That can happen with any electronic components, any time. The tubes made before the 1960’s are, with few exceptions, some of the best electronic components made.
Jon, I have not seen seen that amp. The glass...Western Electric 300B glass. We're talk'n the Mac Daddy of all power valves. So I am told. The Holy Grail. Accept no substitutes. Get the leather out and Remove say......$10,000 for a matched pair of NOS 1961's To quote Andrew Dice Clay. "Cuz I got. That. Kinda. Cash!"
It seems the gripe is that the design speaks nothing of the heritage nature of the tube. Too modern looking. 91 E — Western Electric - Maker of electron tubes and high fidelity
they're sweet. The thing ya got to remember with NOS valves is there is a long break in time like 80 hours. Don't let occasional or even some persistent noice phreak you. Most likely it's some particles on the getters baking off and falling in the grid I'm talking tiny tiny stuff. Everything "under the hood" has to bake in. They just gonna get better and better
My current tube line stage, amp and phono stage have given me no significant problems at all, and I have not had to so much as replace any tube. All of the tubes are run very conservatively. A good thing because the four driver tubes and four output tubes in the amp cost more than $1,600 each these days to replace (and replacements are "good" used tubes). The line stage tubes are about $400 each for four of them. The phono stage runs Telefunken ECC803S tubes, and the power supply for the phono stage runs two 300b tubes as rectifiers. In the past eight years or so, I have had to do nothing with my setup except clean the tube pins and sockets and the RCA interconnections (channel balance starts to go awry when connections get dirty). Once in a great while, I would get fairly load crackling noise in one channel that would last for a few minutes. I have been told by the amp's builder that something has flaked off inside the tube and until the heater/cathode has burned it off, the noise will persist. Aside from this, I have not had any operational issues. On the other hand, my solid state music server/DAC has required much more attention.
I think that MC cartridges may tend to be a better-sounding match with tubes because these often tend to be on the lean-side or bright-side of neutral. But some modern tube designs are not remotely warm sounding, and these would not exacerbate an overly warm sounding MM cartridge. Although I have difficulty recommending this approach.
I absolutely LOVE VALVES ! Can't really imagine ever owning solid state. I'm a guitarist and have always used tube amps, so when I moved into hifi, it was a logical step to keep things all valve. I've listened to solid state equipment, but it always leaves me feeling cold. I can understand why people like solid state, but the warmth and real life feel of valves will be forever what I need.
Right, but remember as a guitar player, we are looking for almost exactly the opposite of what an a'phile is looking for in their tube amp. As a guitar player we are looking for great distortion and a nice clean sound when needed, but distortion in the amp is a big plus, mostly derived from the tubes...which is almost 180 degrees away from what we are looking for in our audio reproduction...wherein distortion is exactly what we do NOT want.
After diving into tube gear several years ago when I got into Klipsch speakers, first Heresy, then Forte, then Cornwall's. Started with some Fisher receivers, then onto to various Heathkit, Dynaco, Eico and others, going modern with Decware, but ultimately back to solid state. Both because of various maintenance issues that were problematic, and because I started to enjoy using less efficient speakers from AR and KLH. I liked using tubes with them, but the smaller tube amps just didn't get those speakers moving like they can with a larger solid state amp. I didn't give up tubes completely as I enjoyed using various tube pre's with the SS amps. And that's the way it's been until a couple weeks ago, when I acquired another pair of Cornwalls. I was happily using them with a couple of McIntosh SS amps but the urge overcame me to try out tubes with them. I wanted to stick with McIntosh, so went to the only place I would consider buying old Mac gear, Audio Classics, spent some money and picked up a McIntosh MC240 AND MC30's. Classics, obviously, but also got them because they're auto bias so easy to use. One pair will end with the Cornwalls', one pair with my Allison One's in a second system. I use a McIntosh C11 preamp in the main Cornwall system, and a homemade tube pre in the second system which utilizes 27 tubes(and variants), and old radio triode. Very sweet sounding. So that's where I'm at today, and while anything could change, I couldn't be happier. No bones against quality SS whatsoever, but yes there is an extra element of musicality that seem to come when using these older tube amps. And I can listen for hours and hours without wanting to do anything else.
The old McIntosh amps, properly maintained and/or reconditioned, are much better sounding than the currently manufactured gear. Back in its heyday, McIntosh put a lot of effort where it matters most--designing and building topnotch output transformers. There is hardly anything new in tube circuitry in the last 70 years or so, and many older amps are terrific sounding when in good condition. I heard a completely original Western Electric 124 amp, with old stock 348 and 350B (Western Electric version of the 6L6) tubes in it that sounded stunningly good. It needed no work at all (Western gear was built to last). Recently, I heard a pair of Northern Electric 6L6 amps that was incredibly good sounding as well, and although far from being inexpensive, they cost less than the Western Electric 124. I noticed that sberger's two McIntosh amps are 6L6 amps too. This is one of my favorite type of tube.
Some foibles crawled into one of the MC30's yesterday, and it's now on it's way back across the country to Audio Classics for repair. These things happen, and while mildly disappointed, I have the sturdy 240 to entertain me. And this morning it dawned on me that I could set up a nifty little mono system in the spare bedroom to listen to my several hundred 78's, as well as other mono records and hell, even some old mono cd's like the Harry Smith collection. So here's a short video...one MC30, the preamp described above, and Elac 50H II changer, and one AR2 completely stock and original from the same period as the MC30. Enjoy!
Even something like mono, there are different ways to set up for mono. I know some people convert stereo to mono to feed their mono system by using a simple Y connector and others who use transformers to sum the signal. The transformer approach is dramatically better sounding, and there are differences between transformers doing the job. A friend built a comparison box holding several different transformer options plus the Y-connector option and it is easy to hear differences. The best is a Western Electric transformer, but, a much cheaper currently manufactured transformer came quite close (I don't recall the brand). This friend also tried piggybacked transformers and told me that this more expensive approach is ever so slightly better.
That’s the beauty of vacuum tubes - there’s nothing in there to cause oxidation or other deterioration of the internal structures, so everything stays as pristine as the day the vacuum was pumped, even after many decades. You might get a little surface oxidation on the pins, but that is easily removed; otherwise, feel free to “plug and play” even the oldest tubes without fear. If they do happen to fail, it will be due to an inherent defect, and they almost certainly would have done so had they been put into service at the time they were made.
Unless, after many years a leak develops at the base and air gets in. Funny how you didn't mention that.
Spoken like a person who has never had a tube short-out, go gassy or experienced a red-plating melt-down event, etc. Don't worry, if you keep using tubes long enough eventually you will... I say this as an avid tube die-hard who has been running tubes in one form or another consistently for 40 years in my main system.
I agree with the statements about occasional noise. Ive used old tube amps in the past from Heathkit, Eico, Fisher and at one time or another they all made some noise that would eventually go away. In the beginning it did phreak me out, but then I learned to live with it as long as it went away. The amp that got sent back today started off with loud popping/crackling like July 4 fireworks last night upon startup, which I more or less ignored and figured would go away when the amp heated up. But then I saw one of the 6l6's flashing like it was a part of Doc Frankenstein's laboratory and shut it down. When I changed out the tube for another, still got some popping, but by that time the volume had been reduced, and there was a faint smell of something unpleasant from the amp. That was my signal to have examined. Meanwhile the remaining MC30 and MC240 are quiet as church mice and performing beautifully. While these things have the occasional problem, they are sturdy as all get out. But when things do go wrong, it's good to have a company like Audio Classics there to sort it out.
I wonder if we shouldn't try making a list of what is normal as to tube amp sounds and what is not? For instance, last night, I was treated to some minimal popping sounds from both channels, which went away after a few minutes...which i have heard on occasion before. The cause of this remains a bit of a mystery to me, but i presume it is because the amp has not warmed up totally...anyhow, I would put this in the category of normal. Whereas some of the descriptions above with regards to loud popping and crackling...not so. I recently had a rectifier tube blow on my guitar amp...sounded for a brief second like a louder pop..and then there was additional distortion in the amp...BUT this was only on the clean channel...nonetheless after a little investigation, sure enough the rectifier tube had blown.
I guess I assumed it went without saying that one always carefully inspects any tube before plugging in. If the vacuum has been lost and air leaks in, the getter will oxidize white and you will likely be able to see the issue (unless you are using a metal bottle tube like a 6K6, 6L6, 6V6, etc. or one with smoked glass - in that case your only option is a tester); however, I think this is fairly rare as I have handled literally hundreds of NOS tubes and only encountered this a handful of times. (I also didn't mention that one should also inspect for any misaligned internal structures and/or debris that might have been knocked loose.) My objective with the post was to simply give a brief summary as to why it's really no more risky to plug in a 80 year-old NOS than a new production tube (in fact, I might argue it's less risky to go NOS); I didn't intend for it to be an exhaustive "guide" to using them, as that information has already been covered in scores of other posts. Oh, I have had all those things happen at one time or another, and have even been known to curse ARC for using resistors as "fusible links"; real fuses are easier to replace and won't fill your house with that acrid "burnt" odor when they blow, lol. The worst was when I ran an 833A (an early 60s NOS Gates-branded one ) too hard in a tesla coil I was tinkering with and the plate deformed and the bottle overheated and shattered. I failed to adequately ventilate it, and was also pushing a little beyond its rated filament and plate voltage limits - stupid rookie mistakes, but it taught me a few things and did produce some very impressive bright-purple 24" streamers for about two minutes before it took the nosedive! (I subsequently dialed-back to appropriate operating parameters and replaced with a 833C (graphite plate), and all was well again.) My point was simply that these events can occur unexpectedly, and there's no inherent reason why an 80 year-old tube would be at higher risk to do so than a brand-new one, so it is perfectly fine to use them without fear. (Assuming of course one has done due diligence to closely inspect the tube, but this should be done with any tube regardless of new or NOS status.)
I check all tubes, new and old, with a tube tester before using them. That's not to say they won't fail in use but at least you're not sticking in a shorted tube. I did that once, that was more than enough.
Since I have started buying tubes, I managed to single out 3 or 4 shorted tubes upon received using a multimeter. I cant imagine anyone powered up a newly arrived tube without first testing it. They are very brave, IMO...
