• 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.

LOT of tubes. what can I do?

Status
Not open for further replies.
Jump to Latest
Z

zafira1981

Member
Joined 2004
#1
I have a LOT, i mean REALLY a lot of tubes. My father used to build amplifiers, rf transmitters and lot of stuff with tubes.

I want to "try" the tube sound, i've never heard a tube amp.

What can I do? how can I start?

maybe a pre-amp & an amp (low power) to test.

Thanks!!!
Jorge.
 
#2
Valves need high voltages and that makes them dangerous. You really should cure yourself of this affliction before it becomes both expensive and dangerous. There are plenty of people here who would be happy to dispose of your valves properly...
 
#3
EC8010 said:
Valves need high voltages and that makes them dangerous. You really should cure yourself of this affliction before it becomes both expensive and dangerous. There are plenty of people here who would be happy to dispose of your valves properly...
Click to expand...

Have you heard about Tesla Coils?
I'm pretty familiar with high voltage 🙄

If I'm not dead yet, is because I know how to work with HV 🙂

thanks for the advice.

I cant sell the tubes, they're from my dad. If i sold one, he will kill me. But will be very happy to see me building a tube amp 🙂
 
#4
Have you heard about Tesla Coils?
I'm pretty familiar with high voltage 🙄
Click to expand...

Tesla Coils are even worse, I would be happy to dispose of any pulse capacitors, coil winding equipment, magnet wire, synchronous rotary or Marx Blast spark gaps, and tungsten electrodes you might have. 😉

Vacuum tubes (ones you dont care about sacrificing to Thor or Loki!) can also be used to drive Tesla Coils.
 
#6
zafira1981 said:

What can I do? how can I start?
Click to expand...

Hello Jorge,

please post some info on the tubes you've got, I'll find something easy for you to start with, at only the expense of a couple of output pentodes 😉

But more important, do you have iron at hand? And if not, how easy would be for you to obtain some?

If you aren't so geek like us, for "iron" we mean power transformers, input transformers, output transformers, interstage transformers, autotransformers... everything that "transforms" is "iron" 😀
 
#8
well I will take some time to write an excel with the tubes and cantity I have.

And about "irons", i didnt know that you call them that way, but at the first time i read it, i was sure you were talking about transformers 😀 so im a kind of nerd too 🙄

My father is looking for the irons right now. he said he has lot of output irons and for the PSU too.


here is a pic of the box with the tubes:

An externally hosted image should be here but it was not working when we last tested it.
 
#9
I cant sell the tubes, they're from my dad. If i sold one, he will kill me. But will be very happy to see me building a tube amp
Click to expand...

Great! Be sure to ask for and get his supervision when messing around with high voltage circuits. If you haven't that experience yet.

Also he should be able to offer good advice on circuit layout and construction to improve success.

"Iron" for transformers, because the steel lams are mostly made of iron. And weigh like solid iron bricks....
 
#10
big & medium size list

43
77
42
43
47
75
78

1629
12AX4GTA
12Z3
1G3GTA/1B3GT
1K3
247 52-13
24A
25L6G
25Z5
25Z6GT
5AS4A
5U4GB
5U4GB
5Y3GT
6A3
6A7
6A8
6AU4GTA
6AX4
6AX4GTA
6BL7GT
6C5
6C6
6D6
6D6
6DE4
6DQ6B
6E5
6EM7
6J7
6J7
6K6GT/G
6K7G
6K7GT
6K8GT
6L7GT
6Q7
6Q7GT
6Q7GT
6SA7
6SJ7
6SL7GT
6SN7GT
6SN7GTB
6SN7GTB
6V6
6V66T
6V6GT
PF9
PH235
PM5
SYI56H
 
#14
the list is only from big tubes. there are lot of small tubes that i didnt "catalogued"? yet.

tomorrow maybe i will take some time to write them.

I have 2 brand-new PHILLIPS 6A3. my father told me that he bought that tubes for a new high-fi amplifier but never made it. so maybe i can use them 🙄

here a pic of 2 irons & the brand-new 6a3.

I think that the irons are for PSU, not output. maybe i will have to buy a couple.

An externally hosted image should be here but it was not working when we last tested it.


An externally hosted image should be here but it was not working when we last tested it.
 
#19
poobah said:
Zafira,

EC8010 is correct... send all your tubes to him... they are very dangerous.

:xeye:
Click to expand...

No Rob, you're wrong. Big tubes like 6A3, 25L6, 6V6 are extremely harmful. If you leave them on a shelf or on a table, they could fall to the floor and broke in little pieces that could easily KILL children and pets. I'm the only one in the world to have a legal disposal facility, please send them to me to avoid dangers.


:smash:



(Nice, a 6A3 amp!)
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Top Bottom