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Topic: The differences between tubes? |
Colin Swinney
From:
Wisconsin, USA
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Dave Grafe
From:
Hudson River Valley NY
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Posted 25 Apr 2010 5:06 pm |
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| Unless you have a full comprehension of the subtleis of vacuum tube design and characteristics, only use the tubes that your amp was designed for. This information should be posted on the inside of your Fender amp. Changing things around without such understanding of what you are doing can damage other expensive components of your amp. If you want a different sound I strongly suggest you try a different amp. |
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Rich Hlaves
From:
Wildomar, California, USA
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Posted 26 Apr 2010 8:56 am
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Colin,
I know that ebay seller and have bought tube sets from him for my Hammonds. Hammonds are not particular about tubes in the least. Fair prices and nice NOS tubes for the most part. Your Fender might be a little better sounding with other tubes specially for steel guitar.
There are as many opinions about tube brands as there are tube customers so what I have to say is purely subjective. First, when changing power tubes I would recommend you re-bias the power secion of the amp. Again, subjective settings here but for the balance of clean headroom & tube life I would think plate dissipation of about 55-60% would be best.
For the 6L6 power tubes, my favorite clean tube is the "Winged C". My favorite 6L6 power tube over all at present is the "JJ". They are a little warmer to my ear. The JJ preamp tubes are good sounding too and not too pricey. I use the spiral filaments for V1 & V2 of Fender amps. Antique Electronics is a good source for tubes if this is a DIY project. They can be found at www.tubesandmore.com
Just my 2C,
Rich
_________________
On man....let the smoke out of another one. |
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Dave Grafe
From:
Hudson River Valley NY
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Posted 26 Apr 2010 3:37 pm
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Perhaps a note of clarification is in order here.
I am not cautioning at all against replacing tubes from different manufacturers but strongly discouraging experimenting with different tube types. Many differing tubes will fit in a given socket but even if the pin assignments are the same they can cause excessive or mismatched loads to be placed on plate windings of transformers. This is not recommended unless you really know what you are doing and have the data sheets to determine that the electrical characteristics of the original and replacement types are compatible.
Ever since USA manufacturers stopped making vacuum tubes quality has been an issue. Some of the foreign-made tubes that were considered poor quality in the past are now considered desirable and vice versa. I suggest you contact Brad Sarno and Ken Fox as they are both doing a lot with tubes these days and can give you the rundown on which manufacturers - and variant types - might be most appropriate for your application. |
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Colin Swinney
From:
Wisconsin, USA
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Posted 26 Apr 2010 6:27 pm
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| Thanks for the input guys. Maybe I will give Ken Fox a ring, good thinking. |
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