[MagmaVander]

2 questions-
I have to buy matched pairs of 6S45P?
when plugging 32 ohms Grado's- It's better to set the impedence to 30 or 100?
 

 

[Kees]

Yes.
30.

 

[hodgjy]

I would say tubes with the same year of production are fine.  I have a few sets of tubes, and I use the ones together with the same years.
 
Interestingly, just last night I put in some tubes that were NOS of older production.  The tubes I was running had dates of 1990, so I rolled in some from 1980.  I wanted to see if older tubes sounded better.  One of them hummed like crazy and didn't play any music through that channel.  I waited a few minutes to see if the tube would come around, but it never did.  Dead on arrival.  Bummer.
 
Quote:

2 questions-
I have to buy matched pairs of 6S45P?
when plugging 32 ohms Grado's- It's better to set the impedence to 30 or 100?
 

 

 

[Skylab]

The NOS Russian 6S45P tubes I have found come in bulk and do not come matched, and I have not seen a tube tester that can test them, so while it might be a nice idea to have them "matched", it's probably not going to happen except by happy accident.

 

[hodgjy]

I have a bunch of 6S45P tubes that date from 1985 and 1990.  They sound pretty much the same.  I bought some from 1980 on eBay to see if they sound different.  Well, one was dead on arrival, and it seems like I'm not going to get a refund from the seller.  Oh well, such is life.
 
Anyway, the point of this post is to say I got some Reflector tubes from 1974 delivered yesterday.  There's a seller on eBay selling a bunch of these tubes dated from 1974, which are the oldest I can find.  There is a very slight difference in sound.  Sure, they are new and still burning in, but I can already tell they have better bass than the other tubes.  It could just be batch variation, or it could be because they are of older production (16 years older than the tubes they replaced).
 
If anyone is looking for a hint more bass from their amp, try the 1974 Reflector tubes. They really are more bassy, at least to my ears.

 

[oqvist]

Also bought some Reflector tubes. My first tube roll. Haven´t done any real comparison to the old but after a heavy start with big imbalance it has automagically solved itself???
 
At first fresh out of the box it measured over 3 db difference on two different headphones and it was clearly audible and repeatable by changing the left and right driver tubes. However now I don´t detect anything and my SPL metre suggest then less then 1db if anything at all. Hope it stays this way. They look identical to the Sovtek tubes and appear to use the exact same material and parts. Lettering is different  and the pins not being quite as shiney.  Make you wonder if you been scammed but I guess there is no point scamming on cheap tubes like this. I suppose Sovteks bought the reflectors factory and blueprints?
 
Waiting for a Brimar rectifier next

 

[Skylab]

I learned recently that there are really no new production 6C45P. Basically you have your 70's production and your 80's production. The Sovteks are likely the 80's production, relabeled. The 70's tubes I had sounded better I thought.

 

[dgilz]

I am now a happy owner of this Trafomatic head one since a couple of days.
I'm very happy of my purchase : nice amp, detailed, dynamic, suits really well my AKG Q701 and if I believe my seller, will be wonderfull with my future grado PS1000.

Have any of you tried to replace the stock EZ80/EZ81 with something else ? I'm used to tube rolling, before this I had a Woo Audio WA6. But for the Trafomatic I don't feel the need for tube changes, as I like it very much as it is and haven't read yet about tube improvement for it.
Does anyone has some ideas about this ?

 

[Kees]

I replaced the EZ81 with a Weber copper cap.
And I also replaced the Russian tubes with Electro Harmonix. Lighter bass, but more transparency. 

 

[dgilz]

I have electro harmonix as EZ80, and the 2 others are Sovtek.
Could you describe what improvement/evolution you did get with the changes you made ?

 

[hodgjy]

Get yourself some Reflector plant 6S45P driver tubes and an RFT EZ80 rectifier and be done with it. You won't find any better.

 

[dgilz]

Thanks for your advice
I've just seen that "Reflector plant" tubes on eBay sales for Ukrainian sellers, apparently they don't test the tubes, hopefully these are not really expensive, I've order a couple betting on a good luck...

By the way what's RFT ? I had never heard about this brand before ? As far as I know EZ80 were used mostly in TV sets, do you know more about the brand ?

 

[hodgjy]

RFT was an East German company. Many of their tubes have a reputation for being clinical, but their EZ80 is very nice. Good stage separation and detail without being fatiguing.

 

[dgilz]

Thank you hodgjy, with your help I've learnt something new today about tubes
I've bought this Trafomatic without thinking of tube rolllng, but it must be worth at least a try.

I've ordered RFT, Telefunken, and "Reflector plant" tubes (from Ukraine)

 

[hodgjy]

You're welcome. This is an excellent amp, but there aren't many tube rolling options. Rolling in different rectifiers have subtle effects, and I've found I like the RFT the best. The nice thing about fewer tube rolling options is you spend more time listening to musc and less time trying to get the tube combinations right. It's almost set and forget.