| wicked1 |
Anyone have any experience w/ silk transformers?
I could have sworn I read a few things about them here, but my search just came up w/ nothing.
I guess if anyone knows, how do they compare to the James? Silk (as a company) is very responsive, and James took a month to get to my email. Euphonia has NEVER responded to several emails over the past couple of months, so James just isn't working out for me.
I'm looking for a decent, good value 300b se transformer.
thanks |
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| kevinkr |
Try Jack Elliano over at Electra-Print, he can make what you are looking for and his prices are very competitive.
Another option would be to look for Transcendar Output transformers on eBay. I used them and they're extremely good for the money.
Edcor is still another option.. |
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| revintage |
| I have also very good experience from Jacks stuff. Have only bought custom PPs from him but they work like clockwork. He is also very concerned that you get exactly what you need. |
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| wicked1 |
Electra-Print is twice the cost of the james or silk transformers. (unless his prices are per pair, but i doubt it. His website doesn't say they are listed as a pair).
$450 is more than I wanted to spend, but I would if they would be twice as good as the Asian transformers! :)
Urg.. I've been dreading this part of the build. Everything else is figured out and ordered, but it's really tough to feel good about the transformer purchase. There are so many mixed reviews and variables, and different methods of construction, etc. |
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| Jeb-D. |
| Anyone tried the One Electron transformers for 300B? |
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| kstagger |
| quote: | Originally posted by Jeb-D.
Anyone tried the One Electron transformers for 300B? |
a few years ago I built a 300B circuit using an One Electron Transformer - it sounded very good. But honestly I haven't compared it to James/Electraprint/etc - my previous SE foray used a 2A3 and an AudioNote 'Experimenter' SE OT. |
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| dsavitsk |
| quote: | Originally posted by wicked1
Electra-Print is twice the cost of the james or silk transformers. (unless his prices are per pair, but i doubt it. His website doesn't say they are listed as a pair).
$450 is more than I wanted to spend, ... |
Which EP's are $450? I don't see anything approaching that price except the ones with partial silver secondaries. |
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| wicked1 |
225 each. It's 225 for the pair for the silk's, and $190 a pair for the james.
I do like the idea that it's someone here in the states winding them by hand for me, but is it wrong to take advantage of the lower cost of living in the far east and save a few bucks? The Silks are also hand wound on a per order basis. |
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| dsavitsk |
| quote: | Originally posted by wicked1
but is it wrong to take advantage of the lower cost of living in the far east and save a few bucks? |
Yes. :)
I can't speak for the Silks, but I did directly compare James and EP. The EP's are currently in use in my amp while I sold the James. |
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| wicked1 |
HAH
Somehow I knew someone would reply to that w/ a simple yes. :)
I am leaning towards the EP's... I've given in and spent way more than intended on several other purchases for this amp... It looks like I might have to continue that trend, and pay this credit card bill b4 the wife sees it. |
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| dsavitsk |
| That's the spirit. I always find that the conversation with Jack at EP is worth the extra money. |
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| kmtang |
I just fell in love with it.
They are really good sounding OPT.
Johnny |
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| wicked1 |
Ah... if I'm willing to give in and spend almost $500 on transformers, it opens up all sorts of new possibilities, doesn't it? The lundahl's are actually less expensive than the EP's! I could even go w/ amorphous core for about the same price as the EP's. (depending on if I chose the 1660 or 1620 series) I've read a lot of good things about amorphous cores, but then the EP website says they aren't as good as a standard core.
Making decisions sucks. |
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| Andrewbee |
| quote: | | Making decisions sucks. |
I disagree. Making a decision is the most important thing, right or wrong. If it's right it works out and if wrong you will learn from it.
Back on topic. The conversation with (its part of the purchase package) Jack at EP will be more than worth any saving you may make from another manufacturer.:) |
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| JLH |
| One the main differances between Eletra-Print transformers and the Asian ones will be the primary inductance. For some reason, all the Asian designed OPT's I have tried always had much lower inductance - i.e. weaker bass. |
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| zarniwoop |
| I have the james in a 300b amp. Not much useful to say about them sonically since no comparisons made so far. Another plus, aside from price, is that they look better in their potted covers. I'm sick of the standard exposed transformer painted in black look. If you're gonna cover up winding/bobbin/leads with a couple steel covers I don't see why you just don't go all the way and make it look less obnoxious with a potted enclosure. Just a thought. |
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| kmtang |
I have used Plitron's 3035SE OPT in my 300B mono's for few years. It has very good frequency response upto almost 100KHz. However, I don't like the sound of it much.
The Lundahl 1620AM amorphous OPT has much more natural sound breathing out music.
If you want to build the 300B amps, I would recommend the LL1623AM 80mA. I would say it is worth in this investment. You may buy the cover of OPT to make it look nice if you want.
Johnny |
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| Jeb-D. |
| quote: | | One the main differances between Eletra-Print transformers and the Asian ones will be the primary inductance. For some reason, all the Asian designed OPT's I have tried always had much lower inductance - i.e. weaker bass. |
There are also drawbacks with excessive primary inductance. Inductive & capacitive parasitics and in many cases a higher DCR. |
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| MQracing |
| quote: | Originally posted by zarniwoop
If you're gonna cover up winding/bobbin/leads with a couple steel covers I don't see why you just don't go all the way and make it look less obnoxious with a potted enclosure. Just a thought. |
the drawback to potting transformers is that the potting material adds significantly to the capacitance of the trans. If you test the same trans before potting in a can and after potting in a can you wll generally see the freq response droop earlier and if you look at some 10 or 20 khz square waves before and after potting you will also generally see some degradation from the potting materials.
And the most common modern potting materials have not so good dielectric constants and dissapation factors.
potted tranneys may look pretty but unpotted tranneys more often sound pretty :=)
msl |
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| MQracing |
| quote: | Originally posted by Jeb-D.
There are also drawbacks with excessive primary inductance. Inductive & capacitive parasitics and in many cases a higher DCR. |
This is too broad a generalization. It's possible to design a PP output trans with very high OCL (say a hundred henries per thousand ohms of nom pri impedance) and with proper coil design (i.e., interleaving) keep the leakage L at very, very low levels (say 1 mh per thousand ohms of reflected primary impedance) and keep the winding resistance low enough that your insertion losses are at .25 db (that's point twenty five DB). And get high frequency response in excess of 100khz at minus 1 db.
These are some of the characteristics of a high quality output trans. Sadly, your probably not going to build to this level at Hammond prices.
MSL |
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| kmtang |
I used Lundahl's 1620 and 1620AM for the 45 SE tube amps. The OPT's were ordered with idle current of 30mA. The primary inductance is approx 90 to 100H which is more than double of the Hammond 1628SE.
I measured the frequency response of the 45 amp with LL1620. It is rather surprised to me that it can go all the way to 20kHz and with a dip at approx 35KHz. Then it will come back up. The low frequency response is too good that it stays flat at 10Hz which is the limit of my signal generator.
The 10KHz square wave response looks really good without ringing.
With almost 100H primary inductance, surely you will get excellent bass that ROCKS...................
Tested drive with B&W801 speakers..... My friend said the music was so rich that has fresh, blood and bones.
I know that there are better OPT's out there such as Audio Note double C core and Tamura. However, their price is not affordable for me at this moment. I need to win some money from lottery.
Johnny |
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| rdf |
| The 1628SE was rated at 79H if I recall, the 1628SEA at 48H. |
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| wicked1 |
| quote: | Originally posted by kmtang
I used Lundahl's 1620 and 1620AM for the 45 SE tube amps. |
Are the amorphous cores really worth 2x the price for SE outputs? I can see where it makes a big difference to push pull designs where the signal crosses zero. Even the manufacturers seem to think they don't make much difference for SE. |
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| Bandersnatch |
| quote: | Originally posted by wicked1
Are the amorphous cores really worth 2x the price for SE outputs? I can see where it makes a big difference to push pull designs where the signal crosses zero. Even the manufacturers seem to think they don't make much difference for SE. |
hey-Hey!!!,
There are some of us who believe that a PP core should have a small gap; not to allow DC, but to reduce remnance and linearize the permeability. I have not yet done this sort of experiment with power outputs, but for PP grid chokes, I have. Core material must be chosen to allow appropriate perm for a given number of turns for one.
Core choice is always a balancing act; perm, flux density, loss, size/MPL...can't say that any one is best, yes?
cheers,
Douglas |
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| kmtang |
From my experience with the LL1620 and LL1620AM OPT's, I would say the Amorphous OPT sounds much more natural than the nickle one.
If you have the money, I will buy the AM one.
Johnny |
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| zarniwoop |
Have you guys seen that comparison of OPTs on silk's page? Thats a good idea, but some of the data seems questionable. Primary L numbers are strange in some cases. james 6123 should have ~20H at 60Hz, not 13H at 120Hz.. and thats at 80mA! And bandwidth is 25Hz-30kHz, -1dB.. whats the problem with that? it can dip all it wants at 80khz, this is audio!
well it would be nice if someone did an unbiased test on many OPTs to see how they do. Even though, yes, the numbers are not necessarily indicative of sonic performance. It may help someone choose a particular type better. The way it is now, the numbers from different manufactures testing are all over the place and use different test conditions.
msl: ok potting means, capacitance goes up, worse square wave (if that test means much in the first place). Looks like a tradeoff yet again. Lots of people like those potted tangos and tamuras, though.
kmtang: wow, i can't imagine a SE 45 amp doing very well w/ b&w801s. yikes! |
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| dsavitsk |
| quote: | Originally posted by zarniwoop
kmtang: wow, i can't imagine a SE 45 amp doing very well w/ b&w801s. yikes! |
At 87dB, you wouldn't get much sound, but older B&W's had, relatively speaking, benign loads. I heard some 801's w/ push-pull tubes back in the mid 90's and thought it was a pretty good combination.
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| kmtang |
Good sound doesn't mean it is loud.
It's the richness of the music you can hear from the speakers.
Johnny |
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| limono |
Consider O-netics for your project .I could only afford level 1 (~$250 a pair) SET trans for my 45 project but they are truly great transformers with fine detail in, mid bass and gentle natural highs. I read today that Bud Purvine is rising prices so act quickly;) . I also have Electraprint Tm3kb (65mA 3.5k ) Opt and it is very good too comparable to O-netics with more accent on treble . (my version is nicely poted and was >$400 a pair)
Regards, L |
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| wicked1 |
| quote: | Originally posted by limono
I also have Electraprint Tm3kb (65mA 3.5k ) Opt and it is very good too comparable to O-netics with more accent on treble . (my version is nicely poted and was >$400 a pair)
Regards, L |
Which has more accent on treble? Electraprint, or O-Netics?
thanks |
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| limono |
| quote: | Originally posted by wicked1
Which has more accent on treble? Electraprint, or O-Netics?
thanks |
Electraprint.
There is a little problem with my comparison because Electraprint is 3.5k primary and O-netics 5K. Both were used in Yama 08 clone(45) . O-netics trans started from the day one with great "resolution" (hate that word) in midbas ,detail and suprising "kick' for 2W 45 amp. I was listening only for about week before I had to leave home for over a month but my conclusion was that O-netics is a wonderful transformer for $250 a pair. I just wonder how level II and III sounds. |
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| kevinkr |
| quote: | Originally posted by limono
Electraprint.
There is a little problem with my comparison because Electraprint is 3.5k primary and O-netics 5K. Both were used in Yama 08 clone(45) . O-netics trans started from the day one with great "resolution" (hate that word) in midbas ,detail and suprising "kick' for 2W 45 amp. I was listening only for about week before I had to leave home for over a month but my conclusion was that O-netics is a wonderful transformer for $250 a pair. I just wonder how level II and III sounds. |
This comparison might be a non starter simply because the two transformers don't reflect the same load impedance to the output tube, and in the case of the EP the primary inductance is probably considerably lower given its 3.5K primary Z thus further reducing output at low frequencies. |
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| limono |
| quote: | Originally posted by kevinkr
This comparison might be a non starter simply because the two transformers don't reflect the same load impedance to the output tube, and in the case of the EP the primary inductance is probably considerably lower given its 3.5K primary Z thus further reducing output at low frequencies. |
Kevin ,you may be right , but it was detail and quality of the midbass which was noticable not quantity of lows which was plenty on electraprint too. (I also used VT-52) I'm still out of home so cannot even play with load (secondary taps) to report more. Anyway whoever buy Electraprint should be happy for the price and I've met guys on audioshows that said they (electraprints) are the best transformers on the market for normal money. But ,I wanted to share my experience with O-netics because I think those transformers are something special and deserve some publicity. |
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