Recapping an ARC LS-5 mkiii

@gs5556 appreciate the heads up. I’m still learning all the ins and outs on caps/etc., so thanks for clarifying.

@tecknik Thanks. Yeah, I jumped on it last year because I know they don’t come up very often and I really wanted to see how well it paired with my Vandersteen 3A Sigs (it works pretty darn well).

@adg101 I certainly have a tech who is capable...and that ain’t me lol (A guy I know who has rebuilt my Aragon equipment and has a pretty good reputation on DIY Audio).

I’ve reached out to ARC on what may be involved. I contacted Pyramid Audio who resurrected my "unserviceable" (per ARC) D400mkii and it sounds pretty darn good...but Pyramid hasn’t seen a ton of LS-5’s and they’re risk averse to modding or changing anything.

I took out the original Sovteks and bought some "platinum matched" gold pin EH tubes from Upscale Audio because they’re basically the only 6922 they recommend for ARC gear. I have 4 Amprex 7308’s, but those I haven’t personally put on a tube tester and didn’t feel like sporting for four more at the moment. (I have 2 Willsenton integrated amps I’ve rolled tubes in and, well, don’t feel like spending more than the $400 I’ve already spent on those EH tubes).

@spatialking thank you. I have a guy who is pretty knowledgeable, and has some advanced test equipment. Appreciate the heads up.

I’ll update this thread when I hear ARC’s response. I know a lot of this classic gear (regardless of brand) from the 80’s and 90’s at least needs to be looked at because what sounds okay and what measurements show are probably two different things (for example, the DC offset was completely wack on my Aragon 4004, and that was after it had been serviced by the factory recommended repair shop...turns out it was a bad transistor).
 

Ah, okay. Thanks.

Think I have settled on what I’m going to do.

On the LS-5 mkiii it looks there is 1 output cap and 2 bypass caps per channel. Going to upgrade each output cap to a Stealthcap and upgrade the bypass caps to Dynamicaps. (That will still be in the "voicing" that ARC uses since their REF stuff gets Stealthcaps and Dynamicaps are made by TRT as well).

Then I’ll let the tech replace anything else that is out of spec (I’ll ship to Pyramid Audio, who resurrected my D400 mkii, which ARC now calls "unserviceable").

Thanks @djohn. Scott looks EXACTLY like the kinda guy I want tweaking my equipment.

Also, would love to see pics of the work in this thread and what exactly was replaced with what.

Glad to hear you feel the differences were noticeable.

@jafox sounds like you’re a huge Michael Elliott fan lol

I appreciate you giving me your pre-amp progression. Makes me want to search out an Aria Audio preamp, especially since they’re collectors items now (went down an Internet rabbit hole, and found this guy who may have gotten his hands on the last one: https://forums.stevehoffman.tv/threads/upgrading-my-system-from-denon-elac-to-aria-audio-meadowlark.1097306/) What did the Aria do the Aesthetix didn’t? (I ask because people seem to wax poetic about the Callipso). Someone should make a schematic of those Aria pieces because I don’t think any exist.

I guess a lot of what people love about the LS-5 is nostalgia, and nostalgia is a dirty liar. The reason I am thinking of getting work done to the LS-5 is that I think it will be cheaper in the short term to update it. Reason why is I have Vandersteen speakers, and that’s one of the default set ups with Vandies.

As @djohn mentioned, he’s very happy with the updates to his LS-5 from Scott Frankland. Per Scott, he upgraded 16 caps/etc that were (or might be) age related wear items. Scott did mention he didn’t touch the coupling caps and thought there could be further improvements there. Doing the same thing DJohn had done would be in the $1000 range.

@erik_squires reason I thought about coupling/bypass caps is because I think ARC offers (or at least used to) offer the TRT Stealthcaps as an upgrade and that would (at least in theory) preserve the ARC house sound.

Thanks @tomic601.

I'm there and I think we've interacted :)

@jafox okay, now this is funny...because I have two differentially balanced preamps.

One is an LS-5 mkiii. The other is...wait for it...an SFL-2 that's been updated by Parts Connexion and had the coupling caps replaced by the previous owner with VCap ODAMs bypassed by CuTF VCaps.

Now, I did a very brief listening test in a terrible room, and I couldn't hear any immediate differences...the LS-5 has EH gold pin 6922 tubes from Upscale Audio and the SFL-2 has some so-so regular EH tubes of unknown provenance with two Reflektors.

Anywho, if you were going to recommend a preamp in the $3500, what would it be? I ask because I am seriously considering sending the LS-5 to Scott F. I've read some reviews that state the mkii had "unatural" mid range bloom that was "fixed" by the mkiii version...but, you know...don't believe anything that you read on the Internet.

I'm also considering replacing the Solen caps in the power supply of the SFL-2 because I'm a tweaker and I can't leave well enough alone LOL

Thanks @djohn. I'll make sure I do that re: Scott.

Also, I went with the gold pin EH tubes because that's what Upscale has as their recommendation for the 6922 tubes on their site re: ARC equipment.

I will contact Brent Jesse about tube recs for the LS-5 and the SFL-2. I know that Chris Johnson recommends the Reflecktor tubes for the SF gear...but I'm interested to know what Brent says.

Appreciate the preamp reccos @jafox.