Retro VU Meter

Thread Starter

d'Arsonval

Joined Nov 8, 2012
7
In stumbling upon this site a few years back... I never registered until recently. "This morning actually".

There's a lot of really interesting "things" people are working on here.

As a [project] person since childhood... I'm finally able to move my Retro VU Meter along, and segue on to something else.
A Belated zillion years later, I'm posting video of the device at this YouTube URL:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WwFNs8WDc0M&feature=plcp

The complete "dated" construction sequence can be found here:

http://www.pbase.com/visual_first/building_a_vu_meter

It's fun making and doing, and to all of you... Keep Going.

John
 

Wendy

Joined Mar 24, 2008
23,415
Please read the rules of the Completed Projects forum.

When posting a project please include the following information:

  1. A clear title that describes the project appended by the word 'Project:', for example "Project: 555 Audio Oscillator".
  2. A list of parts, equipment, software used.
  3. Details of any theory, references or information that may be applicable.
  4. Any schematics, source code, etc.
  5. A short description of what to do.
  6. In the interests of manageability and security, project files/code/schematics must be locally stored. Links may be used to provide supplementary information, however they must not provide the substance of the project.
This project has sat in limbo basically because it didn't meet the above requirements. If you want to resubmit this entry please rework the entry to meet the requirements, then drop one of the moderators a PM pointing to it. If it is acceptable a moderator can move it back to the Completed Projects forum and clean up notices and suggestions (making them invisible).

All documents must be hosted locally. AAC allows for attachments and albums, use them. You Tube video links allowed, but they in no way constitute proper documentation.
 

bountyhunter

Joined Sep 7, 2009
2,512
FYI, nothing that size could actually be a true VU meter which has to meet specific performance specs to be called a VU meter. The mass of the assembly would make it too slow. From one reference:

Ideally, a VU meter is supposed to take 300ms to stabilise, and should show only minor overshoot. Very few so-called VU meters come even close to the specification, and the little units on tape machines and sometimes provided on power amplifiers generally bear no resemblance to a real VU meter except that the meter dial is divided into the proper number of divisions, and has a red section from 0VU to +3VU. Oh yes, it will also say 'VU' on the meter face as well.
and

A VU meter is classified as a quasi-average reading device. It almost completely
ignores peak waveforms. With the somewhat arbitrarily chosen rise
time of 300 us, engineers have developed certain compensations, such as
riding dialogue 3 to 5 dB below music, to control the peak levels in an
attempt to attain consistent listening levels. The standard broadcast practice
is to allow for a crest factor of at least 10 dB to cover the peak excursions of
the waveform that the VU meter is too slow to indicate.
http://www.dorrough.com/PDF/40ab.pdf
 
Last edited:

Thread Starter

d'Arsonval

Joined Nov 8, 2012
7
"FYI, nothing that size could actually be a true VU meter which has to meet specific performance specs to be called a VU meter. The mass of the assembly would make it too slow".

It's a "Model" of a vintage device. Not intended to measure anything.
I apologize for ever exposing it to this website.
Remove the post as needed.

John
 

bountyhunter

Joined Sep 7, 2009
2,512
"FYI, nothing that size could actually be a true VU meter which has to meet specific performance specs to be called a VU meter. The mass of the assembly would make it too slow".

It's a "Model" of a vintage device. Not intended to measure anything.


John
Then I genuinely do not understand why the youtube video showed it was being fed signal tones of various frequencies and giving the dB levels it displayed. It looked to me like it was trying to measure something.

And the title of the video was not Model VU meter, it was "HUGE VU Meter" and the title of this thread is "Retro VU meter".

I was just clarifying that an actual VU meter is something with specific characteristics and this isn't it.
 
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