El84 as driver tube

->>>> Click Here to Download <<<<<<<-

To qualify as a Select Series tube, thetubestore. Gold Lion EL84 - All tubes in the EL84 family are tested in a cathode biased amp where they are really pushed and their harmonic content blooms.

The Gold Lion's just sound great at any volume level. The plates look to have a different coating than anything else coming out of new sensor in EL84's and this, combined with a heavy gage crimped plate seems to really keep the noise down.

Clean tones are chimey and sparkling with single coil pickups and a bit darker with humbuckers. The overdrive on these tubes is smoooth. No gritty, raspy tones, the tubes have just the right amount of compression to track with the overdrive and keep it beautifully controlled while blooming nicely as the note fades out. This produces a very nice organic sustain.

If you figure in the extra cost of NOS, these are actually a better value. If not, try a set of the Gold Lion EL84's. It has the least clean headroom and can be pushed into distortion with aggressive playing. When pushed into distortion the Mullard EL84 tube has a softer, creamier overdrive that is more musical than other EL84 tubes and is the tube to pick if you want dirt.

The sound of these tubes is very smooth when biased correctly. They are pleasant to listen to and have the creamy overdrive most people look for in an EL It looks a lot like the standard Sovtek but a closer inspection will reveal differences.

The plate looks a bit more polished with a different coating and internally they feature precisely wrapped grid wires with a bright metal shine. The only problem with this tube is that like the Sovtek and TAD product, they are tubby. The fattest one I measured was. For most purchasers this will not be an issue. If you have an amp that requires the tube to pass through a hole in the chassis before the pins seat in the socket you should measure the diameter of that hole.

The Reflector company produced these back in the day as part of a series of miniature pentodes. This tube really surprised me. A good Russian EL84, my sample has their typical rugged build. Big plates and nice micas. Really great for blues tone when clean or overdriven. The overdriven sound comes on gradually but breakup can be coaxed out at lower volumes if you dig in with a pick or use hotter pickups.

These would be great replacements for your vintage radio as well. Equipment of that sort would have been a primary destination for these tubes back in the day. This tube really is a good value. It is predictable, reliable and affordable. You can get good EL84 tone at a reasonable price. Find Posts New Posts. Install the app. JavaScript is disabled. For a better experience, please enable JavaScript in your browser before proceeding.

You are using an out of date browser. It may not display this or other websites correctly. You should upgrade or use an alternative browser. EL84 driver tube, with less than 5mA current. Can anybody help me on choising a decent driver that can live with 5mA per channel. I got the idea from the Legacy amp of Thorsten as well as another project on the net that uses el84 triode strapped to drive a 2a3.

If you guys want to try it, I can give you the operating points. Post subject: Re: EL84 pentode as driver. I've wondered about using "power" tubes as preamp tubes for a while. My tube under consideration was the 6V6; it has a little more current than each triode of the 6CG7 mA each and wired in triode mode could make an excellent split-load inverter.

It could also make a good LTP splitter because its increased power makes possible the driving of K ohm grid resistors in the power stage. The increased power might be helpful in this region. The EL84, with an even hotter cathode, would be even better although you would need a better transformer. You wouldn't want to run something like this as a phase splitter in pentode mode.

The extra cathode current leaving through the screen grid would cause an imbalance in the voltages at the plate vs the cathode. You would have to change one of the resistors ever-so-slightly to make up the difference. To successfully use it you'd want to triode-strap it. Posted: Sat Jan 28, pm. I built a Spud amp that used the EL84 Pentode mode by itself to drive my speakers. It sounds fantastic! Posted: Sun Jan 29, am.

Posted: Mon Jan 30, am. I have seen SET amplifier schematics and they always use a semi-powerful tube in the "driver" stage to drive the output triode. Owners of amps from Dynaco, Eico, Mullard, and Fisher, among others, were enjoying great sound from these reasonably powered vacuum tubes. In that same time, Vox began using the EL84 power tube as well. Vox built their incredibly popular stable of guitar tube amps based around EL84 vacuum tubes and has never looked back.

These reviews will be a great help in narrowing down the options for your needs.