Lafayette KT-250
A 50-watt integrated stereo amplifier that arrived as a box of parts and a promise. By at least one account, it sounded far better than its price had any right to.
Overview
The KT-250 was Lafayette's 50-watt integrated stereo amplifier in kit form, sold alongside the factory-wired LA-250. The kit went for $64.50. The wired-and-tested version cost $89.50. Lafayette's catalog copy said assembly required no special skills or tools. Every part, every tube and a detailed instruction manual came in the box, along with a shipping weight of 26 lbs. For that money a builder got a properly specified amplifier, not a starter project.
The output stage used EL86 tubes, with premium examples called out in the catalog. Power was rated at 50 watts monaural or 25 watts per stereo channel. Frequency response was quoted at 17 to 21,000 CPS within ±1 dB at normal listening levels. Harmonic distortion was listed at less than 0.25% and IM distortion at less than 1%, with hum and noise 74 dB below full output. Those are respectable figures for the period. Starting at 17 cycles on the bottom end is wider than the number alone suggests for a tube integrated of this class.
The control set is where the KT-250 gets interesting. A clutch-operated volume control sits alongside separate bass and treble controls per channel, a 4-position selector, and Mode, Loudness, and Phasing switches. Outputs were provided for 4, 8, or 16 ohm speakers. The headline feature, the one Lafayette put in bold in every advertisement, was the "blend" control. It was a continuously variable channel-separation adjustment running from full monaural to full stereo.
The blend control was no gimmick. According to contemporary coverage, the circuit could tame the exaggerated channel separation found in some stereo material. Lafayette also claimed it would suppress vertical rumble when a monophonic record was played back with a stereo cartridge. A third-channel output was provided as well. Stereo records were still new in 1959 and many listeners had a mixed mono/stereo library, so a variable blend answered a real problem.
The preamp section inside the KT-250/LA-250 earned an unusual endorsement decades later. Writing in Audio-Express (July 2001, p.57), one listener said he had spent five years auditioning commercial phono stages and found most simple designs lacking. He then tried the preamp used in the Lafayette KT-250/LA-250, was genuinely surprised, and called it fantastic sounding. That is a single listener's account, not a laboratory verdict.
Independent coverage of the amplifier was thin but not absent. HiFi-Stereo (July 1961, p.38) took up the LA-250A, the later wired variant. It noted a $99.50 price with metal cabinet and a rating of 25 watts per channel, with the KT-250A kit version listed at $74.50. The same review observed that the front panel, while short on the control facilities found on more expensive units, had the virtue of simplicity.
The model designations shifted over the product's life. Anyone hunting for one should confirm which revision they are looking at, because the suffix matters for both price and parts. The KT-250 is a kit amplifier, so surviving examples vary enormously in build quality depending on who soldered them. A clean, careful build is worth seeking out over a cosmetically perfect unit with questionable work inside. As with any tube integrated of this age, check the capacitors and tubes before trusting it with speakers you care about.
What the KT-250 represents, more than any single specification, is the moment when serious stereo amplification became a kit-builder's hobby rather than a wealthy buyer's privilege. Fifty watts bridged, 25 per channel, a blend control that solved a genuine problem, and a phono section that one devoted listener rated above commercial stages decades later — all for the price of a decent dinner out in 1959. That combination is why the KT-250 still turns up in collections, and why it is worth a second look when one surfaces.
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