed, I used a Khozmo passive and a Graham Slee Accession M phono stage (double insulated fig. 8 mains lead), with no ground lead between a fully earthed turntable (SL1200G) and phono stage and it was the quietest vinyl playback I ever had, much better than a Quad 303. Digital was a bit hit and miss in terms of noise (whether insulated or not), although a Quad 99 CDP worked out very quietly and even worked well directly into the Leak when I tried it briefly. The Croft 25 preamp was no good though due to ground loops.

Curiously, I’ve heard of people asking Glenn to make them a 25 preamp specially made to go with a Leak 20. I wonder if he does something to the earthing arrangement? Might have to drop him a line to get to the bottom of it, as info seems very scarce on this issue.
 
Pretty sure the Croft pre Glenn makes to go with a ST20 is simply a zero gain pre. He'll make them with any gain you specify. When I had a ST20 I briefly ran it with a Linn Kairn before I got hold of a Rothwell Indus passive, had no ground loop problems at all. It always seemed to sound better with a passive though.
 
I ran mine with a Croft Micro 25 Basic for a bit and don't recall any earth problems (though it was a while ago). Might have just been lucky I guess.

The main annoyance was not being able to get the volume past about 1 o'clock even after I had it modified to be (slightly!) lower gain.
 
Even with a passive the gain is faintly ridiculous. Doesn’t seem to be any kind of problem. At 12 O’clock on digital I’d blow the windows out. But my speakers are a claimed 101dB efficient.
 
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