Building my own valve amp
 

"Andre Jute" wrote


PPS The SEX kit as above is super for what you want; SEX stands for
Single Ended eXperimenter's amp but the carriage from Poulsbo near
Seattle will be a killer. A super kit if it is still made is the Arion
Adonis (their base the last time I heard was in Northern Ireland),
about 20W from 5881, lovely casework with a polished stainless
topplate and excellent transformers designed by the sainted Simon
Shilton.


Hah!

The valve amp that was my introduction to valves (and slammed the door
shut forever on SS amps for music playback for me) was an Arion 'Tycho'
(still with the astronomical references today!) - ran as hot as a
blacksmith's forge with the odd red-hot resistor here and there, but
with a fabulous *fully Class A* sound from 8 x 5881 power valves. I only
got rid because it was a great big, complex bugger that needed a bit of
attention and because I had built my own not long after getting it.

It was also a bit humungeous:

http://www.apah69.dsl.pipex.com/show/Arion01.JPG

http://www.apah69.dsl.pipex.com/show/Arion02.JPG

http://www.apah69.dsl.pipex.com/show/Arion03.JPG

http://www.apah69.dsl.pipex.com/show/Arion04.JPG


:-)

Sadly, Arion Acoustics went bust in 1997, I believe...

Building my own valve amp
 

"Andy Evans" wrote in message
oups.com...
You fall for the trap, by assuming a REPRODUCTION system has
any relation to a CREATION system

No trap, just a straw man argument. As a gigging musician I'm quite
aware of the difference, in fact I believe a 10 year old child would
be.
The more subtle point is whether you are able to accept that:
a) musicians can distinguish between a Stradovarius and a practice
violin in a live context, and that is their identical goal in a
recorded context SHOULD THEY BE INTERESTED IN THIS. I say this because
some musicians are indifferent to recordings because the bulk of their
sound input is live music and additionally because if they want to
look at details in a work they read the score. Musicians can also
quite easily run through music they know in their head. So as
musicians we're pretty weary of the "I know a musician who listens on
his kitchen radio, which shows that musicians don't understand
reproduction" kind of anecdotes.
b) no reproduction is perfect, and some flaws are more objectionable
to some listeners than to others. In particular musicians, as above,
are sensitive to timbre and tone and can easily prefer a system with
less than perfect frequency response to one with dull and wooden tone.
As has been said many times, timbre is one of the SET qualities.


Yep.

Question of preference here.

Yep.

Building my own valve amp
 

"Andy Evans" wrote in message
ups.com...
On Nov 2, 1:29?am, "Keith G" wrote:
"Trevor Wilson" wrote

snip magazine reviews and personal OSAFs

When examining the frequency response plots of the SET amps we can
see
serious, highly audible flaws. When examining the distortion plots,
we
can see serious audible flaws in most models at realistic listening
powers. Examining the plots of the other amplifiers, we can see no
obviously audible flaws. Choosing a SET amp over a push pull amp,
is
therefore the deliberate choice of audible problems. Those audible
problems are completely artificial artefacts, not present in the
original sources.

Your problems are not everybody's problems - choice of a SET is to
choose an amp for its characteristics. The bit you can't choke down
is
that people buying/choosing/using SET amps consider those
characteristics to be beneficial. Three members of the 'St Neots Six'
(local enthusiasts) own and use SETS, one of the others prefers my
SET
to my PP amps, another would like a SET and the last one keeps
threatening to build one but probably never will as he is getting
perhaps a bit to old for more building - otherwise that could easily
become a *100%* instance of SETs here!!

I'm going to take a rest from trying to grapple with the considerable
weirdness of TWs mind (he now alternates between calling people
logically inconsistent and lying pieces of ****...), and note that the
above is exactly what happened at one of our London Audiocircle meets,
where we auditioned about 10 amps - 845, 300b, 2a3, KT88, EL34 and
probably something I forgot. Everyone fell in love with the Bez 300b
SET.


Yep. I inevitably return to it after an excursion with another of my
amps...


A month later four of our members had their own SET amps -
including me. Two guys bought 300b Music Angels, I built a 300b amp
and the other was an 805 amp. This does show that the 300b SET is a
mightly seductive little thing.


Yep.


Reasons for liking it were just that
it was naturally musical - not a "reason" as such, just a listening
preference. So, is this an infatuation with a honeymoon period or a
permanent preference.


See above - it's been pretty permanent for me so far!


Well, in my case I don't quite know. I've been
very happy listening to the 300b for a week. But on the other hand
I've been listening to my latest 2a3 PP amp for a few days and it's
bloody good as well.


Yep. Better bass than the 300B (might be the trannies) but the sound can
harden up if you drive them too hard.


My preliminary findings - SET more lush with excellent tonal and
timbral detail, PP cleaner with better leading edge attack. But make
no mistake, PP can give you that spooky "they're in the room in front
of me" feeling. I listened to Brahms violin sonata 2 in a lifelike
recording, and you could nearly smell the rosin and see the pianist
turning pages. Right now I'm perplexed which way to go in construction
terms - I can see virtues in both. I've built three PP 2a3 amps now
and one 300b SET. I guess to really know I need to build a 300b PP
amp. A 2a3 SET would be nice, but a bit low powered.


Yep they are (or should be) destined only for Lowthers and then (with a
decent vinyl source) they will punch buttons that many will never get
punched in all their 'audio careers' while they spend a fortune
'sidegrading' their way along the shelves of the local hifi bandit (who
is, naturally, only to pleased to help them do so) in a futile search
for a truly *engaging* and enchanting (can't stop playing records/can't
switch it off kinda thing) sound....

Building my own valve amp
 

In article , mick
wrote:

Keith was quite right though; it's almost impossible to find a dealer in
the UK that has *any* valve amps to listen to, never mind several to
compare.

That is quite interesting given the way they tend to feature so much in
magazines.

Slainte,

Jim

--
Electronics http://www.st-and.ac.uk/~www_pa/Scot...o/electron.htm
Audio Misc http://www.audiomisc.co.uk/index.html
Armstrong Audio http://www.audiomisc.co.uk/Armstrong/armstrong.html

Building my own valve amp
 

"Keith G" wrote in message
...


There is no big mystery AFAIAC - valves give more clarity, 'air' and
*life* than any SS I've heard; SETs add more depth and better imaging than
PP, making the sound more *natural*....

Is that too simple??

How to make a good SS amp sound like a SET:

Parallel a power suuply rated silicon diode across the terminals of of any
speaker that is driven by a SS amp. Put a 2 ohm resistors in series with the
speaker hot leads, going back to the power amp.

The 2 ohm resistor will pretty simulate the typical SET's high output
impedance, and the diode will simulate its nonlinearity.

If the bare diode is a bit gritty sounding (hard to believe that a LP & SET
tolerator would even notice!), try some resistors in series with the diode
in the range of 2,4, 8 ohms.

Building my own valve amp
 

"Arny Krueger" wrote in message
...

"Keith G" wrote in message
...


There is no big mystery AFAIAC - valves give more clarity, 'air' and
*life* than any SS I've heard; SETs add more depth and better imaging
than PP, making the sound more *natural*....

Is that too simple??

How to make a good SS amp sound like a SET:

Parallel a power suuply rated silicon diode across the terminals of of
any speaker that is driven by a SS amp. Put a 2 ohm resistors in
series with the speaker hot leads, going back to the power amp.

The 2 ohm resistor will pretty simulate the typical SET's high output
impedance, and the diode will simulate its nonlinearity.

If the bare diode is a bit gritty sounding (hard to believe that a LP
& SET tolerator would even notice!), try some resistors in series
with the diode in the range of 2,4, 8 ohms.


Or maybe I could just use one of my two SET amps? :-)

Anyway, **** all that palaver - go see my *squadron* warming up on the
'tarmac'....

http://www.apah69.dsl.pipex.com/show/Dawn_Patrol.wmv


(The Soozie's back home - prettier'n ever!! :-)

Building my own valve amp
 

the local hifi bandit

Well, salesmen have their place. Just not the same place builders
inhabit. I haven't been in a hi-fi showroom for - let's see - about 7
years. And that was to accompany my brother when he wanted to listen
to a Nagra 845 amp. Not a bad amp as it happens, and he paid 7 grand
for it. But then, that's how he does things. He works hard for his
money, and the thing sounds nice and doesn't blow fuses.

Andy

Building my own valve amp
 

If the bare diode is a bit gritty sounding (hard to believe that a LP & SET
tolerator would even notice!), try some resistors in series with the diode
in the range of 2,4, 8 ohms.

And don't forget the candelabra on the grand piano and changing the
water in the flowers.

Building my own valve amp
 

On Fri, 02 Nov 2007 14:26:59 +0000, Jim Lesurf wrote:

In article , mick
wrote:

Keith was quite right though; it's almost impossible to find a dealer
in the UK that has *any* valve amps to listen to, never mind several to
compare.

That is quite interesting given the way they tend to feature so much in
magazines.



Round here (West Lancs) you are lucky to find any audio magazines
(dealing with hardware, not content) on the newsagents shelves either, so
that isn't a problem!

--
Mick (Working in a M$-free zone!)
Web: http://www.nascom.info http://mixpix.batcave.net

Building my own valve amp
 

mick wrote:
On Fri, 02 Nov 2007 14:26:59 +0000, Jim Lesurf wrote:


In article , mick
wrote:


Keith was quite right though; it's almost impossible to find a dealer
in the UK that has *any* valve amps to listen to, never mind several to
compare.

That is quite interesting given the way they tend to feature so much in
magazines.




Round here (West Lancs) you are lucky to find any audio magazines
(dealing with hardware, not content) on the newsagents shelves either, so
that isn't a problem!


Ah, well, but there is a bit of a cluster of people playing with valves
around the Manchester to Hull area.

--
Nick