V1,V2 and V3 tube choices ?

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Rob Livesey
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V1,V2 and V3 tube choices ?

Post by Rob Livesey »

Hi chaps,

I'm going to experiment with tubes in my 100w 6L6 HRM.

As you probably know from experience, this could take hours, if not days!

So, I would like to ask what you guys are using in preference, just to get me started.

The tubes I have are as follows:

Amperex Bugle Boy x 2
Telefunken flat plate x 2
Telefunken ribbed plate x 2
Various GE, RCA and Mullards as well as new JJ's

Any help getting me started would be much appreciated.

Cheers,
Rob
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Rob Livesey
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ToneMerc
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Re: V1,V2 and V3 tube choices ?

Post by ToneMerc »

Rob Livesey wrote:Hi chaps,

I'm going to experiment with tubes in my 100w 6L6 HRM.

As you probably know from experience, this could take hours, if not days!

So, I would like to ask what you guys are using in preference, just to get me started.

The tubes I have are as follows:

Amperex Bugle Boy x 2
Telefunken flat plate x 2
Telefunken ribbed plate x 2
Various GE, RCA and Mullards as well as new JJ's

Any help getting me started would be much appreciated.

Cheers,
Rob
Yeah HRM's always seem to give me fits when tweaking the OD. First, what type of tone stack, which OD entrance network and is there a FB loop on V1?

TM
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David Root
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Re: V1,V2 and V3 tube choices ?

Post by David Root »

In general I like the real Heerlen factory Dutch Amperex in V1 and V2. Smooth, warm, nice overdrive characteristics when you lean on them. Check your Bugle Boys, the Heerlen factory code is a right angle triangle. Long plates from the late '50s have a tad more harmonics but the short plates are very nice too.

I would defer to ToneMerc on the HRM question. I built a Bluesmaster w/HRM but don't recall what pretubes are in it, sold it a while ago.

Long blackplate RCAs are nice too, in V1 and V2 also, but not in V2 if they are a tad microphonic.

Bugle boy labels were put on tubes from lots of Philips factories, in France, Germany, UK in particular. So if you get a Bugle Boy that sounds like an old Mullard, it probably is a Mullard. Again, the factory code will tell you for sure where it was made.

In the PI old long plate GEs from the '50s or early '60s are good, in my experience. Some folks like a Telefunken in the PI, I found them a bit dry for my tastes. I use a long smoothplate T'funkin in my Dumbleator and like it very much there.
Rob Livesey
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Re: V1,V2 and V3 tube choices ?

Post by Rob Livesey »

Thanks for the replies chaps.

TM, I have no idea ! I'll have to ask Tommy Cougar who built the amp.

David, thanks for the info. I looked at my Bugle Boys and couldn't see any markings at first, but in the end I did find some codes. The right angle triangle precedes a numeric code, so it looks like these are the ones you are talking about.

Anyway, I've had a few hours at it, my ears are too tired to carry on with any certainty now. I currently have one Bugle boy in V1. The second Bugle boy didn't seem to work in V2, tried swapping them, but no. In V2 I now have an NOS RCA 7025 and in V3 a good used RCA.

The Telefunken's weren't very characterful, nice but no cigar. I did try one in the dumbleator as you suggested and I will keep that there, nice.

What I'm finding, and this was the case before the swaps, is that I have too much sizzle in the OD. It looks like I'll have to tweak the trimmers, I was hoping to avoid this!

Any advice welcome !

Thanks,
Rob
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Rob Livesey
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ToneMerc
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Re: V1,V2 and V3 tube choices ?

Post by ToneMerc »

Rob Livesey wrote:Thanks for the replies chaps.

TM, I have no idea ! I'll have to ask Tommy Cougar who built the amp.

David, thanks for the info. I looked at my Bugle Boys and couldn't see any markings at first, but in the end I did find some codes. The right angle triangle precedes a numeric code, so it looks like these are the ones you are talking about.

Anyway, I've had a few hours at it, my ears are too tired to carry on with any certainty now. I currently have one Bugle boy in V1. The second Bugle boy didn't seem to work in V2, tried swapping them, but no. In V2 I now have an NOS RCA 7025 and in V3 a good used RCA.

The Telefunken's weren't very characterful, nice but no cigar. I did try one in the dumbleator as you suggested and I will keep that there, nice.

What I'm finding, and this was the case before the swaps, is that I have too much sizzle in the OD. It looks like I'll have to tweak the trimmers, I was hoping to avoid this!

Any advice welcome !

Thanks,
Rob
Yeah its hard to make generalizations without knowing what you have there. Although I really like to focus on V2; voltage, snubbers , etc. To chase that OD sizzle, I would I ask if their are snubbers on V2 and what value.


The marvel these amps are sum of the small things.

TM
Last edited by ToneMerc on Mon Dec 08, 2014 5:44 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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David Root
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Re: V1,V2 and V3 tube choices ?

Post by David Root »

Rob, you can go to audiotubes.com and click on the yellow square marked Euro Tube Codes. This will give you the factory code list for many many Euro tube factories. Also there is the date coding breakdown, which is a bit confusing as it varied a bit with time and factories.

Basically the Philips factories which include your Bugle Boys (Heerlen), French, German, British and other countries date codes were three digits for '50s tubes and 4 digits for '60s and '70s tubes.

So IIRC, for example B9C is Mullard Blackburn (B) factory, 1959, March. This would be a long 17mm plate.

And (Right angle triangle)6C2 would be Heerlen, 1966, March, 2nd week. Short 14mm plate.

If the second digit is 0 thru 4 or 5 it could theoretically be '60-65 or '70-75, but in most cases you will find that the getters are different, '60s to '70s eg Amperex large Halo (early '60s), small halo (mid to late '60s) and disc halo ('70s)

This may seem like more than you need to know, but for example '50s long plate, short plate '60s and short plate '70s Amperex tubes from the Heerlen factory all sound a bit different, so to find that perfect match you can at least know what you're starting with.

In USA tubes, the only mfr with reliable known date codes into the '70s is RCA, see attachment, page 18 is the list you want. Most USA mfrs used numeric codes in the '50s and early '60s eg 51-09 which are easy to read as year, week, but later they went to letter codes eg LQ which you need a crib sheet for. These crib sheets for GE, Sylvania, Raytheon, Tung-Sol etc are for the most part lost.
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Structo
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Re: V1,V2 and V3 tube choices ?

Post by Structo »

These preamp tube descriptions are sometimes helpful.

http://ampgarage.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=17936
Tom

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Rob Livesey
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Re: V1,V2 and V3 tube choices ?

Post by Rob Livesey »

Thanks for all the input here.

I spoke at length with a good friend yesterday, he owns Dumble #0155. Partly on his advice, I went back to the beginning, the basics, and went through each component in the signal chain, one at a time. It was worth it! After checking each part, here's what I have changed.

Firstly, guitar leads. I was using George L's. I a/b tested a number of others, every one was smoother than the George L's. I switched to Ernie Ball and things got much more pleasant, especially the OD.

Second change was the cables to and from the dumbleator. I had made up some very short cables but one must have a problem. Switching those to standard Ernie Ball 12' cable smoothed things out some more but also dramatically increased the volume of the amp. Something was definitely amiss in this dept before. Things have really opened up now, it's a beast of a machine.

Third, I have gone back to the V3 tube this amp shipped with. I guess it was balanced with this tube in place and I just can't hit the spot with any other tube without measuring and adjusting the trimmer.

I'm a pretty happy camper at this point. I'm going to have to get some cables for the dumbleator, 24' total seems a little over the top. Is there an optimum, what do you guys use?

Thanks,
Rob
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ToneMerc
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Re: V1,V2 and V3 tube choices ?

Post by ToneMerc »

Rob Livesey wrote: I'm a pretty happy camper at this point. I'm going to have to get some cables for the dumbleator, 24' total seems a little over the top. Is there an optimum, what do you guys use?

Thanks,
Rob
I use about 14' of RG400.

TM
Charlie Wilson
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Re: V1,V2 and V3 tube choices ?

Post by Charlie Wilson »

Rob, my .02 cents for what it is worth as I have built a whopping one Dumble circuit. I like to start with the clean channel and get as nice a sound as I can. If the clean channel is overly bright than it will carry over to the overdrive. The other thing is tube brands only tell part of the story. Tubes of the same brand, NOS or new production, even from the same batch, can be all over the place voltage and gain wise in the circuit. It sounds like you had a bad cable going to your Dumbleator but it also sounds like you are using cord length to smooth your amp. You may have a great tube for your PI in your collection of NOS tubes but I don't think you will know unless you adjust your PI trimmer to some degree. The other thing is you may have a high frequency trimmer in your amp that you can use to smooth your OD. Oops, you said HRM. You have a whole tone stack you can adjust. I know you did not want to have to adjust the trimmers but adjusting them may get your amp more to your liking.
CW
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Structo
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Re: V1,V2 and V3 tube choices ?

Post by Structo »

Yes!
Cables can make a difference.

I thought George L's cables were a bit too bright for my needs.

Also, if you have any long plate tubes, black or grey plate, or maybe too microphonic for V1 or V2, you can try those in V3.
Tom

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stelligan
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Re: V1,V2 and V3 tube choices ?

Post by stelligan »

Charlie Wilson wrote:Rob, my .02 cents for what it is worth as I have built a whopping one Dumble circuit. I like to start with the clean channel and get as nice a sound as I can. If the clean channel is overly bright than it will carry over to the overdrive.
Great advice here. I am always in a hurry to hear the amp's overdrive section but, this is not to be overlooked. The overdrive depends on what it is getting from v1, too..... I have had good luck with old GEs and new JJs. FWIW.
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Re: V1,V2 and V3 tube choices ?

Post by Charlie Wilson »

Yeah, the nice thing about JJs is that you can buy half a dozen of so at not to much of an expense and pick out ones that that work in your circuit. I like V1 to be between 190v and 195v and the JJ sounds great in my amp. I use a high grade Ruby(Chinese) tube for V2 and a balanced Mullard reissue as V3. I settled on these new production tubes AFTER I had bought a bunch of NOS and used GEs, Telefunkens, and Amprex that just didn't seem to work out in my amp.
CW
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stelligan
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Re: V1,V2 and V3 tube choices ?

Post by stelligan »

Charlie Wilson wrote:Yeah, the nice thing about JJs is that you can buy half a dozen of so at not to much of an expense and pick out ones that that work in your circuit. I like V1 to be between 190v and 195v and the JJ sounds great in my amp. I use a high grade Ruby(Chinese) tube for V2 and a balanced Mullard reissue as V3. I settled on these new production tubes AFTER I had bought a bunch of NOS and used GEs, Telefunkens, and Amprex that just didn't seem to work out in my amp.
CW
Don't know about Ruby tubes but, your choices on V1 & V3 are spot on with my findings. Your can roll a bunch of cheap JJs in V1 'til you find one that pleases you. The new Mullard long plates are excellent in the PI if you find a good match.
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Re: V1,V2 and V3 tube choices ?

Post by dcribbs1412 »

stelligan wrote:
Charlie Wilson wrote:Yeah, the nice thing about JJs is that you can buy half a dozen of so at not to much of an expense and pick out ones that that work in your circuit. I like V1 to be between 190v and 195v and the JJ sounds great in my amp. I use a high grade Ruby(Chinese) tube for V2 and a balanced Mullard reissue as V3. I settled on these new production tubes AFTER I had bought a bunch of NOS and used GEs, Telefunkens, and Amprex that just didn't seem to work out in my amp.
CW
Don't know about Ruby tubes but, your choices on V1 & V3 are spot on with my findings. Your can roll a bunch of cheap JJs in V1 'til you find one that pleases you. The new Mullard long plates are excellent in the PI if you find a good match.
Good info
Looking at ordering some
Have you guys used the Sovtek LPS in the PI position if so how does the Mullard compare
Looking at somewhere they offer matched triodes....tubestore, Dougs Tubes

D
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