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Tubes Asylum Questions about tubes and gear that glows. FAQ |
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Tubes Asylum Questions about tubes and gear that glows. FAQ |
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In Reply to: Ok, that's not a tube box, thats a warehouse! posted by Gary Kaufman on June 3, 2001 at 13:18:50:
Love that picture! Most of my valves are "bulk packed" and subsequently relocated to immense cardboard boxes, and spread out over several storage areas (three, at last count). So this doesn't give as impressive a photograph...nothing like having a bunch of RCA transmitting valves in their "Global Map" multi-coloured boxes clearly visible in a photograph...they always look boss! If I wanted to show off, what I'd have to do is unpack my "Global Map" 800's & 203A's (I have about 85 of the former and 35 of the latter) and photograph a carelessly-piled heap of them, or unbox all the "Martian" 800's and take a group photograph of them all, along with my 815's and Hytron E1148's, all with that same "Martian" dual-cap arrangement! One of my ambitions is to make an amp with the 815's as outputs and the E1148's as drivers...or configure the 815's as cathode-followers and drive the 800's with them! Gotta find a rusty black-crinkle painted chassis to cannibalize and build it in, to give the period authentic "Von Frankenstein's Lab" look...
I found the 6S4 to be EXCESSIVELY soft sounding, not nasty or anything, just incredibly compressed, pillowy and generally horribly sloppy and veiled. The 807 ain't nothin' but a glorified 6L6, and I doubt very much it can approach the somewhat superior sound of the GEC KT-66, which I consider very much to be the "King" of the 6L6 family. If I was going to give out a nomination for a runner-up, it goes to one of the very few Russian bottles that I think has anything at all going for it, the Sovtek 5881. It still ain't no EL34, though, not even as good as their own...
Glad you like that W-1! I've not had such good luck with what I affectionately nickname "Griefkit", and have found the Williamson amps that I owned and heard (W-3M to W-6M, and some very nice home-builts using Hammond 1700 series potted OPT's, which were rated to do 45 Watts at 50 kc/s, in a 15 Watt amp!) sounded pretty darn lousy to me, even after extensive rebuilding (I did one pair of W-5M's which I rebuilt to far better than new: Philips/Mullard Metal film resistors, Philips/Mullard Polystyrene and Polypropylene signal condensers, selected electrolytics, all MIL-SPEC "Type E" silver/teflon wire, new or selected good sockets, new input and output terminals, selected valves and original GEC KT-66's...still sounded like crap, sorry!).
I've come to the conclusion that the Williamson amp needs some minor tweaks to make it perform properly (the splitter is assymetrical, and combining the cathodes of the driver stage only makes things worse), and is a rather mediocre if clever piece of BBB (bull**** baffles brains) circuit design. A classic example of "Great Specs, shame about the sonics..."
Try laying your mitts on an old Futterman H-3 that still works (speaking of decent valves with anode caps, try finding one that uses the 6FW5, which is a 6DQ6 without the anode cap! You're right about audiophiles having it in for types that use anode & grid caps. Never thought about it, but I have a subconcious dislike for the extra hassle too! But then, I've had problems with nice, tight fitting anode sockets ripping the anode caps right off the valve itself when trying to remove them and rendering the valve useless! Not a nice experience when the valve is a lovely vintage RCA 811, or worse, the very expensive 6MJ6 used in the Hill Plasmatronics direct-drive amplifier), or a Marantz 8B. Do a signal-capacitor upgrade with decent polypropylenes (Westermann or Roederstein), and enjoy! These two ought to easily better the W-1, but then, they're alot more expensive to buy and maintain too, particularly the Futterman which is load-fussy. But when you've got a suitable load...NIRVANA!
Cheers!
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Follow Ups
- Re: Ok, that's not a tube box, thats a warehouse! - Joe Rosen 06/4/0111:05:34 06/4/01 (0)
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