Best new current production EL34 being made now

Bael · Post by **Bael** » Wed Jul 04, 2007 11:57 am

Besides the NOS Mullards that we all know are the best of the best but can be insanely expensive (and for most average guitar amp applications probably not REALLY worth it...unless you are using it for audiophile, Hi-Fi stuff) which new production EL34 have you been really digging in your Rocker 30s or Marshalls or whatever? The Winged =C= I've heard good stuff about as the old standby, Svetlana. What about the reissue Mullards? Anybody have experience with these or the EH or GT's? There are some RFT's out there (German made-Siemens labeled and Telefunken) that are also supposed to be good and a steal for NOS tubes, which go for about $100 a pair but I'm wondering if some of the new stuff which goes for less than half that are about as good.

riffmonster · Post by **riffmonster** » Wed Jul 04, 2007 12:06 pm

Are you in the UK?

Check out:
http://www.watfordvalves.com/products_harma.asp

I've just re-valved my AD30R with the Harma cryo EL84s - they seem pretty good to me and for reasonable price.

The last lot I had was Electro Harmonix, and they were cheaper but still sounded good I thought.

TheOrangeJuicer · Post by **TheOrangeJuicer** » Wed Jul 04, 2007 2:59 pm

Quality is largely about standardized performance and in vacuum tubes that means consistency in materials and construction. Once they have a good design down (or a good clone of an old, proven design) then they need to maintain that throughout the production cycle. There are some variations of course and the best way to get the top bunch is to have them selected. Many places offer those services such as Watford in the UK. The more notable US places are Groove Tubes and Ruby. Groove Tubes even has a few tubes made exclusively for them so they are also a real brand that uses OEM services to their specs and not just a selection service for standard run tubes. There are a lot of smaller places that also offer selection services and many people have a favorite for one reason or another. I think some of those places are definately better than others and they are probably a bit less consistent even than the larger places as they can't afford to throw away tubes. Mesa is another good place for quality as they also offer better than average testing and as with some of the other premium tube suppliers, they charge enough for them to be able to ditch the ones that don't meet their tests. I would be surprised if these were actually thrown away however. I rather suspect they are wholesaled to the less scrupulous. Deals on eBay may not be as good as they appear

.

Cryo, cold, and heat? Oh my! ...Cryo, cold, and heat? Oh my!!

mastertrax · Post by **mastertrax** » Wed Jul 04, 2007 3:18 pm

Well put, Juicer.

I think that's it in a nutshell.

Simon Wicks · Post by **Simon Wicks** » Wed Jul 04, 2007 4:07 pm

I've said it many times but cryo treating tubes is a waste of time. The heat/cool cycles the tubes undergo during normal use will anneal any kind of supposed benefits from the cryo treatment process. I also tend not to believe the hype over a change in tone anyway. There is too much internal inconsistency in a brand of tubes today to determine whether or not you definitely get a tonal change. Just remember Watford valves would sell anything if they said "Well, we cryo treated these tubes but i'll be buggered if i can tell the difference"

IMO, the best tubes out there for ruggedness, tone and consistency are the GT EL34M, the Shuguang EL34B and maybe the SED EL34s (though i've not personally used them).

riffmonster · Post by **riffmonster** » Wed Jul 04, 2007 4:39 pm

<blockquote id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">Originally posted by Simon Wicks
 I've said it many times but cryo treating tubes is a waste of time. The heat/cool cycles the tubes undergo during normal use will anneal any kind of supposed benefits from the cryo treatment process. I also tend not to believe the hype over a change in tone anyway. There is too much internal inconsistency in a brand of tubes today to determine whether or not you definitely get a tonal change. Just remember Watford valves would sell anything if they said "Well, we cryo treated these tubes but i'll be buggered if i can tell the difference"

IMO, the best tubes out there for ruggedness, tone and consistency are the GT EL34M, the Shuguang EL34B and maybe the SED EL34s (though i've not personally used them).
<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote">

Funny you should say that... but it was on the guy at Watford valves recommendation

I've not used loads of different brands, but to me the tonal difference is quite subtle anyway. It seems to me tone is 95% how you play - 4.9% your gear and 0.1% what tubes you have.

neonrust · Post by **neonrust** » Wed Jul 04, 2007 5:08 pm

IMO.......SED Winged C's are DA'BOMB!!!!!!:)

johnreardon · Post by **johnreardon** » Wed Jul 04, 2007 5:10 pm

<blockquote id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">Originally posted by Simon Wicks
 I've said it many times but cryo treating tubes is a waste of time. The heat/cool cycles the tubes undergo during normal use will anneal any kind of supposed benefits from the cryo treatment process. I also tend not to believe the hype over a change in tone .
<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote">

Simon

So you disagree with Guitarist mags opinion that cyro treated valves are an improvement on standard valves then? They believed there was a definite improvement and gave the review products nearly 5 stars. Are they wrong?

Are the people in the Aurospace industry who also cyro treat many electronic bits for space missions wrong?

I can understand the views of Guitarist are just their own opinion, but I would think the Aerospace Industry base their views on more than just opinion.

As with all of the equipment we use, the best judges are our own ears.

johnny1111 · Post by **johnny1111** » Wed Jul 04, 2007 5:11 pm

I put a pair of the GT EL34Ms in my Rocker 30 and they seem to be doing very well, indeed.

neonrust · Post by **neonrust** » Wed Jul 04, 2007 5:13 pm

Some of these in the preamp don't hurt......

[:p][:p]

TheOrangeJuicer · Post by **TheOrangeJuicer** » Wed Jul 04, 2007 7:12 pm

We have quite a few scientists as customers as well as commercial EE types. NASA isn't the only place they work but more than one has contributed directly to their programs. I only know of one customer who works directly at the Langly facility but then I don't ask every customer what they do. Typically that comes up when they express an idea that I find to be above the average level of knowledge for an audio customer.

A lot of times people will throw the NASA label on products or processes but usually in an attempt to sell them to someone who doesn't understand what they are talking about anyway. I will not go as far as to say that cryogenic treatment doesn't have any effect, I'll just agree with Simon that it is both negligable and reversable.

What do I know that NASA uses cryogenic processes for from reports from their scientists first hand? Well, in electronics which is what we are discussing here, they use it for testing components and circuits and also for cooling. The more common cryogenic treatment is done for component evaluation and can be repeated as well as cycling with heat. This is basically a "stress test" to evaluate the servicablity of components under extreme conditions. They test complete circuits as well and have been investigating actually operating circuits at these temperaturs for unmanned, deep space missions. A probe to Neptune for example would encounter these temperatures and may not be able to operate without having temperature certified circuits. There is not much point in blasting a multi-million dollar baby out there that won't work. The other thing that cryogenics is useful for in an electronics application is cooling. One of my customers runs or ran a business which developed the use of a cryogenic cooling system for computers. They could easily double the speed of any processor by allowing it to operate beyond its normal limits. Since this type of processor speed wasn't a real necessary thing for controlling systems on rockets or aircraft at the time, the applications were for doing mathamatical calculations for huge problems in real time. His customers were the CIA, NASA, etc. One NASA application which he revealed was the actual plotting and tracking of each piece of space junk, particles, etc that are orbiting the earth. They move around at many thousands of miles per hour and their trajectories were calculated and mapped by NASA so that they would be avoided at launch and reentry times for vessels. Even extremely small pieces of material at those speeds could penetrate a spacecraft like a bullet. So in this case, the electronics are not being tested but rather cooled with an extremely cold fluid in a closed loop system.

Further, no one can confirm that any treatment has actually been performed on products for sale such as vacuum tubes. That's a perfect lair for a snake oil salesman. They could simply charge a much higher price for the same product. I like to call that a stupidity tax, but then i am not going to directly accuse anyone of doing that as I have no proof. I just like to point out the fact that it is entirely possible to potential customers of such products. if they get some sort of satisfaction from those products, then hey, good for them. I have customers who claim they hear a difference using different AC power cables in products that never come close to the current limits of the standard, supplied cables. Okey dokey... I've got really good ears and that's probably one of the larger reasons that I am in the business that I am, but I don't hear that. Personally, I would rather have the tubes blessed by monks; but hey, that's just me ;-D.

Simon Wicks · Post by **Simon Wicks** » Wed Jul 04, 2007 8:53 pm

<blockquote id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">Originally posted by johnreardon
 <blockquote id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">Originally posted by Simon Wicks
 I've said it many times but cryo treating tubes is a waste of time. The heat/cool cycles the tubes undergo during normal use will anneal any kind of supposed benefits from the cryo treatment process. I also tend not to believe the hype over a change in tone .
<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote">

Simon

So you disagree with Guitarist mags opinion that cyro treated valves are an improvement on standard valves then? They believed there was a definite improvement and gave the review products nearly 5 stars. Are they wrong?

Are the people in the Aurospace industry who also cyro treat many electronic bits for space missions wrong?

I can understand the views of Guitarist are just their own opinion, but I would think the Aerospace Industry base their views on more than just opinion.

As with all of the equipment we use, the best judges are our own ears.
<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote">
I disagree with the Guitarist review yes. As for the aerospace industry, i beieve they stopped using valves in the late 50's early 60's.

Think of it like this:

All matter is made up of atoms. In metals, they pack together in a lattice like arrangemant in a crystalline manner. All matter above absolute zero vibrates and is subject to diffusive flux - that is, the atoms can move around within the metal for instance. Now then, cryo treatment is supposed to fix the atoms and realign them...i dont quite buy that myself. You do cryo temper metals such as stainless steel but that is a little different to cryo treatment of valves. Now then, switch a tube on and you warm it up. The heater gets to about 800Ã‚ÂºC - 900Ã‚ÂºC...this is going to warm the tube structures to probably > 250Ã‚ÂºC.

Now then, imagine you are tempering carbon steel. You harden it by heating then quenching forming martensite crystal. You then temper it by heating to between 180Ã‚ÂºC and 280Ã‚ÂºC. This removes varying amounts of the martensite crystal. If you re heat, you again modyfy the temper. This is what happens when you heat up a cryo treated tube. you get it hot and you destroy any temper the cryo treatment may of imparted.

JXG · Post by **JXG** » Wed Jul 04, 2007 9:06 pm

My two pence- cryo valves sound different, mains cables make a difference, JJ KT77s are the best sounding EL34 type new production I've come across, but I've had more dud JJ tubes than any other current brand

Simon Wicks · Post by **Simon Wicks** » Wed Jul 04, 2007 10:00 pm

Technically KT77s are closer to 6l6s

JXG · Post by **JXG** » Wed Jul 04, 2007 10:16 pm

Are they? I know they can be substituted for EL34s without rewiring the socket- I thought 6L6 use pin 1, but (most) EL34 don't... I could be wrong of course, wouldn't be the first time...

Best new current production EL34 being made now

Who is online