10 6V6 in ppp may only put out 100 watts but with a nice toroidal output transformer the primary impeadance is about 1900 ct and the secondary at 8 ohms is wouund with number 10 wire , it will produce as much or more current drive than a solid state amp . Also the low turns ratio and the low DC resistance has beter fedelity and damping factor than most tube amps .


I used 4 6550's with the toriods , to get 100 watts out , but it would be cheeper to redo it with 6V6's from scratch , i have two more toroid outputs wating to be used after i finish building amps with the UTC LS outputs that are semi toroidal .

I'm happy to see this thread where it can fit into a common topic and see more readers.




Yup! I could crack the ceiling in the house with that! (I think I might have done that already)

But beyond loud, think of the dynamic range! Think of a very soft piece of music that suddenly rises into a mountainous crescendo that actually does shake the room, instead of being all at the same level as the soft part.
Think of the incredible sounds coming from a bank of huge premium quality speakers that are mounted strategically all over the room, driven with enough power to reproduce any recorded medium you might decide to listen to.


IIRC the book "an approach to audio frequency amplifier design" has an amp that can do 1,100 watts. This day and age it would most likely require custom built transformers which would cost some $$$, but boy would it be loud.

IIRC the book "an approach to audio frequency amplifier design" has an amp that can do 1,100 watts. This day and age it would most likely require custom built transformers which would cost some $$$, but boy would it be loud.


But I realize that power isn't everything. It needs to sound right, too.
I have a 600 watt SS stereo amp. (QSC - they're not lying on the power rating) Nice. Quite a bit of power, but nothing like what can be had. It sounds great.
But I also have a set of four EL34 stereo amps, all four running in bridged mono. Each amp driving it's own speaker of 98db efficiency, 18" woofer, 10" tweeter and titanium horn tweeter. That's only 80 watts to each speaker. A total of 320 watts. It sounds better than the 600 watt S.S. amp driving all four of those same speakers. A LOT better. It's probably just me, but I like the tube amps better.
It also could be, I'm guessing, something in using four separate amps that causes it to sound better to me because of a slight phase shift from one amp to another. Something that then, when reproduced, makes the room sound more full with the sound.

Mark D.

Battradio, you make some very valid and interesting points.
I think after I make my first million, I'll build such an amp. But it will still use bigger tubes. Bigger meaning bigger power per each. I can use it to weld with when I'm not listening to music.

And that 6550 amp with the torrid transformers HAS to sound really great.
I've looked at using torroid transformers in output stages, but never could figure out how to pay for them.
Mark D.

To me tube amps are probably right up there with the current popularity of mechanical watches. Its not like a boring $10 quartz movement watch isn't accurate- because in all reality they are probably going to be more accurate than most mechanical watches. At one time quartz watches were seen as revolutionary and highly sought after. But now there is a high amount of interest for mechanical movements. In fact, I'm wearing a one year old Seiko "premier" automatic mechanical watch and even though it loses about a minute a month, I still like it over a quartz watch because to me its pretty cool that the thing is more like a small engine on my wrist.

Same with amps. As mentioned, the 70's Marantz amp I picked up will blow the doors off. But it was cheap- not because its not as good as a tube amp of equal output and performance, but more because it doesn't have nice shiny glowing tubes inside.

I think people these days actually like to see something "working" as in you can either see cogs and wheels turning, tube filaments glowing, and so forth. It all goes full circle...

I got mine from Antek , at the time they where $140 each .
http://www.antekinc.com/

I still have the amp I'm building that uses the 6JE6's. I haven't touched it for a few years now. But everything's still there except for what's needed for the 6JE6 outputs and a chassis. PT, OT's, tone control and first stage are all there. The last time I threw it together, laid it out, and powered it up, it was pretty loud. However the anode plates would always cherry-up and stop doing so when 2nd grid was deactivated. And it did that with the original 7189's before it destroyed every last one of those. However the 6JE6's would keep playing, not as loud, and the 7189's wouldn't play at all. I think the plan was to have everything set on a heavy re-enforced sheet of clear acrylic. Another amp from scratch driven by a pair of 6BG6's dedicated for subwoofer, I think coming off the same PT. Enclosed in an open back tone cabinet containing a pair of 10's and 12's. I'll have to check my notes to see what I had originally planned to do with this.

I remember seeing a web site of a guy in Europe making amps with a dozen or so 300Bs. He showed winding his own power transformers. I wish I could find the site again.

The old Macintosh tube amps were hand crafted. The tubes were gain matched and the transformers were custom engineered. That alone makes them valuable. My MC60 tube amp (60w) has better sonics than any 300w high power SS amp I have had, including the high end brands like Crown, Ramsa, Crest.

Mark, my philosophy exactly! We do it for the history, the ambiance and the glow... they look good and they are all fixable. If well designed, they sound good, too.
Cheers,
Roger
(Custodian of about a dozen of them)

I still have a pair of Plitron/Van der Veen 2100CH toroid OPTs that I'm soon to put quads of 6550s on. Unless somebody had a set of eight or more KT88s or, better yet, 6CA7s they'd donate to the cause..
I presently plan to use a differential inverter and a single (high gain and low-distortion) gain stage w/cathode followers to drive the finals. The power supply will be an extremely low impedance solid state beast with Plitron toroidal power xfmrs that are to loaf along very conservatively. No guts, no glory. This will be one of two hand-crafted pairs of monoblocks that I'm leaving to my two sons when I pass on.

+1

I have a couple of repurposed chassis blowing quads of 807's in AB1 which can be dangerous to old plaster. Bet the kids will toss all this stuff in the dumpster when I'm gone.

I think there are many allures to why tube amps have regained popularity and are in demand. One of which, especially for the DIY/Fixit crowd, is that you have a reasonable chance of keeping them in repair (and enjoy the process of doing so).

Best regards,
Grid2

Many thanks to all you fellows for a good thread. I'm late to the party since I was out on work sabbatical for three months, but I'll chip in, since the topic is near and dear to me.

Anyone who knows anything about me knows my preference for tube amps in general, and tube amp construction in particular, and many know why. You can build them small:



or large:



and every grade in between, with precisely as much personality as you want them to have.

The earlier comparison to a steam loco, contrasted to a Diesel, was a very good one. Sure, "dismals" can outperform the steamers, but as any devoted railfan will tell you, the steamers have a sense of animation and personality about them that the Diesels simply can't match. Thus our tendency to associate the steamers with living beings; they show many of the characteristics of such beings.

It can be much the same with a tube amp. "Soiled state" amps can be well and good, fine and powerful, and all that; but they don't have a tube amp's projection of life and personality. If the picture above can't display what I'm getting at, I don't know what can .

I use SS amps when I must; on stage, for example, where their savings in weight and upkeep are an overriding plus. But otherwise? Give me the amp that "lives."

Good to be back. Best regards to all...

Larry

I have a big 30watt ASL AQ1003
...but my favorite tube amp is a 3 watt Mp3 amp I built myself using those tiny-little 5902 subminiatures in AB-1 PP.

This little amp nicely drives my full sized living-room speakers and provides all the "umph" I need for the most pleasurable listening.
I love it. (esp because I built it ... and that seems to make the sound all the more enjoyable)

I built two versions; The taller one was the first one I built for myself and then a year later I built the other smaller one as a gift for my brother.

In both designs I have the power supply inside the same tiny box with the amp.

That's always the real bottom line with self-constructed gear. The fruits of one's own successful labor are always and especially sweet, and mere appliance operators will never know such pleasure.

Larry

Found this today very similar to the Badwin 45 pc i have pictured in circuit wise http://www.pearl-hifi.com/06_Lit_Archiv ... L_6V6s.pdf