Preamp Tubes? - Who, What, When, Where, Why, and How?

[frails]

I like the JJ 803S. It is a perfect match for the Orange Rocker 30.

 

[RiverRatt]

Just got my Mazda ECC83 through.

Its exactly the same as my Brimar.

And tests strong! all for £5.99!

Great price. Of course, we'll need a tone report and some pics!

 

[solarburn]

I like the JJ 803S. It is a perfect match for the Orange Rocker 30.

I liked it too. Mine lasted 4hrs...

 

[Procter2812]

Great price. Of course, we'll need a tone report and some pics!

Yeah, well iv tested it and it sounds great. No noise high gain for a NOS valve.

It sounds different to the Mullard.

Bit smoother, but the Mullard has a real mid punch which you cant complain about. Sounds more 'Vintage' to me.

Il stick some photos of em all up later...

 

[SpiritOfTheAge]

Well my pair of Bel 12ax7 came today, they sound and look exactly like my other phillips tubes, ie great! Scored this pair for £15. Has the number 71 ethced just above another alphanumeric etching saying E05 on both valves.

 

[MartyStrat54]

Great pictures. Hey RATT look at those BEL plates. They only have the cut-out holes on the front plates. Remember my slant top Raytheon had cut-outs on the front and rear plates. Since the BEL's have the single cut-outs, this indicates a Philips design which it is.

Double cut-outs-Mullards

Single cut-outs-Philips

 

[MartyStrat54]

Yeah, well iv tested it and it sounds great. No noise high gain for a NOS valve.

It sounds different to the Mullard.

Bit smoother, but the Mullard has a real mid punch which you cant complain about. Sounds more 'Vintage' to me.

Il stick some photos of em all up later...

Sweet, Solar loves TooB PorN. He can look at pictures for hours at a time.

I'm really glad that you have snagged some good tubes. Way to go. I think you will like the end results.

 

[MartyStrat54]

I like the JJ 803S. It is a perfect match for the Orange Rocker 30.

These tubes suffer from a reliability issue. If not for that, some say they sound really good. I'm hoping you have good luck with yours, because you seem pretty happy with it. Love that Rocker 30.

 

[MartyStrat54]

Brought this over from deep within the vaults. PAGE 64

Slant Getter Raytheon. Probably an Amperex or Philips tube. Later Amperex, non-Bugle Boy has a cut-out in the plate like the Raytheon. Everything looks the same except for the slant top getter.

EDIT: Third picture down is the one that tells all. The Amperex only has cut-outs on the outer plates. The Mullard design has the cut-out going through the outer and inner plates. This is what the Raytheon has. See post below.

Good shot of plate cut-outs. Same style mica spacers and plate design.
I took a look at some various Mullards and they all had the cut-out and the same plate design.

The RCA Mullard is on the left. It has the identical internal structure as a late design Amperex (which could have been made by Mullard). The Raytheon is very similar to both. Then I start thinking about the Mullard equipment that went to Japan.

 

[MartyStrat54]

JJ Tubes any good?

I think they make some good power tubes, but I personally am not a fan of their preamp tubes. One of the things about a tube amp is that there are all of these tube options. The best thing is to try different tubes out at a pace you can afford.

Remember, depending on your amp, you may only need one or two good tube. Take a DSL for instance. V1 and V2 are the gain stages. These tubes shape the tone of your amp, so you want your best flavor tubes here. V3 and V4 can be EH12AX7's.

If you notice, some of the younger guys took the initiative to go online and buy themselves some great NOS tubes. Now they have killer tubes for their gain stages. They can still run current production in the other slots and save their extra good tubes as spares.

Just ask anyone here the difference between a Mullard and a JJ? NOS tubes just flat out sound better. Hang around here and read about some of the stuff we do and I guarantee you will be wanting some NOS tubes. If you catch the right auction, you can get a couple of RCA's for $40 and that is in the same price range as some of the CP tubes.

 

[wegman]

Hey WEGMAN you owe me. You also owe Jon Wilder a cold beer...a good one.

I looked at the schematic on Dr. Tube and I broke it down to what I thought the tubes were doing. I was close, but Jon was exact. Take a walk with me.



There you go. That signal path is like going in circles. Let's break it down.

Normal Channel: V1A and V2A and V2B

Boost Channel: V1A and V1B and V3A

Reverb: V3B and V4B

Effects Return: V4A

Phase Inverter: V5

To be honest, it would take some very serious tube rolling to set this amp up. In reality, you would want V1 to be say a 24-27 tube. Then V2 would be a 26-26 as this is your normal channel. Then you would have to get a tube for V3 that would be like 29-25. Not that difficult when you have 400 tubes.

So V1 is important, but what makes it tough is that it is double duty. Instead of a 27-27, you would want a 24-27. V2 is the easiest tube there is. It is dedicated to the Clean Channel. Your Boost Channel is like connect the dots.

However, it can be done. I just needed to see how it worked.

And yes, you are going to have to get your tubes tested so you can rethink your approach on this monster.

No, this is more like Differential Equations.

Wait till Weggie gets a load of this.

<Wakes up and goes to computer.>

<Goes to Marshall Amp Forum, Preamp Tubes Thread.>

<Sees what Marty has posted.>

<Shits his pants.>

Holy Geez! (Cleaning fecal matter from shorts)

First off thanks for the info Marty. I will have to thank Wilder too.

I had no idea this thing was this complicated. I am going to screw around with it tonight with this new knowledge and see what I come up with.

Looks like you are going to be getting a load of tubes test Marty

 

[MartyStrat54]

Yeah what I can do is test the tubes and see what you have. Then I might be able to do a trade plus a little cash for what you need. I have lopsided tubes that will work perfectly in this amp.

I tell you I didn't know anything about this amp. It is a killer amp and Jon and I love the design. It is really old school, but it is a two channel. It was Marshall's final offering of the 800. It was made for about two years then the 900's came out. If I ever find a 2205, I may just snap it up. (Now that I know how it works.)

Give Jon a shout and let him know that you appreciate his help.

 

[wegman]

Yeah what I can do is test the tubes and see what you have. Then I might be able to do a trade plus a little cash for what you need. I have lopsided tubes that will work perfectly in this amp.

I tell you I didn't know anything about this amp. It is a killer amp and Jon and I love the design. It is really old school, but it is a two channel. It was Marshall's final offering of the 800. It was made for about two years then the 900's came out. If I ever find a 2205, I may just snap it up. (Now that I know how it works.)

Give Jon a shout and let him know that you appreciate his help.

I think it's a killer amp but all you hear everyone talk about is the older 800s such as the 2203 and 2204. For the record mine is 1989, the last year they made the amp. It has the diode clipping which the affcianados like to bash.

Without getting to far away from tubes what is about the amp you like?

I will see when I can get these tubes out to you. Probably at soonest after Christmas if not after the first.

I dropped wilder a note by the way.

 

[RiverRatt]

Well my pair of Bel 12ax7 came today, they sound and look exactly like my other phillips tubes, ie great! Scored this pair for £15. Has the number 71 ethced just above another alphanumeric etching saying E05 on both valves.

Dude, these are some great pictures. I can't figure out the codes on your tubes, though. According to the Philips bible, they should have a code that starts with "V" if they are made in Bangalore, India, which they appear to have been. The "E" code should belong to the factory Hyperlec Brive which appears to be in Correza, France. I found another thread with Google which refers to BEL tubes that were made in India with the "E" code as well, so who knows. I'm going to have to hunt down a couple of these and try them.

If anyone wants to have a go with the Philips code book, I found a link to a revision that's newer than mine:

http://eastwoodamps.com/PhilipsCodes.pdf

 

[Procter2812]

. Are you guys familiar with "black top" getter flash? This is actually a better getter material than the nice chrome looking flash. It took more time, so only a small amount were treated this way. Well, I got six Mullards and two of them are black tops.

Take care, Merry Christmas.

Just realised,

My brimar/Mullard has a black top. None of the others i have do...

Il stick a pic up soon

 

[MartyStrat54]

Well I don't know if it improves the sound, but the black top getter was supposed to improve the life of the tube. They are a rarer tube. I mean I have gone through Mullards and I will get one every 20 or so.

Wow! I made some killer little deals. A guy was selling a Westinghouse BP and it tested it at 42-44 on a TV-7. I'm looking at his picture. It's a friggin RCA. Starting bid $9.99. I didn't think anyone else was going to bid on it so I put in $13.99. There were two other bidders. Winning bid, $13.99.

Then for $20.50, I got two, late 50's GE Black Plates. These both tested very strong.

Oh and then I pick up another pair of Sylvania 6CA7's with Double O getters and the guy stated they tested better than NOS. (He was using an emissions tester.)

Well he had three sets and they were all "Buy It Now." The first set I bought was only $99.99. That's cheap compared to a month ago. Then he had another pair like the first, but they had Sylvania in yellow letters on the base. He wanted $125 for those. Then I look at his third offering. My friends, it is the Holy Grail of 6CA7's...very few made. This is the famous "Triple O Getter" tube. Two O's on top and one on the side. I snatched them up for $125. I felt about getting the other pair, but decided I had spent enough money on my amp and other stuff.

I missed the Fed-Ex guy yesterday. I thought it was some tubes from Canada. Well he shows up at 10 AM this morning with my Twister amp already. I mean I could of had it yesterday. That was incredible. I just closed the deal a few days ago. Anyhow, I'm letting it slowly warm up. I don't want to rip it open and have it explode. So my Christmas present made it on time and now I have some extra special tubes for it that should be here before the 1st.

 

[racko7566]

Marty, could you post some sound clips of the twister? Would love to here before and after Nos tubes. Happy holidays.

 

[MartyStrat54]

Well right now I've spent a bunch of money...on myself and others. Also, my main frame computer went down (again) and it is in the shop. I do not have any means of doing a digital recording, be it a DVD camera or a digital recorder, but I am working on that. It just seems like money is really going fast and I have looked at Musician's Friend and what their prices are. There is some really neat stuff and usually the prices fall after Christmas. Also, Musician's Friend is closing their clearance center. That sucks! They only had one here at the KC location. I'm going to miss that place. That's where I got my brand new Explorer and Gibson case for $850.

I'm going to have to see where I'm at money wise. This is always a spend, spend, spend time of the year. I've already went overboard on buying these 6CA7's, but at that price, I had to have them. Especially the rare triple getters.

At some point I will get set up for at least some raw wav file recordings. I don't know if I want to do like a YouTube thing. I noticed on one DVD camera that all you had to do was plug the camera into your computer and log on to YouTube and then hit one button on the camera and "WHAM" you are on YouTube. If I went on YouTube, it would have to be in pink spandex with white high heel shoes and a big potato stuffed in my crotch. Then some heavy black eye liner and maybe a light pink lipstick. In other words, I would want to look my best.

 

[racko7566]

 

[RiverRatt]

Marty, any comments on these? Looks like they would bear watching if the test scores are OK. Another black getter flash?

2 PHILIPS r CODE ECC83 / 12AX7 TWIN TRIODE TUBES 1960's