Tube Tester Recommendations

[TV7]

What sort of troubles? I'd gladly test any tubes you are using if you mailed them to me (with return postage inside). I am assuming if you live in Australia.....
However I wont be back from Japan for another 8 weeks, so probably no help.

[TexAus]

There is some intermittent issue in the high voltage section (I think). It blows rectifiers all the time. The turn-on delay board was bypassed and I though the problem was solved. I played it about three hours that evening, went to bed, then turned it on the next day. the rectifier went out once again.
I found someone locally that was kind enough to check the tubes and also briefly looked at the wiring etc. All that seemed to be fine.
I'm working with the dealer of this amp in an attempt to find a resolution as the amp is new. This is proving more difficult that I had hoped. I don't wish to tarnish the dealers reputation at this point as I am still hoping for a resolution that is reasonable. Once the outcome is known I'll let everyone know what happened and the identification of the dealer.
Thanks for you offer to test the tubes, that is an exceptionally kind offer. I'm actually in the U.S., a small town near Austin Texas.

[TV7]

Oh ok. Far from me to speculate on any 'new' equipment it sounds like a major design flaw.
I don't like the idea of bypassing any on board delay. Is it silicon rectifiers or tube? you can get flash overs with rectifiers for a few reasons, this would 'hurt' the tube but in my experience they still work to some degree. Sounds like heater failiure or something crazy like that. Good luck anyway! feel free to let us know the brand later!

[TexAus]

Thanks again TV7,
I tend to agree with you regarding the amp, I have been told that by another person as well. Some of the items he asked me to try were not well received by others either. One was the instruction to 'bypass' the delay. I wasn't especially happy about that solution either. I paid extra for that feature as I intended to use a solid state Weber rectifier. The Weber was also listed as a recommendation on his own website. I was specifically told not to send the delay board in for inspection/repair/replacement. Just bypass it and forget it. I'll post resolution and details later. I want to give the seller all opportunities to remedy this before I disclose everything.

[SY]

The delay in that amp is a poor idea, IMO. The voltages are not high enough to cause cathode stripping, there's a tube rectifier, and the input caps aren't oversized. Needless complication and opportunity for failure.

As a reference, Dynaco made a couple hundred thousand SCA-35s, which had no delay, silicon rectifiers, and a B+ rating well above the datasheet maximums for the output tubes. Result? 10-20 years of tube life!

[TexAus]

Thanks SY,
Nice to know it's not a problem to do without it.
The amp still fails, even without the delay board. The sellers solution seem to be about the same as with the delay board. Too bad - So sad; send it to a third party (he specifies) and pay them to give you an estimate. Another $110 plus is just shipping (both ways), plus whatever he chooses to charge for the estimate. Who knows what an actual repair would cost. The amp is a money pit at this point. It's a shame that a person would sell a product to another and not support it. Oh well ....

[SY]

That sucks, sorry. If you're still coming Saturday, bring it along and leave it with me for a couple days- I'll run it through a few more checks to see if we can pin down the intermittent.

[TexAus]

Thank you so much SY -
You are the absolute best. I'm really looking forward to Saturday, it's the kind of thing that makes life worthwhile for audio nerds like myself.