Need help retubing tonight - Which 6L6? (Mod50)

[jarrett]

I want to swap the tubes on my new (to me) Egnater Mod50 tonight before tomorrows gig. I have several tubes including:

JJ 6L6GC
Winged C 6L6GC
Sovtek 5881WXT
Mullard EL34 (new)

What should I use? Thanks.

 

[bruce egnater]

Try a new pair each set!! Only takes a few minutes to change right??

 

[jarrett]

Wow, straight from the man himself. Thanks! You are right, I've owned several amps with external bias points, but this design is the most straightforward and quick I've used. Very cool. As long as the back panel is off I could retube this thing in a couple minutes I think. Thanks for that and thanks for such a cool amp. I am loving this thing so far and can't wait to the new modules to get here next week.

 

[3 Mile Stone]

Yep. I leave my back pannel off. I have a good case for road travel tough. Do a quick run through at home to see what they all sound like. Then why not try a swap out at the gig of your two favorites to keep it simple? Of all the ones you posted I've heard pretty good things about the Winged C, but I haven't tried those. I have a set off Mullards, They sound awesome for leads, big and thick, but I like the brightness of the 5881 for rhythm. I've been seeing your posts on TGP. 5881 are really great, I'm just not sure about the Sovteks. They could be same tube Tung Sol uses. I really like the Tung Sol, I go back to them every time.

What kind of music will you be doing?

 

[jarrett]

It's modern Christian rock for the most part with some non-Christian rock tunes thrown in occasionally.

 

[jarrett]

Little feedback here, I didn't dig the JJ's so much. Kind of cold sounding. I had them biased at like 32mV I think. I put the Winged C's in and they felt a lot better to me. I put them in the 30-31 mark. I still want to give the Mullards a whirl. I put them in my other amp and they sounded great I thought, need to try them in the Mod50 this week.

And all in all, the Sovtek 5881 WXTs sounded good as well. I wish I would have checked their bias before pulling them, but I forgot. Any other good tube recommendations out there?

 

[joey_truelove]

I have good experience of both the GT 5881-C and the 6L6-CHP. These are on the darker side of the scale, the CHP being the stronger and snappier of the two. I guess I'm a 6L6 type of guy. I'd use either for pop, jazz and any type of blues and rock all the way up to heavy metal... Very flexible since they go well in both Marshall and Fender environments.

Myself I'm looking into trying the Tungsol 6L6 and the TAD offerings and then I'll have them cryotreated for better tone and more longevity.