S5 Electronics 139 $ tube amp

[Gubby]

Hi,

I plan to purchase this amazing 139 $ tube amp kit

http://www.s5electronics.com/gpage1.html

Do you have any idea what are the specs of its power transformer ? I'm living in Belgium (Europe) and here we use 220 VAC-50 Hz so I could not use the stock transformer...

Do you have any experience with this amp ? (for info I already red all the topics in the archive concerning this amp)

Thanks

[gmilitano]

Originally posted by Gubby
Hi,

I plan to purchase this amazing 139 $ tube amp kit

http://www.s5electronics.com/gpage1.html

Do you have any idea what are the specs of its power transformer ? I'm living in Belgium (Europe) and here we use 220 VAC-50 Hz so I could not use the stock transformer...

Do you have any experience with this amp ? (for info I already red all the topics in the archive concerning this amp)

Thanks

This kit has been discussed in:

Is this a good tube DIY kit to get?

Good Inexpensive Starter Amp Kit

There is a lot of good info in there, so check them out.

Cheers,
GM.

[ixeo]

so anybody figured how to use this amp with 220V AC?
the links have no info on that...

[Kashmire]

Thanks for the links to the other threads.

I built this amp - I think it sounds horrible, even when compared to cheap consumer all-in-one systems that can be bought at Best Buy or Circuit City.

It sounds very metallic, tinny, very much like some of the 60's guitar amps. No smoothness whatsover.

I encourage people to listen to mine (I loan it to my friends) - that way, they can experience that tubes can sound very, very bad, removing the "magic" that some people assume all tubes sound good.

[Kashmire]

As an additional comment: I attribute the very poor sound to the very high levels of feedback, pentode operation, and the poor quality of the OPTs.