Chandler Limited TG-12413
A rack unit built to honor the first solid-state limiter EMI's technicians ever made, and a modern piece of gear with a real Abbey Road pedigree.
Overview
The TG-12413 is Chandler Limited's recreation of the original TG12413. That was the first solid-state limiter built by the technicians at Abbey Road, designed to replace the Fairchild 660 and 670 tube limiters and EMI's own RS124 tube compressor. The TG series sat in the signal path for records by the Beatles and Pink Floyd. The Zener Limiter is Chandler's attempt to put that circuit back in reach of working studios.
The modern unit comes out of an anniversary. When Abbey Road Studios celebrated its 75th anniversary, Chandler design engineer Wade Goeke and the facility's senior engineer, Peter Cobbin, marked the occasion by modifying a classic EMI limiter used to record the Beatles and Pink Floyd almost four decades earlier. The result was the dual-channel unit that became the Chandler TG12413 Zener Limiter. Mix (May 2007, p.110) covered the project. It described the modified design's ability to overload progressively and more dramatically, with a Limit mode that reviewers found ideal for presence and size.
The physical package is spare. The rear panel has a pair of XLRs for input and output and an XLR4 jack for the TG1's PSU-1 power supply. The supply is outboard, which keeps the audio chassis clean. Pro Audio Review (July 2008, p.46) called the TG1 a sturdily built, incredibly flexible limiter/compressor with unique rack appeal. It also noted the unit's connection to the original EMI TG12413 rather than treating it as a generic modern compressor.
The Zener does what the original was built for: gain reduction that stays musical when pushed. A review in Mix (August 2006, p.112) described the super-compressed sound as clean and solid with no objectionable artifacts - no pumping, no breathing. That is the behavior that made the TG-series limiters valuable on drums, vocals, and full mixes alike.
One clarification on scope. The TG12413 name also belongs to a software emulation, the EMI TG12413 Limiter Pack plug-in, sold in multiple versions. It is a digital product modeled on the same original hardware. The rack unit covered here is the hardware Zener Limiter. Listings for "TG12413" can mean either the analog unit or the plug-in license, so buyers should check which one they are looking at.
Confirm that the outboard PSU-1 supply is included with any used example. The unit won't power up without it.
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