Hello,

I have just received my first LOMO 19a13 and am very happy man.
I was wondering if you could tell me a bit more about this mic. What do you use it mainly for ? all the things I should know ? and some advises. Is the tube difficult to find if broken etc....

Thanks a lot.
Alex

congratulations!

I got one about 2 months ago. It fares well in many applications, the following have been most succesful:

drum overhead microphone, very smooth and bright wiithout being too harsh

male vox... outsanding

upright bass, on the body, very full sound

bass guitar

some gtr amps


mtar

How much do these mics go for? I've never seen one for sale.

They're pretty rare.

Chris Garges
Charlotte, NC

All the parts are Russian (or should be). The lore is that they were copying Neumann designs, but I don't know how true that is. It would be great if we had a crate of whatever their version of the AC701k, and VF14 tubes somewhere. So the capsules might look like, and even sometimes sound similar to their Neumann peers, but if you put a u48 next to a 19a13 they would not sound identical. Not saying one is better or worse, just different animals. I can't help you on the schematic, but let me know if you find one. Lomo mics pretty simple designs. You should be able to keep yours going will not much pain.

I am curious if anyone has a schematic and a few details on this microphone. I have been collecting various classic mic schematics, building and modifying a couple mics at home, and learning about the designs in general. The specific circuit details of the 19a13 are elusive, though I see many of the other Lomo mics are documented at http://www.xaudia.com/xaudia/Schematics/Pages/Lomo.html...maybe it is the same layout as another model?The mic is often compared to a U47, but is it really a k47 type capsule? From guts pics it looks edge terminated...not sure on the backplate design. What tube does it use? Transformer looks hefty, any details? Has anyone tried building these DIY? FM Steve told me a lot of this info in session, but I didn't write it down and in the frenzy of a quick session forgot the specifics. I really like the sound of the mic and from browsing on here, it looks to be a top choice for vocals for a few other forum member studios as well. Thanks in advance!EDIT: sorry if this should be in the Tech discussion, I saw this topic already had a thread and didn't know if I should start a new one there.

greg wrote:All the parts are Russian (or should be). The lore is that they were copying Neumann designs, but I don't know how true that is. It would be great if we had a crate of whatever their version of the AC701k, and VF14 tubes somewhere.In my experience, Russian parts can be very cheap on eBay and various surplus dealers. I've bought lots of NOS 12AX7 workalikes for less than ‚¬1/ea for guitar amps, it may be possible that high quality similar tubes are available. I think that anything used in military hardware was kept in production as a legacy part for very long stretches of time. I have a box of germanium transistors with 1989 date codes on it.

I rebuilt an old mic which I posted here one time with the 19A19 circuit, and used a Lundahl 1538 transformer, if I remember correctly. I can't remember the 6C6B or it's equivalent. The capsules probably have the largest sonic impact in microphones, generally speaking.

Thanks for the response Greg!I did some more digging and found a few more details on this mic. It looks like a 6C6B triode. I also notice the 19a19 uses a more commonly available 6S31B triode, perhaps a possibility for my DIY project? As many novices, I did the Royer TapeOp Mic using the 5840... a fairly similar simple design as far as the amp section.Also from looking at pictures of the capsule backplate, it seems to resemble a ck12 style. Nice pics of the 19a13 are here http://krosh.tehnologia.info/forum/viewtopic.php?t=10349 and my comparison is based on this site which has a nice exploded diagram and description http://www.saturn-sound.com/Curio's/akg's\_ck12\_capsule.htm Again I am a novice, so feel free to correct me.Despite my query on these specific details, I understand that the quality of a microphone's performance has less to do with its "bits and pieces", but the sum total of the implementation of each part, capsule/amp/transformer...and I have a long way to go on understanding this. Still learning a bit about a good sounding mic which I have a recorded example of is pretty exciting!