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VU Meters: Let's See 'Em!!

Yamaki Electric Co, Ltd. is another Japanese pro-audio instrument company, of course including VU meters (VU meter units as well as multichannel VU monitors) widely used in professional audio-visual engineering scene (in Japan);
https://www.yamaki-ec.co.jp/
Quite regretfully, it looks they do not have English pages, English catalogues and manuals.

For my multichannel audio project, I am interested in this 8-Ch VU monitor (W 710 mm x H 80 mm, 4.5 kg);
https://www.yamaki-ec.co.jp/product/vum-a208/
https://www.yamaki-ec.co.jp/wp-content/uploads/2019/08/SS-24490-3_01VUM-A208.pdf
having eight (8) of rather large CVU-80 VU meter unit (panel face W 76 mm x H 35 mm). The backlight color of each of the 8 VU meters can be selected (white, yellow, purple, red, light-blue, green, blue, off) and the bright/dark switchable for all the meters together.
 
Interesting!
Yesterday, I found Yamaki VUM-A208 working in a studio (captured from a TV program) with different backlight colors;
WS003475.JPG



WS003476.JPG


It looks very attractive, at least for me for the possible use in my multichannel audio system...
 
I just found/noticed a Japan domestic garage VU meter manufacturer, SUZUDES10;
http://suzudes10.shop-pro.jp/?mode=cate&cbid=1421732&csid=0
Each of the latest CE30R65E2FD-II series VU meters (four different backlight LED colors) has two of the nice professional-use glass-face large VU meter R65 (W111 mm, H77 mm) from Nishizawa Electric Meters Manufacturing Co., Ltd. (NEMM Co., Ltd.).
WS003479.JPG


WS003480_r2.jpg


The garage company SUZUDES10 has a special contract with MEMM Co., Ltd. for production and supply of their conventional (off-the-catalogue) VU meter R65 (W111 mm, H77 mm, glass face) with bulb backlight, and SUZUDES10 replaces the bulb backlights with color LEDs. SUZUDES10 is also selling the R65 VU meter unit of original bulb light as well as four different color LED ones;
http://suzudes10.shop-pro.jp/?mode=cate&cbid=2774641&csid=0

For the LED color variations, SUZUDES10 also contracted with NEMM Co., Ltd. to have white scale plate in R65, instead of the original pale yellow one, for better LED color representations.
https://ameblo.jp/suzudes20/entry-12716821866.html

I am very happy finding such a small niche VU meter manufacturer is still alive and active in Japan, even though I do not know whether they would accept purchase order from abroad or not.

Edit:
The detailed dimension and DIY mounting info can be found in SUZUDES20's blog site.
 
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Is there a list of recommended VU meters? I'd add some for the old school visuals if nothing else.
 
WillBrink said:
Is there a list of recommended VU meters? I'd add some for the old school visuals if nothing else.
Click to expand...
I would get an old tapedeck if you like the style of them. The silver Yamaha decks have very nice VUs:
yamaha-k850_219660.jpg


And here is the one i use currently:
PXL_20211013_205801044.PORTRAIT.jpg
 
TheBatsEar said:
I would get an old tapedeck if you like the style of them. The silver Yamaha decks have very nice VUs:
yamaha-k850_219660.jpg


And here is the one i use currently:
Click to expand...
I don't see myself searching for old tape decks to find UV meters. I assume there's plenty of stand alone UV meters out there.
 
WillBrink said:
I don't see myself searching for old tape decks to find UV meters. I assume there's plenty of stand alone UV meters out there.
Click to expand...
Right, thought you meant "something old" by old school.
 
Something like this?

Untitled-1.jpg
 
Last edited:
Doodski said:
Hehe. I was thinking it looks like Soviet era nuclear generating station instrumentation. :D
Click to expand...
I have much more pleasant memories of the Altec stuff. They were still making the Green Line when I worked there.

The green vibe was popular with lab gear. This is a vintage Bruel & Kjaer oscillator from the same period.

vintage-bruel-kjaer-beat-frequency_360_aeadd5576d8d9c9b2987b32b0ee4987c.jpg
 
MakeMineVinyl said:
I have much more pleasant memories of the Altec stuff. They were still making the Green Line when I worked there.

The green vibe was popular with lab gear. This is a vintage Bruel & Kjaer oscillator from the same period.

View attachment 194948
Click to expand...
All nice stuff. I've owned those green ~18" AL woofers and a very large AL green horn. Nice paint finish. There's a name machinists use for that finish. Can't remember what it is but it's common to see machinists' equipment in that green too. The finish looks sorta like metallic stuff in green paint and applied to look like orange peel texture. I've tried various methods to imitate it but no success.
 
Doodski said:
All nice stuff. I've owned those green ~18" AL woofers and a very large AL green horn. Nice paint finish. There's a name machinists use for that finish. Can't remember what it is but it's common to see machinists' equipment in that green too. The finish looks sorta like metallic stuff in green paint and applied to look like orange peel texture. I've tried various methods to imitate it but no success.
Click to expand...
The official name for the color of the green paint Altec Lansing used was "African Green".
 
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