Heavily modified Stereo pair of Matching Analog Gates M-3689 vintage tube mic preamp hot rods

Another grail hotrod build you won’t see anywhere but here. Retubed again July 2026 With NOS vintage top tier hand selected Telefunken, RCA and Sylvania glass. An incredibly rare matched pair of custom modified M-3689 Gates preamps, 2 years in the making. Looking for a “big” warm analog sound that remains clean and clear? You found em. Follow my Shop for more gear like this. We carry only the coolest, rarest grail studio modules for the biggest producers, artists and studios on earth. Check out the other hotroded and modified Gates Dynamote modules as well as a pair of RCA consoles and an Altec 9200 console I currently have listed for sale. Our clients span from the Strokes to RHCP to Steve Albini to Panic at the Disco. We carry unobtanium dream gear for those looking for the cleanest, most reliable vintage gear available for sale in the world. This totally unique listing is brought to you by the unique partnership of Custom audio labs KY, JML Studios, and Lutz Multimedia LLC. Each year we make a couple over the top hot rods for the high end clientele that demand the best the industry has to offer. This year we’ve outdone ourselves for you once again with a stunning pair of world class preamps that feature some pretty amazing functionality such as DI input, multiple outputs and phantom power! —————— Near matching serials at 38799 and 38792, this pair of colorful preamps do what no others can: provide warm and colorful ribbon level high-gain, while retaining a very clean signal that does not self-oscillate, even up at the top of the gain ceiling! These can also now both power condenser mics thanks to their new internal phantom power supplies. They also both have a new DI hi-z input, new internal PSU, new tubes, components, wiring and fresh solder… the works. They’ve also been slightly modified to be less susceptible to RF, while having increased headroom and quieter noise floor. All this, whilst retaining 100% of the color and magic they are sought out for. Details below. PREAMP SPECS & DETAILS: Modifications include full recap, phantom power, new 48v LED indicator lights, direct balanced outputs, upgraded IEC power, recapped power supply, repaired needles and VU, repaired filament bulb operation indicators, refreshed Daven pots, improved SNR, new wiring where needed, new 48v PSU, and a brand new D.I. Input! Each recapped unit now boasts 75db+ of overall gain, phantom power, attenuated output control, modern upgraded balanced connectivity jacks, upgraded vintage tubes, improved SNR, 3 prong power (chassis and sub chassis now fully grounded), dual output, all new PTP components, serviced PSU and hand selected, high end audio tubes. This pair of matched preamps showcase just what can be done in the audio industry today with vintage gear for the modern studio. M-6389 HISTORY: While most of the field mixers were just intended for local small time broadcast, these rare M-6389 units were one of the only models specifically designed for use in recording studios 70 years ago! These two beautiful Gates M-3689 mixers started out with a rich history rooted in the golden era of American broadcasting AND music recording. Manufactured by Gates Radio Company, which later became part of Harris Corporation, these two mixers were built in the 1950s at a time when Gates was the most trusted name in professional broadcast equipment, next to RCA. Gates mixers, including the M-3689, were fixtures in studios for their reliable performance, rugged construction, and high-quality sound. Known for its rich, warm tonal quality, the supremely rare M-3689 model remains very popular in Recording studios when it comes up for sale… which is almost never. It’s especially valued for recording where a warm, “big” analog sound is desired. A LMM resto-mod build is the best of both worlds because it has all the character, saturation and color every engineer on earth is searching for but the modifications and general servicing render it much cleaner, with a quieter noise floor and a bit more headroom than it was initially designed with. Possibly the best sounding preamps on the internet for sale today. ABOUT US: Lutz Multimedia LLC is a high end custom “resto-mod” hotrod shop of audio outboard builds and restorations. Nothing is more rare or more cool than these unique preanps. While most of these boutique shops don’t even bother to debug and clean their rare items, we go through each unit with a white glove, an extremely detailed inspection process and swap out all out of spec components, before we even get to the modification process. Each year we work on one or two crazy hotrod builds to bring something very special to reverb, and this is our latest endeavor. Past examples are a similarly feature-laden Gates Dynamote MO3777 for Panic at the disco, a tricked out Binson Echorec with boosted internal preamp and varispeed, a fire breathing Raytheon RR-10 with added phantom, eq, 600 ohm tap, pre and post transformer outputs, additional Hi-z…