- High
End, no compromise components and build quality
- Hand
Made in small series, 50 units at a time
- Capsules
selected with very tight tolerances
- Point-to
point wiring with silver-plated wires
- All
soldering points made with Mudorf Msolder Supreme SilverGold solder (Sn88, 6Cu, 1,8Ag, 9,5Au)
- Solid
wood microphone box, flight case. Every mic,
box and psu has a badge with the serial number.
The
Telefunken ELA M 250/251 was made for Telefunken by AKG after Neumann
discontinued its OEM production of the Telefunken U-47. The Golden Age
Premier GA-251 is inspired by this truly classic microphone model.
The GA-251 shares the same design goal that was set for the GA-47: to
offer the classic qualities and advantages that a vintage unit in
perfect condition would provide and doing so at a very low price point.
Having gone through a number of prototypes that were compared to great
sounding vintage units in different recording settings, everyone
involved agreed that the goal was reached.
Bo Medin, October 2018
The
MKII version has the following improvements:
-
A new CNC produced base plate made of brass.
-
Improved, more even grille
-
The inner design is more tidy and stable using a an expensive Rogers
circuit board with point-point wiring resulting in an ever more refined
sound quality.
-
A new metal flight case and black cardboard box
GA-251
build info
Microphone
body and grille
The microphone body is made of brass, the grille is made of iron.
The grille, which is a critical component affecting the sound character
is similar to the one in the 251.
Capsule
The GA-251 uses a 34mm K251 style capsule. Being a dual-sided one
it provides both cardioid and omni polar patterns.
In order to get a good consistency between units, for each production
run of 50 pcs GA-251 units, approximately 200 capsules were evaluated in
order to find 50 capsules with specifications that lie within the tight
tolerances.
Specifications:
Backplate material: brass
Capsule diameter: 34 mm
Membrane diameter: 34 mm
Membrane material: 6 micron gold-coated mylar.
The sensitivity of the front and back side of the capsule do not differ
more than 0.3 dB. The sensitivity between different capsules do not
differ more than 0.5 dB.
The tight manufacturing tolerances lead to a very good consistency
between different GA-251 units.
The capsule is specially designed to complement the electronic circuit
of the GA-251 to achieve a frequency response curve with a nice balance
between the high, middle and low frequencies.
The result is a very smooth sound with a warm bottom and airy top end
just like ELA M251.
Tube
The GA-251 uses a NOS Phillip 5480W super low noise pentode tube
connected in triode mode in order to decrease the noise. The tube has
the following character:
- balanced sound response
- a smooth and warm sound character and a low noise level
- long lifespan
The GA-251 amplifier features a new proprietary circuit designed around
the NOS 5840W tube.
Output
transformer
The GA-251 transformer is specially designed with a 10:1 AMI style dual
bobbin transformer. It is made from permalloy steel sheet from USA and enameled
wire from Germany. It offers a wonderful sound character with
a high resolution and great balance between the low, middle and high
frequency bands.
Capacitors
and resistors
The coupling capacitor is made by Solen from France. It is a high
balanced film capacitor made from MKP material with pure oxygen-free
copper connections. It has a very delicate and balanced sound.
The capsule capacitor uses NOS Siemens antique grade polystyrene
capacitor to reduce loss.
The tube cathode bypass capacitor uses an ELNA OFC Cerafine high end
hifi capacitor from Japan with oxygen free copper connections exhibiting
a very sweet and delicate character, not least for vocals.
The other capacitors are of the low loss polystyrene type.
The resistor used for setting the capsule voltage is a high quality DALE
1% metal film resistor. The result is a very stable and consistent
operating level leading to better consistency between different GA-251
units.
The plate resistor uses a non-inductive resistor of the United States
IRC audio with pure copper connections. The sound level is rich and full
bodied.
Mic
interior
The electronic circuit is built with point-to-point wiring. All
soldering points made with Mudorf Msolder Supreme silvergold solder.
All of the internal wiring uses pure silver wire which decrease the loss during
the circuit transmission, also it can ensure the sound quality is
transparent.
All components which are connect to electrical ground are
connected to the ground plane on the circuit board. All other
component connections use point to point wiring which results in
virtually zero loss and crosstalk.
Power
supply transformer and electrolytic capacitors
The vintage style power supply PSU uses a high power R-style
transformer with a low noise level and minimum stray field.
A simple but effective circuit uses dual-stage filtering for the
filament voltage. The High voltage is also precisely filtered and
stabilized using an ON semiconductor zener diode.
The polar pattern switch is placed on the power supply so that the
recording engineer can change the polar pattern between Cardioid and
Omni remotely.
A ground lift switch will help to solve mains power related noise issues
that can appear in some cases
Mic
cable
The cable is specially produced using 99.99% pure oxygen-free copper,
Teflon insulation, tin foil and 98% kitmesh which is a very high density
braided cable shield. It has a very open and smooth sound. The
microphone connector is an aviation style plug providing solid connections and
a long life.
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