• 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.

CCS for tubes/valves: PCBs

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#262
burnedfingers said:
Any update on this yet?
Click to expand...

currently stalled due to no time to even think about it (actually a couple small glimmers this week, but not enuff to light a fire under my butts)

If anyone wants to do some board fab pricing (that is where we are at) to see if we go with Advanced or with someone else the help would be appreciated.

dave
 
#264
Wow, I just found this thread. It's kind of Twilight Zone-ish for me. I didn't plow through the whole thread to see what changes you have made, but you guys are certainly aware that your original circuit posted 1-27-06 is our Camille Cascode Constant Current source as used in Bottlehead kits, and that we have been making and selling standalone C4S kits with boards, transistors, LEDs and an application manual for about ten years, yes?

I'm not concerned about your copying it because we put in the public domain years ago. A little credit to John Camille for the design when posting the original circuit would have been be nice. It seems like you guys are going to a lot of trouble to get boards made when I can get have bins full of them in about ten days time. I may be able to help with your "boards only" group buy if someone wants to contact me. We have also designed a new board for our own products that will accomodate a couple of cascode CCSs and hybrid shunt regulators, that will probably come out in standalone kit form later this year.

BTW the original CCS idea goes way back before Morgan. Try looking in Valley and Wallman.

Doc B.
www.bottlehead.com
 
#265
Sorry, when I put together and documented these designs, I didn't (and still haven't) seen any of your stuff. It is in no way a "copy" of anything except a figure out of "Valve Amplifiers," which itself wasn't an original design. Cascode CCS using bipolars and/or FETs have a long history, as you aptly point out. I don't know when using a red LED as a reference for a CCS originated, but the first time I saw that, it was an Ike Eisenson design (his Dynaco mod boards) about 25-30 years ago.
 
#266
Doc B. said:
but you guys are certainly aware that your original circuit posted 1-27-06 is our Camille Cascode Constant Current source as used in Bottlehead kits, and that we have been making and selling standalone C4S kits with boards, transistors, LEDs and an application manual for about ten years, yes?
Click to expand...

Hi Doc... Good to see you here. Yes i had noticed that your CCS was similar (if not the same). The circuit came straight out of Morgan Jone's Valve Amplifiers (with Morgan's permission & help) which was 1st published in 1996 (and that came out of work he did at the BBC and was no doubt around long before that). Any similarities are either purely coincidental -- or John saw Morgan's book. Anyone who knows what they were doing would probably come up with the same thing so i'd guess coincidence.

dave
 
#267
or John saw Morgan's book
Click to expand...

Of course John was publishing his early CCS work in Sound Practices back in 1994 and it was an extension of his many year's work at TI, so maybe Morgan saw John's work? Who knows? They could have corresponded and developed their ideas in parallel as well. John was rather prolific in his correspondence and committed to sharing his knowledge with the community.

It appears from a quick scan of the thread that you guys have been struggling for a year to put a group order together. Group orders are tough to execute and can turn out to be a lot more work than people expect. If you are having trouble making the project happen I might at least be able to advise you on a way to get some boards made for everyone at a reasonable price. If you want to press on without my interference, no sweat. I'm sure I can find something else to keep me busy. ;^)>
 
#268
Who knows?
Click to expand...

I do, actually. MJ first published the LED/bipolar cascode CCS in '93, and had been using it for some years before that. He doesn't claim it as original. The Eisenson stuff on LED-referenced CCS was published in '79 (I checked the date on that issue of Audio Update), and he didn't claim it as original, either. Plus ca change, plus la meme chose.

We got the first run of boards done by Advanced Circuits. I've still got a pile of those for anyone interested. If you've got some good alternate sources, we'd appreciate hearing about them. I've personally used Advanced and PCB Express. John Broskie used someone down in Redwood City; his boards are gems.

BTW, it's very nice to see you over here! :up:
 
#269
We've found that Express PCB, not to be confused with PCB Express is a good company to work with. If you can get your quantities up into the few hundreds the pricing for small masked and screened boards is competitive.

They also have a pretty reasonable small quantity package for prototyping called MiniBoard, which is three 2.5" x 3.8" boards for $51. The MiniBoard does not include solder mask or silkscreen. But for prototyping where you are assembling the board yourself and you know where everything fits it's a very cost effective way to try out a new small board design, and we use them often. PJ might do a layout that fits three or six little board patterns on one mini board, and we just cut them up here.
 
#275
How do you use the LV NPN CCS?

Let us say I have a -12V supply, do I connect the -12V to input, ground to Return and the output to the cathode of the tube?

If i have a +-12V, -12 to input, +12V to ground and output to cathode tube?

How about the HV NPN CCS?

B+ on input, ground to return and output to cathode of tube?

Thanks.
 
#280
Would anyone be kind enough to tell me how I connect IN, OUT and RETURN terminals of CCS schematics below to actual tube amp circuits?

Sorry, I don't even remember how I had the schematics but I am kind of positive that I've got it sometime ago from the thread.

All the best,
Kay
 

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