Manley EQP-1A Enhanced ‘Pultec’ Equalizer

The Manley Enhanced Pultec EQP-1A is Manley’s interpretation of the historic Pultec Equalizer as originally produced by Pulse Techniques, Inc. Manley has been building Pultec EQs since 1990 after they hunted down Eugene Shenk in New Jersey to ask for his permission and blessings to produce their own version of his classic piece. This Manley Pultec EQ employs a simple and clean all-tube make-up gain block to reamplify the signal after the passive EQ circuit.

Manley Enhanced Pultec Equalizers use a transformerless signal path and has a vastly superior B+ power supply, with regulated and balanced heater supply. The Manley line amp is known to be killer-sounding. The components Manley uses today on the EQP-1A equalizer just weren’t available in the 1960’s. So, if you want a project with crackling carbon pots, dirty open frame wafer switches, 5% and 10% tolerance noisy carbon resistors, exposed tubes sticking out the back of the 3U chassis, etc., go pay top dollar for an antique Pultec.

The Manley Pultec EQP-1A uses 1 x 12AU7WA and 1 x 6414 in it’s all-tube single-ended line amplifier for the gain make-up and extra-beefy sound; gain is factory set for unity but additional gain is available by a rear mounted feedback adjustment trimpot. Like Manley 40dB Mic Preamps, the Manley Pultecs offer both transformer coupled balanced and direct capacitor coupled unbalanced outputs for easy interface and sonic variety.

The rackmount Pultec EQ may be set to ‘flat’ positions or BYPASSED entirely. All BOOST and CUT controls are continuously variable conductive plastic potentiometers for absolutely silent operation and long life. Manley’s single rack unit mono blocks occupy one-third of the space of the ‘antique Pultecs’, an important consideration for allocation of outboard rack space. Manley added a couple extra frequencies too. The rear mounted input switch selects 0 degrees or 180 degrees PHASE INVERT for the balanced gold pin XLR input or the transformerless unbalanced bridging input (1/4″ jack) may be selected in that switch’s middle position.

Kick drum? Bring on the Pultecs and all the iron you can muster! You’ll soon discover the power and magic of having those individual Low Frequency BOOST and CUT controls in that LF shelf circuit. Need a little clarity or extension? Try that middle bell-shaped Boost dialing in the sharpness of the boost on the BANDWIDTH control. Something bugging you? Ease it off with the HF shelf cut. You’ll see. There’s no substitute for what a Manley Pultec EQ can do!