Solo Ultra Linear DIY upgrade

I believe that I am the first to buy the Solo Ultra Linear DIY upgrade and as such I would like to report how this turned out.

I ordered this via the online shop which was very easy to negotiate,in fact one of the best shops of this variety I have used,very slick ! The upgrade is in fact a completely new PCB which arrived just over a week later by UPS,I was given notice of dispatch with a tracking number by e-mail,all very reassuring.

The DIY aspect of this upgrade is pretty straightforward and is simply a matter of swapping over the UL PCB withe existing board,this is how that was done.

First off I connected my earth cable to my watch strap (a length of wire connected to a bared radiator pipe one end and the other with a croc' clip fitted under the watch strap),I do seem to be a collector of static so a necessary precaution !

Dealing with the front panel of the Solo the volume knob was removed by loosening the small grub screw and then the nut securing the pot to the front panel was undone.Next the 4 small countersunk screws were removed using a 2mm hex key.This enables the front panel to be now removed and after removing the 4 similar screws on the rear panel the entire PCB together with the rear panel can now be slid rearwards out of the casing.

The rear panel now needs to be removed from the PCB,firstly the small black self tapping screw in the centre of the RCA connector panel is removed and then the grounding post needs to be disconnected.

This was in fact the only fiddly bit in the whole operation as when undoing the nut securing the post, the screw itself turned as well,it was obviously necessary to hold the screw from the PCB side but there was not enough room for a conventional Philips screwdriver.After a search through the toolbox I unearthed my "right-angled" screwdriver with a flat blade one end and a Philips drive the other,this fitted nicely in the space and the nut was removed and the screw taken out of the tag on the end of the ground wire of the PCB ,the rear panel was then removed from the PCB.

Fitting the new UL PCB is essentially the reverse of the above,however some care needs to be taken to align the rear panel over the RCA input sockets,also the ground wire on the new board needs to be re-connected via the screw removed above to make the ground post this being secured by the nut on the outside of the panel.This assembly is then slid back into the casing using the lowest grooves in the case sides to locate the PCB and the 8 screws are replaced in the front and rear panels.Last job is to secure the volume pot to the front panel with the large washer and nut,take care not to overtighten,just nip it up,same goes for the end panel screws.

So there we are,"the job's a goodun'",all in it took about 20 minutes,if anyone has any doubts there really is nothing that is too difficult,if you can change a 13 amp plug, you can do this upgrade !

The great thing is of course is that this is all made here in sunny Yorkshire so if there are any snags the designer and manufacturer is just a phone call or an email away !

I will report later on how the new Solo UL performs,at the moment it is burning in 24/7 via an FM tuner on Classic FM,I'll give it an initial 100 hours and see how it sounds then.