Old/Vintage Shotgun Mics

[twotonepunkkid]

I was wondering if anyone had any experience with the EV DL-42 shotgun mic. I found one for a decent price, but I was a bit worried about buying an older mic. Also, I've been able to find a few Sennheiser ME80s online for pretty cheap, but the same concern about buying an older mic. I've got a bunch of SM58s and SM57s that are decades old and dont have any problems at all. Are boom/shotgun mics pretty much the same way? Will I notice a big difference in teh sound compared to a newer mic?

 

[gpforet]

I am still swinging an ME-80 I bought off of ebay two years ago and very much like it's performance. The pattern is more narrow than the diagram leads you to believe. It is quite long and required me to buy Rykote kit 7 blimp system but I started with a rykote softie which works fine in winds below 10 mph. It does require proper booming technique due to it's narrow pattern which means monitoring by the boom op is critical. The lower noise K3 preamp is preferred over the K2 and this mic is not as hot as some of the newer mics and requires a good clean mixer with lots of quiet gain. I think the one I have is about 20 years old. I have the black one, and a director I know has the silver one which is even older and using his is what led me to looking for one of my own. Once you have the ME-80 with the K3 unit, you can pick up the me-40 hyper capsule for less than $100 on ebay. Although I haven't tried the ME40, I know it is popular with tapers.

When shopping for a used mic on ebay, I usually look at the other auctions of the person selling the mic, and see what else they are selling. I tend to shy away from pawn shops and bulk sellers and migrate to either sellers who specialize in vintage mics, or sound people who have other location or recording stuff they are selling.

I was wondering if anyone had any experience with the EV DL-42 shotgun mic. I found one for a decent price, but I was a bit worried about buying an older mic. Also, I've been able to find a few Sennheiser ME80s online for pretty cheap, but the same concern about buying an older mic. I've got a bunch of SM58s and SM57s that are decades old and dont have any problems at all. Are boom/shotgun mics pretty much the same way? Will I notice a big difference in teh sound compared to a newer mic?

 

[timbook2]

old microphones can be fine. depends on the previous owner and how he treated it. usually these shotguns are prone to get wet or dropped at the worst. the problems with older mics is more common with large diaphragm studio mics like old Neumanns where years of spittle and smoke from a pipe smoking radio reporter left a film on the capsule gpforet gave good advice for greedpain buying! Better pick up locally and test it before ....

 

[twotonepunkkid]

Thanks alot guys!