Restoring an Old Mixer part 3

In addition to the Studiomaster 4 into 8, I've got some other dusty old 19" rack gear. So for the last part of this series, I built a cheap and simple rack to hold my now-fully-functioning mixer and other rack units. This was accomplished in no time at all thanks to the assistance of my dear friend Varun (aka Zebra, Benjamin Sisko & Space Trash). It's made out of wood (3 pieces) held together with L-brackets. For mounting the gear, we screwed threaded metal inserts into the wood corresponding to the holes on standard rack rails. It turned out good! Check the pictures. I've got a link here to download a little mp3 of my favorite drum machine (SCI Drumtraks) with EQ/pan/effects applied to individual drum sounds using the mixer. In case anybody is curious the other rack units from top to bottom are Ibanez DUE400, Zoom Studio 1204 and Kawai XD-5 (my secret weapon!).

-> Download the MP3!


Looks pro man!


Light it up!


Most of the cords are hidden.


Replaced missing slider knobs with red screw protectors.


The End.

Restoring an Old Mixer part 2

It's time to discuss the Studiomaster 8 into 4 once more! This project has evolved into something more spectacular (part 3 coming soon) but for now, let's talk about what it took to get this mixer working again! It shouldn't take too long because the fix was simple. I posted previously that the mixer's LED VU meters were malfunctioning. This symptom led us to discover the real problem. My brother Steve (who also gave me the mixer) deserves props for this one. He determined (via science) that the LED's circuit was not receiving enough voltage (neither was anything in the mixer). We later realized that the Studiomaster mixer, being British, was simply not set for American wall outlets. This turned out to be true, although it was not set for European outlets either (strange). There was an extremely difficult to locate method for switching the voltage to 120. It involved pulling out a square piece of plastic located on the back of the mixer (which contained a fuse) and rotating it to the proper setting. Beyond that, all I did was clean the noisy potentiometers (104 knobs and 12 faders). The pots were all a pain but the slider pots were really messed up. I took each of them apart, cleaned their parts, and removed bits of broken plastic. Stay tuned for part 3, the satisfying and flabbergasting conclusion to Restoring an Old Mixer.


See the tiny hole on each pot? That's where you squirt DeoxIT!


Look Ma -- No knobs!


The Faders were disassembled for cleaning.


Check out these guts.


Each channel has its own identical circuit.

Restoring an Old Mixer part 1

Some number of years ago my spectacular brother managed to acquire a free semi-operational mixer from a club in Minnesota known as The Cave. Needless to say, It's been collecting dust in my parents' garage for years. It's a 1980 Studiomaster 8 into 4. The name pretty much sums up how it works. It's got 8 input channels and 4 output channels. Each input can be sent to any output or combo of outputs. All 12 channels have a fantastic EQ section. Here's what Studiomaster's website says about it:

"Lots of features, good audio specification and the first departure for the company from VU meters to a more rugged LED bargraph 'ladders' for the metering. It could be used as a desk top mixer or rack mounted and with all the connectors at the rear many sound and Audio Visual companies made it their standard audio console."

Funny that it should mention the "rugged" LED meters because those are definitely broken on my unit. Props to Studiomaster for having a history page dedicated to their legacy products. This kind of information is invaluable to collectors of refuse like myself. This post is just an introduction to what is going to be a very exciting series on my latest project which is to restore this mixing console. It's exactly what I need to produce hot tracks for Orchestral Colour Records. More to come including better pictures!


LED "ladders" look cool but are BROKEN.


Check out my shag carpet.