A Good Tube Amp: There Is No Substitute

[BretLudwig]

Building oneself a good tube amp or two is a requisite rite of passage for
the true audiophile.

The quintessential requirements are an amplifier running a pair of
reasonable tubes in push pull with a good output transformer with a well
designed driver stage and an adequate power supply.

It is recommended that point-to-point wiring be used and that the
audiophile construct the chassis himself (rarely, a herself will, but it's
unusual in the extreme, females having more sensible things to do most
often) to achieve the highest satisfaction and skills achievement.



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[BretLudwig]

I would add that the amplifier should be RC coupled throughout and use a
moderate amount of global feedback.

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[Trevor Wilson[_2_]]

"BretLudwig" > wrote in message
lkaboutaudio.com...
> Building oneself a good tube amp or two is a requisite rite of passage for
> the true audiophile.

**Bull****. It can be a useful learning experience for some people, however.
I've built a few tube amps over the years. I fixed a few and listened to
lots. I know a lot of audiophiles, whose hearing I respect. Most have never
built anything. Nor do they need to. To draw further on your analogy, it
would be like telling a racing driver that he cannot know how to drive,
until he has built a racing engine.

>
> The quintessential requirements are an amplifier running a pair of
> reasonable tubes in push pull with a good output transformer with a well
> designed driver stage and an adequate power supply.
>
> It is recommended that point-to-point wiring be used and that the
> audiophile construct the chassis himself (rarely, a herself will, but it's
> unusual in the extreme, females having more sensible things to do most
> often) to achieve the highest satisfaction and skills achievement.

**Bull****, like most of your posts.


--
Trevor Wilson
www.rageaudio.com.au

[[email protected]]

On May 29, 7:10 pm, "Trevor Wilson"
> wrote:
> "BretLudwig" > wrote in message
>
> lkaboutaudio.com...
>
> > Building oneself a good tube amp or two is a requisite rite of passage for
> > the true audiophile.
>
> **Bull****. It can be a useful learning experience for some people, however.
> I've built a few tube amps over the years. I fixed a few and listened to
> lots. I know a lot of audiophiles, whose hearing I respect. Most have never
> built anything. Nor do they need to. To draw further on your analogy, it
> would be like telling a racing driver that he cannot know how to drive,
> until he has built a racing engine.
>
>

The better racing drivers "came up the hawse pipe" and did mechanic
work in the old days. Now they're spoiled cosseted brats.

[Arny Krueger]

"BretLudwig" > wrote in message
lkaboutaudio.com

> Building oneself a good tube amp or two is a requisite
> rite of passage for the true audiophile.

Back when I was in high school, this was true.

But that was in the 60s.

> The quintessential requirements are an amplifier running
> a pair of reasonable tubes in push pull with a good
> output transformer with a well designed driver stage and
> an adequate power supply.

I don't know why I would hobble a modern high school student with all this
legacy technology. I'd rather have him build a LM 3875 amp, and find out
what really matters in audio, which isn't amplfiers.

> It is recommended that point-to-point wiring be used and
> that the audiophile construct the chassis himself
> (rarely, a herself will, but it's unusual in the extreme,
> females having more sensible things to do most often) to
> achieve the highest satisfaction and skills achievement.

Do-it-yourself board etching is more to the point.

[BretLudwig]

>>"Back when I was in high school, this was true.

But that was in the 60s.

> The quintessential requirements are an amplifier running
> a pair of reasonable tubes in push pull with a good
> output transformer with a well designed driver stage and
> an adequate power supply.

I don't know why I would hobble a modern high school student with all
this

legacy technology. I'd rather have him build a LM 3875 amp, and find out
what really matters in audio, which isn't amplfiers.

> It is recommended that point-to-point wiring be used and
> that the audiophile construct the chassis himself
> (rarely, a herself will, but it's unusual in the extreme,
> females having more sensible things to do most often) to
> achieve the highest satisfaction and skills achievement.

Do-it-yourself board etching is more to the point."<<

For one thing, Arny, the DIY electronics hobby lost a lot of people when
board etching began being touted as a necessary part of the hobby by all
the magazines. It's highly tedious and unpleasant and people don't like
it. And that was when people often had darkrooms, the perfect place to do
it.

For another, etching single layer boards by photoresist or manual silk
screen and etching in ferric chloride or even nitric acid is as
commercially obsolete as pointwiring tube circuits. A "thoroughly modern"
school would need CAD board prototyping gear at least and probably a basic
semiconductor fab to be really current.

Schools won't even allow sodium cyanide in chem labs anymore. You want to
bring in arsine and phosphine gases, a hydrofluoric acid washer and a RF
supply with a 4CX20000?

--
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[BretLudwig]

The skills used in pointwiring tube amps are still taught to and used by
professional assembleresses every day. They are used in wiring control
panels, industrial PLC controls, and avionics and communications installs.
Even the latest SINCGARS sets have harnessed wire looms and seitches with
soldered tags. I am in real electronic factories every once in a while and
watch them work.

You don't need a darkroom per se to work with etchants but you need a
chemical proof wet area. Darkrooms are perfect. They are scarcer now.


But knock yourself out, etch all you want.

Tubes are a more fun technology to build with. The fact that some of the
"twiode ****s"-dumbass Marxist anthro or poli sci majors with no
electronics training or aptitude and no test equipment-build the stuff and
get it to work flawlessly says a lot.

Get behind the program, Arny. Tube DIY is the _new_ paradigm.

--
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[Arny Krueger]

"BretLudwig" > wrote in message
lkaboutaudio.com
>>> "Back when I was in high school, this was true.
>
> But that was in the 60s.

My point, exactly.


>> The quintessential requirements are an amplifier running
>> a pair of reasonable tubes in push pull with a good
>> output transformer with a well designed driver stage and
>> an adequate power supply.

> I don't know why I would hobble a modern high school
> student with all thislegacy technology. I'd rather have him build a LM
> 3875
> amp, and find out what really matters in audio, which
> isn't amplfiers.

>> It is recommended that point-to-point wiring be used and
>> that the audiophile construct the chassis himself
>> (rarely, a herself will, but it's unusual in the extreme,
>> females having more sensible things to do most often) to
>> achieve the highest satisfaction and skills achievement.
>
> Do-it-yourself board etching is more to the point."<<

> For one thing, Arny, the DIY electronics hobby lost a lot
> of people when board etching began being touted as a
> necessary part of the hobby by all the magazines.

Unsupported speculation.

When it comes to LM 3875 amplifiers, there is no lack of pre-etched boards.
I see them for as little as $15 for a stereo pair, on eBay.

> It's highly tedious and unpleasant and people don't like it.

Speak for yourself - that would be all that you are qualified to speak for,
anyway.

> And that was when people often had darkrooms, the perfect
> place to do it.

Darkroom is not even necessary.

> For another, etching single layer boards by photoresist
> or manual silk screen and etching in ferric chloride or
> even nitric acid is as commercially obsolete as
> pointwiring tube circuits.

Agreed that point-to-point wiring of circuit components is commercially
obsolete.


> A "thoroughly modern" school
> would need CAD board prototyping gear at least and
> probably a basic semiconductor fab to be really current.

It turns out that the engineering school that I graduated from has both.

> Schools won't even allow sodium cyanide in chem labs
> anymore. You want to bring in arsine and phosphine gases,
> a hydrofluoric acid washer and a RF supply with a
> 4CX20000?

You're way off the deep end, Bret. Personally, I like the 2 for $15.00 LM
3875 boards from eBay.

[Arny Krueger]

"BretLudwig" > wrote in message
lkaboutaudio.com
> The skills used in pointwiring tube amps are still taught

> Get behind the program, Arny. Tube DIY is the _new_
> paradigm.

Been there,done that about 50 years ago.

I passed thorugh and beyond my tube DIY phase in the late 1960s.

[Clyde Slick]

On 30 Mai, 15:02, "Arny Krueger" > wrote:
> "BretLudwig" > wrote in message
>
> lkaboutaudio.com
>
> > The skills used in pointwiring tube amps are still taught
> > Get behind the program, Arny. Tube DIY is the _new_
> > paradigm.
>
> Been there,done that about 50 years ago.
>

Arny does not like anything old, except for his women.
a fifty year old is just a teenager to him.
He has told us he prefers 60 something year old women,
"obsolete" hags with buggy whips who do not perform as
well as more modern "equipment".