• 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.

PCB for making 12V control voltage from 6.3V heater winding.

I made a board for a project and ordered a bunch of them.

It takes 6.3V from the heater windings and makes 12V for controlling a relay etc using a Delon doubler and a 12V regulator such as MC29300 or LM7812. I use it with a dual winding 6.3V transformer using one winding for DC control, and the other for the 6.3V the biasing board requires.


If anyone wants any I'll offer them for 2$ each plus mail.

Cheers.
Koda
 

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Yes, it would work for that too! Since the current limit is about 1A with a 29300 (not much room for heatsink) I figure that's for a pair of 6SL7 or something?

I used SB1100 and an MC29300 myself since I had them... The larger the drop in the diodes, the less work the regulator does, right? It's only there since I read 18.9V with no load :)
 
Stick to AC heaters, much simpler unless using DHT.
All my mixers, pre amps and amplifiers are AC and little to no hum.

AC heating in a phono preamp is a BAD idea. Yes, it is possible to obtain acceptable residual hum levels in AC heated phono circuitry, but the amount of discomfort (as in royal PITA) involved makes (IMO) the choice of DC heating a total "no brainer".
 
Well, I did design this to run a relay module from a heater winding :) 18.9V (unloaded, pre-regulator) would blow it up.

I agree with Eli about DC for phono, or any other small tubes for that matter. I use 12V SMPS for my heaters. That's why the headphone board I made has a 12V input for heaters even though they have 6V heaters :) Even when I'm using a linear supply, I still make it 12V.

I've also built a cheap test amp using the chassis as signal ground, power ground, house ground, and AC heater return (one heater wire per tube socket, the AC return to chassis) and no hum there either. It was a cheap push pull amp though, not a phono stage.
 
@kodabmx

Thank you for mentioning the MIC29300. Some quick computations suggest that Schottky Diode voltage doubling 5 VAC yields enough headroom for the 12 V. version of that low dropout (LDO) part to function reliably.

Does the MIC29300 have a negative counterpart, as is the case with 7812/7912?

I didn't find one, but the LM2990T might do the trick. LM2990T.