About a week ago, this vintage Collins 212A 8x2 Tube Recording Console quietly found its way onto Reverb. Built in 1948 (with serial number 25), this console is being sold by Niles City Sound — a Texas studio founded by members of Austin–based indie band White Denim.
If you've listened to Leon Bridges' most recent release, 2015's soulful and nostalgic Coming Home, you've heard this vintage console in action. Coming Home was recorded and mixed entirely with this Collins and a tape machine, and is a perfect example of the classic high–fidelity, creamy sound this machine is capable of.
Before being employed as the main mixer for Coming Home, this console underwent a complete restoration by our talented friends at Coil Audio.
They built custom PSUs and replaced all of the faulty caps, out of spec and scratchy Daven attenuators, tubes, and incorrectly valued resistors with period–specific NOS parts. Every channel (including the program amps and monitor) was meticulously checked and rebuilt wherever necessary.
The console features eleven total preamps: eight preamps, two program amps, and one monitor amp. The first four preamps feature toggle switches that control high and low impedance for either a modern microphone’s impedance or a 50 ohms ribbon mic, and each of the eight preamps feature insert points before the Daven pots for adding EQ to the circuit.
Both of the program amps and the monitor amp all operate at microphone–level impedance inputs and have direct outs of their own for a very smooth, high–gain preamp reminiscent of a Telefunken V76.
Collins 212A 8x2 Tube Recording Console
The console also features two remote channels that are more or less transformer–balanced pads for padding down high gain outputs or adding two more channels of line level signal into the mix bus to make a it a 10x2 mixer.
Each channel features a toggle switch for choosing between the direct out and mix bus (which has its own dedicated output). The mix bus features another switch for toggling between different bus loads. There are toggle switches above the Daven attenuator on each channel Each channel for panning between left, center, and right.
We estimate that the restoration costs to get this console back into shape likely fell into the mid–four–figure range. The preamps alone can easily fetch $1,500+ per raw module. Niles City Sound is asking $15,000 for this piece, with a promise to swallow the difference for shipping via freight to keep it as safe as possible in transit.
Anyone willing to pay the full asking price will also receive a custom 8–channel pad box and line level selector built by the same engineer from Coil Audio who completed the restoration.
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