• 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.

Morgan Jones "Building Valve Amplifiers"

Status
This old topic is closed. If you want to reopen this topic, contact a moderator using the "Report Post" button.
A thorough book about amplifier design that hasn't been mentioned yet is Amplifying devices and low-pass amplifier design by Cherry and Hooper. Mind you, it is quite expensive.

When it comes to building already designed amplifiers, Building valve amplifiers is about as thorough and complete as it gets.
 
I have two editions of Jones' Valve Amplifiers and his Building Valve Amplifiers books. I find him a bit opinionated (for example, he admits to reluctantly including a single-ended design that he begrudgingly admits to liking after the build), but his books are very informative nonetheless and give a good introduction to tube amp design. I skipped the intro chapters on how passive components work (I have a Master's degree in EE) and went straight for the 'meat' on triodes, pentodes, biasing, etc. Good stuff.
Jones writes well. At least I like his style. The book reads almost like a novel - at least compared to many engineering texts.

I seem to recall the 'Building' book being pretty good also. A bit basic if you're mechanically inclined, but I picked up a few good tricks from it. I was unaware of the Greenlee punches, for example. They're incredibly handy for making holes for tube sockets.

For other tube books, see Pete Millett's collection here: tubebooks.org - Vintage info from the age of vacuum tubes Tons of scans of old tube books available for download at the click of a mouse.

Tom
 
Last edited:
Tom,

Even after skim reading I can agree with that comment (Building Valve Amplifiers) It is very complete, or thorough in the subject. Its just im comfortable with my skill im assembly.

The subject just isn't quite what I was expecting.

There is quite a wealth of online articles and links, members her have written, whilst they contain real and tangible information, something is still missing. At the opposite end of things I guess there are The books which focus on maths, which can be heavy reading.

I haven't a Masters, just a degree but I'd skip to the triodes, pentode, biasing, circuit topologies - so 100% agree with that.
 
Last edited:
Wow! That's I don't even know, but it's not good. When I type in "Amplifier" into TPL, I get 247 results. Are you from a small area or a big city?

I get 20 results if I just search for anything with amplifier in the Sacramento system
Encore -- amplifier
but most have nothing to do with amplifiers

It is depressing

Anyone know how different the 2003 and 2012 editions are?
 
Last edited:
I own both books by Jones and yeah, "Building valve amplifiers" was pretty much a waste of money to me. Having said that, "Valve amplifiers" is an excellent book, but it's pretty intimidating for the novice who doesn't like math. I found Kevin O'Connor's "Principles of power" much easier to follow and it gives the basic gist of how these things work. It's a fairly cheap book but full of very useful information.
 
Administrator
Joined 2004
Paid Member
I get 20 results if I just search for anything with amplifier in the Sacramento system
Encore -- amplifier
but most have nothing to do with amplifiers

It is depressing

Anyone know how different the 2003 and 2012 editions are?

I have 3 of the 4 published editions (1st, 3rd, 4th), and the one you want is the latest (and of course most expensive). I rarely refer to the older editions, but there is some material included in the earlier ones that isn't in the later ones. The 4th edition has roughly twice the page count of the 1st. Unfortunately I don't have the time to get into any further detail, and for that I apologize.

The 4th Ed is worth every penny I paid for it.
 
I find Morgan’s book to be excellent resources and endorse the positive comments made. A book I supplement it with is Merlin Blencowe’s ‘Designing High-Fidelity Valve Preamps’, see here. Added to these two is Allen Wright’s ‘Tube Preamp Cookbook’ which is a great read (if you appreciate Allen’s style!) – available from here
 
Guys, there is lots of material online to learn from if you search it out. Pete Millet has an extensive cache of audio-related books, tubebooks.org - Vintage info from the age of vacuum tubes

Starting in Glass Audio 8:4 (1996) there is an article by Scott Frankland which essentially an annotated bibliography of tube-audio related books. If you are willing to read text books and not just popular books, there are dozens of books from the 30s-40s-50s that cover tube circuits and amplifier design thoroughly. Some of these books are hard to find, but many titles should be available for a few dollars if you can find them.

Ones I have (picked up at Brattle Book Store or other places):
Terman, "Radio Engineers Handbook"
Langford-Smith, "Radiotron Designer's Handbook"
Reich, "Theory and Application of Electron Tubes"
Staff at MIT, "Applied Electronics"
Valley and Wallman, "Vacuum Tube Amplifiers"
Chaffee, "Theory of Thermionic Vacuum Tubes"

Just get an old text, read it and solve the problems.
 
Status
This old topic is closed. If you want to reopen this topic, contact a moderator using the "Report Post" button.