Though a setback for my review schedule, the fact that Sasa kept buttering his bread from all sides—tubes, transistors, mainline product, one-up custom commissions—was exactly why I kept having high hopes for the hybrid Belus. By October 19
th, he was still "sorry for the delay. Fred's big SE 450 TL drove me crazy on some counts and took up a
lot of my time [which explains why one-off custom projects command high prices -
Ed]. To prove that it's real, here are two photos of the Belus chassis ready for assembly. I already sent out the PCB drawings to the plant."
Clearly the amp would be offered in black and silver. But there was more. "The Belus front will have some wood accents. What color do you want?" I hadn't the faintest that I had that choice. Now I mentioned how the old herringbone wood parquet in our rental was of a ripe honey colour. If he had something in that vein, it'd be very trick. Even trickier, it'd impress our interior decorator.
By early November, Sasa had sent another photo asking whether he'd poured on "enough honey". I said that, sight unseen, he had managed to match our floor astonishingly well. Apparently honey translates the same into all languages. Final assembly now was just a few weeks out. On the 13
th of the month, the first PCB photos arrived. Things were beginning to take shape. As to what transistors he selected, "
Exicon ECX10P20 and their complementary EXC10N20 lateral Mosfets, two pairs per channel." Hence, four transistors per side in a mini-paralleled push/pull array. As to what speakers he runs for personal sound checks, "Rethm Maarga modified with class D sub amps. Belus has a gain switch on the back to adapt to any speaker system without noise."