The John Westlake/Lakewest MDAC/FDAC, VFET and Detox

[Stunsworth]

It's not stated in the website

Maybe not, but it was definitely discussed here.

 

[Space is the Place]

Stunsworth i've wrote my investment off, but some here have invested thousands in amps that as far as i can remember and as discussed at the time were going to made using discrete components, it shouldn't be difficult if you are that good a designer to just get on with it and deliver them...

What i find is, it's always best to do the right thing. People have been promised "the moon on a stick" we haven't even had the stick yet.

Dated December 28, 2014...Yes 2014.

"Sooooo,

Sorry I've been quite these past few days as for a Christmas treat, I treated myself to working on the VFET amp design (don't worry, I'll go back to the MDAC2 tomorrow).

The MDAC2 employs a totally symmetrical analogue circuit design - the positive and negative cycles of the audio signal are handled by a "Mirror image" circuit. From past experience "symmetrical" circuits sound the best. This is made possible by complementary NPN / PNP transistors & N channel / P channel fully complementary MOSFETS.

Unfortunately, Vacuum tubes do not have complementary devices as Electrons can only flow in one direction (From Cathode to the Anode). The VFET amp which uses a tube on its front end could therefore not be a symmetrical design – which troubled me.

However while lying in bed a week ago or so I realised I could mirror the current from the Cathode of the tube and then design similar fully symmetrical Gain stage as I’ve designed for the MDAC2.

I spent these past few days with the computer simulator working on the details of the new “symmetrical” tube circuit – with not only confirmed the circuit works, but also with pretty impressive results

I also spent time on designing the VFET ClassA output stage*, which resulted in a VFET / MOSFET hybrid output topology – the VFET device with its linear “Triode characteristics” compounded with a MOSFET to form an ultra linear output device.

*Before I could even start to work on the design I had to create a computer spice model of the VFET devices – as no accurate model existed for them as be last manufactured in the late 1970's they pre-date Spice simulators. I had to purchase HP / Agilent Semiconductor analyser & High performance LCR meter to create “realistic” models. These analysers cost me over GBP10K second hand Oh well, I guess I'll be even more proud of the design when its completed

Its such a shame that its not possible to “Mass Produce” such an amplifier as I’m stunned by the innate linearity of this compound output device – with an open loop (No Global Feedback) THD of lessthen 0.0005% 100W 8 ohms 20KHz (-106dB 2nd & -109dB 3rd)…. consider that the VFET amp stage will only need to produce 10W ClassA and closed loop so THD will be much lower on the final amp!

I’m really pleasantly surprised how linear this 'VFET / MOSFET' compound output device is – when I look at the bigger picture of the Amplifier design it brings a smile to my face as its such unique and “crazy” (in a good way) design

The MDAC2 / VFET amp should be a stunning combination!"

 

[2ManyBoxes]

I think it's worth organising yourselves into a definite group instead of disparate people, gather whatever evidence you can and approach Pro-ject with the whole sorry saga. They might take pity on you and offer some of the products at cost, providing you're interested. Or they might tell you to take a running jump. They could say that, because resistor B is not the same, it's a totally different circuit. As you're facing total loss of all money, it seems to be worth a try.

As for the amps, do you really want to have any further dealings with someone who appears to be less than straight?

 

[Stunsworth]

Stunsworth i've wrote my investment off, but some here have invested thousands in amps that as far as i can remember and as discussed at the time were going to made using discrete components, it shouldn't be difficult if you are that good a designer to just get on with it and deliver them...

What i find is, it's always best to do the right thing.

Like you I’ve written off my investment, and I agree that the sponsors of the VFET amps have been very shabbily treated given the scale of their investment, the relative simplicity of the project and the total lack of development. There’s at least one person on eBay who makes small numbers of the First Watt designs that are in the public domain, so small scale construction shouldn’t be an obstacle for amp production.

 

[Space is the Place]

A Lakewest Investor waiting for his MDAC board to arrive...2014

A Lakewest Investor waiting for his MDAC board to arrive...2015

A Lakewest Investor waiting for his MDAC board to arrive...2016

A Lakewest Investor waiting for his MDAC board to arrive...2017

A Lakewest Investor waiting for his MDAC board to arrive...2018

A Lakewest Investor waiting for his MDAC board to arrive...2019

You get the idea...

 

[booja30]

... There’s at least one person on eBay who makes small numbers of the First Watt designs that are in the public domain, so small scale construction shouldn’t be an obstacle for amp production.

While the designs are available, the intent was for DIY self builds, not building to sell. This came up on DiyAudio recently and both Pass and the eBay seller (Joe Henry) got involved in the thread. JH agreed to stop building Pass/FirstWatt amps and modified his remaining listing descriptions to not mention Pass/FirstWatt/DiyAudio.

Back in topic, I agree there are many hobbyists out there that could translate a schematic to PCB, build, test, etc.

Who knows how far the design got but if it was near completion it should be released to the stakeholders and they could manage the rest with far more efficiency I'd imagine.

 

[gints]

My audio is sorted at the moment. I would not be interested in just any other standart dac as quick fix for situation any time soon. And life is too short for going on and on and on about few hundred spended 5-6 years ago, plenty other troubles. All we know how much John's idea of good DAC changed back and forth, and now finally evolved in something quite unique, I think. I would like to remind that we paid money to develop a dac, and not to build a dac, lot of a new creativity involved, many tries and fails as well. Success comes with expierence, heard in one movie. For that reason I would like to see it finished as JohnW intented it to be. To get help from something with resources he probably will need to compromise with his IP, but in return, JohnW, I hope you get back satisfaction that your idea is out there in world and people will see it as great. Just try to get it out without quick commercialisation compromises on design.
Yes, I am in Vfets as well. Given that number of people involved in dac project is much more, I cannot ask to do something about it before this dac saga is finished. I remember that there was idea of very tight integration of Vfet and dac, so probably today it has to be rethinked anyway. Not a best time for that.

Good luck to get understanding partner aboard, JohnW!

 

[44000khz]

I would like to remind that we paid money to develop a dac, and not to build a dac...

I would like to remind you that that's not true.

Also note that it doesn't say anything about the money not being refundable.

We paid money to develop a DAC and the option to buy a DAC board at cost. This implies a DAC should be built.

Actually referring to:
http://mdac2.referata.com/wiki/Main_Page

"Over the course of 4~5 months these 'backers' would be asked to send monthly installments to support the development, prototyping and ultimately first production run. At the end of this period they would have already paid up for their Next Generation Mainboards and would be the first to receive them".

 

[Stunsworth]

I would like to remind that we paid money to develop a dac, and not to build a dac, lot of a new creativity involved, many tries and fails as well.

What we paid for was a drop in replacement board for the MDAC. That then morphed into a complete new DAC - the FDAC - and that was put to one side while the MDAC2 (aka DEVDAC) was developed. All of these changes of direction (including no doubt some I’ve missed) were instigated by John. He moved us onto a fully built new DAC.

Now that Jarek has left the project I feel our chances of getting a finished DAC have diminished, and our only real possibility of getting anything is for an established manufacturer to take John’s design and offer us a DAC at cost - and I’ve no idea if ‘at cost’ would mean manufacturing cost or wholesale cost.

 

[peter312]

Possibly. I was reacting in part to the suggestion that intellectual property paid for by crowdfunding with a clear promise of physical product delivery had then been sold commercially to another company without fulfilling that clearly stated obligation. I’d like to know a legal view on that.

Presumably someone could get a free initial consultation with a solicitor to see whether this is something that could be pursued. It may even be possible to get a firm on a no win, no fee basis if the case is strong enough.

 

[russel]

Presumably someone could get a free initial consultation with a solicitor to see whether this is something that could be pursued. It may even be possible to get a firm on a no win, no fee basis if the case is strong enough.

Be careful with no win no fee, if you win and bankrupt the defendant then the lawyers will recover fees from the plaintiff, you didn’t think the lawyers would lose out did you?

 

[AndyU]

What we paid for was a drop in replacement board for the MDAC. That then morphed into a complete new DAC - the FDAC - and that was put to one side while the MDAC2 (aka DEVDAC) was developed. All of these changes of direction (including no doubt some I’ve missed) were instigated by John. He moved us onto a fully built new DAC.

Now that Jarek has left the project I feel our chances of getting a finished DAC have diminished, and our only real possibility of getting anything is for an established manufacturer to take John’s design and offer us a DAC at cost - and I’ve no idea if ‘at cost’ would mean manufacturing cost or wholesale cost.

All you can realistically expect is that John uses his design fee to reimburse you all pro-rata. You can then individually decide whether or not to spend it on whatever DAC gets produced. Cleanest solution I can think of.

 

[Stunsworth]

Presumably someone could get a free initial consultation with a solicitor to see whether this is something that could be pursued. It may even be possible to get a firm on a no win, no fee basis if the case is strong enough.

I couldn’t see any law firm taking on the case, it would be against an individual not a mega-corporation, and even if the case was won there’s no guarantee that there would be any money to pay a settlement. Plus it would need to take place in a foreign country.

For what it’s worth I don’t think there was deliberate fraud, I think John just found himself grossly out of his depth when it came to the manufacturing process - coupled with an inability to sign off a final design.

 

[Stuart Frazer]

For what it’s worth I don’t think there was deliberate fraud, I think John just found himself grossly out of his depth when it came to the manufacturing process - coupled with an inability to sign off a final design.

I largely agree with this. It is clear to see that John is rather unorganised in a business management sense and as a designer he is unable to stick to clear goal paths - he goes off in tangents with his design focus. This is not meant to be a criticism, but he would benefit from working under a project manager, which should help keep the focus on what is needed and the end product target. 7 years to get this far and no sign of nearing an end product really is ridiculous.

 

[Stuart Frazer]

It seems to me that @AudioZephyr is either Jarek or @JohnW himself under a different username.

Anyway, it would be useful for you to come back to this thread and interact with us to take the project forward in a civil and constructive manner (this applies to all of us).

 

[davidsrsb]

I spent these past few days with the computer simulator working on the details of the new “symmetrical” tube circuit – with not only confirmed the circuit works, but also with pretty impressive results

I also spent time on designing the VFET ClassA output stage*, which resulted in a VFET / MOSFET hybrid output topology – the VFET device with its linear “Triode characteristics” compounded with a MOSFET to form an ultra linear output device.

*Before I could even start to work on the design I had to create a computer spice model of the VFET devices – as no accurate model existed for them as be last manufactured in the late 1970's they pre-date Spice simulators. I had to purchase HP / Agilent Semiconductor analyser & High performance LCR meter to create “realistic” models. These analysers cost me over GBP10K second hand Oh well, I guess I'll be even more proud of the design when its completed

Its such a shame that its not possible to “Mass Produce” such an amplifier as I’m stunned by the innate linearity of this compound output device – with an open loop (No Global Feedback) THD of lessthen 0.0005% 100W 8 ohms 20KHz (-106dB 2nd & -109dB 3rd)…. consider that the VFET amp stage will only need to produce 10W ClassA and closed loop so THD will be much lower on the final amp!

I see JW as a very talented DAC and digital audio designer. Power amplifiers are an unrelated area and history is full of simulator victims. Many time designers have chased vanishingly low THD and the results have been disappointing. I used VFETs about 1980 in RF amplifiers and found that they had some very strange undocumented non-linearities

 

[davidsrsb]

For those interested this is the Model Railway company thread I was referring too. There is a much longer one elsewhere on that site from the period up to and post it going bust.

https://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/i...dels-company-wound-up-and-liquidation-closed/

Not saying this is the same situation but I think there are similarities.

The MAG-LEV turntable, where the company is trading, but not delivering to its Kickstarter sponsors is another
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/245727224/mag-lev-audio-the-first-levitating-turntable/comments

 

[flapland]

The MAG-LEV turntable, where the company is trading, but not delivering to its Kickstarter sponsors is another
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/245727224/mag-lev-audio-the-first-levitating-turntable/comments

Yes there does seem to be a commercial product in that situation as well with the sponsors left in the lurch.

 

[fred sonnen]

In Germany we would say "Kesseltreiben" to the show here. A small group of naysayers (metaforically meant, I can't think of a better non-vulgar word right now) comes out every time after John has signed up here and every time the world ends even more monstrously. Rumors / (mis?) interpretations become truths and one fairy tale builds on the next. Everything is bad. And John is the very last one anyway.
"Too bad" that we have separation of powers. He'd be hanging from the nearest tree by now. Disgusting.
The vast majority of us have always protested loudly at every turn. And wasn't it true that the vast majority of us always said: Not one more feature? Ceep it simple!
Oh no, it was the other way around. That's too bad...
Today it has unfortunately become commonplace that a vocal minority pretends to speak for everyone. And of course, only one is to blame. It's so nice and simple. Self-reflection? What for? Could be embarrassing. I'd rather point my finger at someone else.

No, I'm not a fanboy! It's just a little one-sided.
The poor status reports are an insult. And what happens with the VFET sponsors, I don't even wanna think about that...

I repeat myself. A valid objection. But I take the same right, which is what a small group of people here show every week.

 

[StephenB]

Update from JW winging its way I think

kudos to our member offering to help