It seems that Mr G and myself are trodding the same path here! Its
interesting that you've gone for a lower mA than me, Ive worked on the
principle that there's 500V runnning around, and a total output of 26W
(max for EL34's I think) giving a max current of 52mA. Working on the
70% rule thats 36mA = 360mV. Anyway, I too have got some of those
mullard ECF82's but from a different seller on epay, but again
claiming to be french origin. Ive also dropped some svet EL34's in
which have made a big leap from those valve art ones. Let me know
what your plans are tweaking this little babe.

"StuH" wrote in message
om...
It seems that Mr G and myself are trodding the same path here! Its
interesting that you've gone for a lower mA than me, Ive worked on the
principle that there's 500V runnning around, and a total output of 26W
(max for EL34's I think) giving a max current of 52mA. Working on the
70% rule thats 36mA = 360mV. Anyway, I too have got some of those
mullard ECF82's but from a different seller on epay, but again
claiming to be french origin. Ive also dropped some svet EL34's in
which have made a big leap from those valve art ones. Let me know
what your plans are tweaking this little babe.



I've seen your very interesting posts Stu and will get back to them later
on - no time right now!!

Keith G

"StuH" wrote in message
om...
It seems that Mr G and myself are trodding the same path here! Its
interesting that you've gone for a lower mA than me, Ive worked on the
principle that there's 500V runnning around, and a total output of 26W
(max for EL34's I think) giving a max current of 52mA. Working on the
70% rule thats 36mA = 360mV. Anyway, I too have got some of those
mullard ECF82's but from a different seller on epay, but again
claiming to be french origin.


OK, I got my knickers in a twist with eBay sellers - got too many valves
coming from different directions atm!! The 'Mullards' I got were from
Michael Giacomelli (mtg803) who emailed me to reassure me they were genuine,
when I queried this with him.


Ive also dropped some svet EL34's in
which have made a big leap from those valve art ones. Let me know
what your plans are tweaking this little babe.


Well, first off, I would say these amps are pretty good straight out of the
box. My plans were to (possibly/maybe) strip one out and rebuild it
hard-wired, but having two 'identical' amps....

http://www.apah69.dsl.pipex.com/keit...ow/twoamps.jpg

....has given me a good opportunity to try them on different speakers, using
shared sources.

It is also a good opportunity to upgrade components (valves, capacitors
etc.) in one of them (leaving one in the original state, of course) to see
if there's anything to be discovered in the 'upgrade' path or possibly
explode a myth or two? I have to say that neither of them are *volunteering*
to be be butchered though - they both seem very happy the way they are!

(I attach too many anthropomorphic attributes to valve amps, I'm afraid!!
;-)

At any rate, nothing will be done in a hurry - there's no time scale and
I've got a lot on the go atm!!

"Keith G" wrote in message ...
"StuH" wrote in message
om...
It seems that Mr G and myself are trodding the same path here! Its
interesting that you've gone for a lower mA than me, Ive worked on the
principle that there's 500V runnning around, and a total output of 26W
(max for EL34's I think) giving a max current of 52mA. Working on the
70% rule thats 36mA = 360mV. Anyway, I too have got some of those
mullard ECF82's but from a different seller on epay, but again
claiming to be french origin.


OK, I got my knickers in a twist with eBay sellers - got too many valves
coming from different directions atm!! The 'Mullards' I got were from
Michael Giacomelli (mtg803) who emailed me to reassure me they were genuine,
when I queried this with him.


Ive also dropped some svet EL34's in
which have made a big leap from those valve art ones. Let me know
what your plans are tweaking this little babe.


Well, first off, I would say these amps are pretty good straight out of the
box. My plans were to (possibly/maybe) strip one out and rebuild it
hard-wired, but having two 'identical' amps....

http://www.apah69.dsl.pipex.com/keit...ow/twoamps.jpg

...has given me a good opportunity to try them on different speakers, using
shared sources.

It is also a good opportunity to upgrade components (valves, capacitors
etc.) in one of them (leaving one in the original state, of course) to see
if there's anything to be discovered in the 'upgrade' path or possibly
explode a myth or two? I have to say that neither of them are *volunteering*
to be be butchered though - they both seem very happy the way they are!

(I attach too many anthropomorphic attributes to valve amps, I'm afraid!!
;-)

At any rate, nothing will be done in a hurry - there's no time scale and
I've got a lot on the go atm!!


Ive got to admit that my initial ideas of being unleashing the
soldering iron on the poor thing have waned abit, the people who have
had a listen are very impressed. Whilst I agree that they sound good
straight from the box Ive got to admit that changing the valves was
more of a, hmmmmmm, how do you say, 'coz I can' kind of thing, after
all its easy to plonk a SS on the rack and never have to touch it!
sadly I get satisfction from playing with DVM's and such, 'involves'
you more.......

We got our mulllards from the same person and Im not so sure about the
quality. The Svets made a difference, and I can rec' them but the
mull's hmmmmm I'll gave 'em time.

I think the only way to get a true bias reading is to find out what
voltage is roaming in there, when you've got it, let me know!! ;o)

Ive also been spending abit more, those little Bada headphone amps
keep catching my eye so I ordered one of them, just checked the DHL
tracking and it should arrive today, Honk Kong to Chorley, Via
Cologne, Brum & Manchester in 3 days aint bad!

"StuH" wrote


Ive got to admit that my initial ideas of being unleashing the
soldering iron on the poor thing have waned abit,



Yes, their eyes get bigger and bigger if you approach them with even just a
screwdriver, don't they? :-)



the people who have
had a listen are very impressed.


Same here, including Shiny Nigel, purveyor of all sorts of 'audio goodies' -
well, up to Cyrus standards mostly....


Whilst I agree that they sound good
straight from the box Ive got to admit that changing the valves was
more of a, hmmmmmm, how do you say, 'coz I can' kind of thing, after
all its easy to plonk a SS on the rack and never have to touch it!


Yes indeed, but I would say that it's a little early for me to thinking of
messing with these amps (if mess I do, in fact, do...) as they haven't had
time to settle down and 'form' properly yet.



sadly I get satisfction from playing with DVM's and such, 'involves'
you more.......


Oh yes! (I think you need to get a bit of a build on:


http://www.apah69.dsl.pipex.com/keith_g/kit88/kit88.htm

http://www.apah69.dsl.pipex.com/keit...de_project.htm

;-)



We got our mulllards from the same person and Im not so sure about the
quality. The Svets made a difference, and I can rec' them but the
mull's hmmmmm I'll gave 'em time.


Badly? Like you can hear it any distance from the speakers? (I haven't put
mine in yet.....)



I think the only way to get a true bias reading is to find out what
voltage is roaming in there, when you've got it, let me know!! ;o)


I'm working on it - keep checking here!!



Ive also been spending abit more, those little Bada headphone amps
keep catching my eye so I ordered one of them, just checked the DHL
tracking and it should arrive today, Honk Kong to Chorley, Via
Cologne, Brum & Manchester in 3 days aint bad!


It's OK if it don't go wrong, my second amp took a month to show up. Good
job I wasn't waiting on it!!

On Thu, 25 Nov 2004 00:45:26 -0800, StuH wrote:

snip

Ive also been spending abit more, those little Bada headphone amps keep
catching my eye so I ordered one of them, just checked the DHL tracking
and it should arrive today, Honk Kong to Chorley, Via Cologne, Brum &
Manchester in 3 days aint bad!

Hmmm.... I'm just down the road from you, in Leyland!

Just modifying my SE 6L6s again... :-)

--
Mick
(no M$ software on here... :-) )
Web: http://www.nascom.info
Web: http://projectedsound.tk

Ive got to admit that my initial ideas of being unleashing the
soldering iron on the poor thing have waned abit, the people who have
had a listen are very impressed. Whilst I agree that they sound good
straight from the box Ive got to admit that changing the valves was
more of a, hmmmmmm, how do you say, 'coz I can' kind of thing, after
all its easy to plonk a SS on the rack and never have to touch it!
sadly I get satisfction from playing with DVM's and such, 'involves'
you more.......

I'm dead chuffed with mine and I've got no intention of messing about
with it yet, I think I'd rather cut my modding teeth by building one
from scratch first, or just wait for Keith to do something to his and
pop over for a listen :-)


Ive also been spending abit more, those little Bada headphone amps
keep catching my eye so I ordered one of them, just checked the DHL
tracking and it should arrive today, Honk Kong to Chorley, Via
Cologne, Brum & Manchester in 3 days aint bad!

I've been looking at those too. Please post your thoughts when you get it!

Phil

"Phil North" wrote


I'm dead chuffed with mine and I've got no intention of messing about with
it yet, I think I'd rather cut my modding teeth by building one from
scratch first, or just wait for Keith to do something to his and pop over
for a listen :-)


Welcome anytime, as you know, but I'm not about to rip either these amps
about for a good while yet - I'm needing to learn a bit more about this
biasing biz and what goes on with it all - current, voltages etc. (These
amps are my *learning* amps now, having successfully built a couple of
stonking amps pretty much on a 'monkey see, monkey do' basis...)

(Btw, I've got a couple of spare 6F2 driver/splitter valves for you if you
want them - I bought 8 of them!!)

Also, nearly lost one of these Chinese amps to Shiny Nigel (whom you have
met) the other night!!!

:-)

Phil North wrote in message ...


I've been looking at those too. Please post your thoughts when you get it!

Phil

It arrived early morning yesterday in fine condition. Bin Bin Ltd
have done their best with the invoice ;0) :0) so we'll see what comes
from Customs. Anyway, first things first, its very well built, bit of
a looker (in aluminium case term) and weighs a suitable amount (how
reassuring is a heavy piece of hi-fi!). I set it up last night,
straight off I wasnt impressed, no better than the phono socket I have
on a marantz thats being used by a mate, it did seem to slightly prove
through the night so we'll wait. Keep in mind that I have no tape-out
function so I was doing direct from source so maybe the lack of
buffers has something to do with it? maybe not............This amp can
also act as a pre-amp so I thought its worth a try, input selector, to
bada to dynavox (the dynavox is a power amp with a passive pot).
Turned the dynavox right up, although on full whack theres a hum so I
didnt go that far, and used the bada. Now this is the strange thing,
Im pretty sure it sounds better doing it this way, Im going to have a
good listen over the wkend to try and get a better picture. So, could
this be a pre-amp with a phono output added on using a cheap tranny
card a la cheap SS integrateds?? I'll have to open it up now and have
a butchers.

Mick...

Hmmm.... I'm just down the road from you, in Leyland!

Just modifying my SE 6L6s again... :-)

Your more than welcome to my humble (very humble, first house, poor
graduate) abode to have a listen.

I'll keep an eye out for your results voltage, oh and I dont tempt
me with building from scratch ideas, I have to resist!!

(StuH) wrote in message . com...
Phil North wrote in message ...


I've been looking at those too. Please post your thoughts when you get it!

Phil

It arrived early morning yesterday in fine condition. Bin Bin Ltd
have done their best with the invoice ;0) :0) so we'll see what comes
from Customs. Anyway, first things first, its very well built, bit of
a looker (in aluminium case term) and weighs a suitable amount (how
reassuring is a heavy piece of hi-fi!). I set it up last night,
straight off I wasnt impressed, no better than the phono socket I have
on a marantz thats being used by a mate, it did seem to slightly prove
through the night so we'll wait. Keep in mind that I have no tape-out
function so I was doing direct from source so maybe the lack of
buffers has something to do with it? maybe not............This amp can
also act as a pre-amp so I thought its worth a try, input selector, to
bada to dynavox (the dynavox is a power amp with a passive pot).
Turned the dynavox right up, although on full whack theres a hum so I
didnt go that far, and used the bada. Now this is the strange thing,
Im pretty sure it sounds better doing it this way, Im going to have a
good listen over the wkend to try and get a better picture. So, could
this be a pre-amp with a phono output added on using a cheap tranny
card a la cheap SS integrateds?? I'll have to open it up now and have
a butchers.

Mick...

Hmmm.... I'm just down the road from you, in Leyland!

Just modifying my SE 6L6s again... :-)

Your more than welcome to my humble (very humble, first house, poor
graduate) abode to have a listen.

I'll keep an eye out for your results voltage, oh and I dont tempt
me with building from scratch ideas, I have to resist!!


The bada is good but not brilliant, maybe a better pair of cans would
make a big difference. For the money, and the time I spend listening
to it its fine for me.

Just picked up Hi-Fi world, the word is out on these dynavox amps,
although its quoted at £400 from Aff. Valve aka Lim! Ive also noticed
that he's doing a modified version (Svets & 4 silver mica caps) for
alot more money. Oh well, it was nice whilst it lasted!