• WARNING: Tube/Valve amplifiers use potentially LETHAL HIGH VOLTAGES.
    Building, troubleshooting and testing of these amplifiers should only be
    performed by someone who is thoroughly familiar with
    the safety precautions around high voltages.

ST-35 Tube Brands

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I'm putting together a Dynaco ST-35 tube amp using stuffed boards from Tubes4hifi, using EL84's and 7247 tubes and would like some suggestions as to what brands sound the best. I listen to jazz, blues and classical music. I know lots of people like to tube roll but I'm on a tight budget right now and want tubes that will work well with the type of music I like to listen to. :D
 
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I'll suggest the inexpensive and rugged Russian military surplus 6P14P-EV, even nicer, but rarer and somewhat more expensive are the -ER which I use in one of my amps. (These are equivalent to the 7189 and IMHO are a better match to the ST-35 operating conditions than most modern production.)

The nice thing about these tubes is an ST-35 is unlikely to cook them, and they actually sound very good.

I like the JJ as well, but am wondering whether they would survive in an ST-35 where they are run pretty hard and usually share a common cathode resistor which means if they aren't all well matched one or more may tend to run away. (From my own experience)

As an aside I hope you are using individual cathode resistors and bypass caps for each output tube as this assures much better current matching between tubes in a PP pair.
 
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Hey Riverrat,
As an aside I hope you are using individual cathode resistors and bypass caps for each output tube as this assures much better current matching between tubes in a PP pair.

Note this is an very easy operation. Don´t mind this if you´ve already done it. If you are into modyfing it, also change the multicap.

I´d like to support Kevin about this as modern EL84s as they aren´t so happy about the overvoltage that you find in ST-35.


Also the brand issue isn´t so much about sound, it is about durability.
 
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