Tubes, tubes and more tubes
Posted by Kurt on Friday, December 08, 2006 at 01:58 PM
After spending yet another couple of hours on sites like The Gear Page and 18 Watt forums researching different tubes for my upcoming DC30 clone, I decided to go with a combination of JJ and current-production Tung-Sol from TubeDepot.com. Sorry to all the NOS tube freaks in the world, I just couldn’t see dropping a nut to put in NOS tubes in an amp that’s never been tested….
Here’s the rundown for anyone who might be interested:
- GZ34 rectifier: JJ GZ34. The GZ34 was a fairly easy decision; not many companies still make rectifier tubes and JJ seems to be the best of the lot.
- EF86 preamp: Tung-Sol EF806, gold pin version, tested for low noise and microphonics. Not much feedback on this particular tube but, generally speaking, the Tung-Sol preamp tubes are well regarded. Since there aren’t too many current production EF86s, I decided to give this one a try. I probably would not have spent the extra cash for the gold pin EF806 if TubeDepot.com a regular Tung-Sol EF86s listed.
- 12AX7 preamp: 2 each Tung-Sol 12AX7, tested for low noise and microphonics. Among all the current production 12AX7s, Tung-Sols seem to have the most wide-spread reputation for good sound. They’re also supposed to be very quiet tubes.
- 12AX7 phase inverter: Tung-Sol ECC803S, gold pin version, tested for balanced triodes. Yes, this was a little more than the regular Tung-Sol 12AX7s, but I’ve come to understand that the phase inverter is somewhat critical so decided to spring for a better tube. I also paid the extra couple dollars to have it tested for balanced triodes which might be another plus in a phase inverter.
- EL84 output: 2 pair JJ EL84, matched. There are a few different companies making EL84 output tubes, but the range of choices is still less than some other, more popular output tubes. The JJs have a reputation for sounding good and being reliable, so that’s what I went with.
The tubes should be here next week but I won’t be able to give any feedback until after the amp is assembled which probably won’t be until sometime next month. You’ll just have to wait!