415's

[MesieBooga]

Found a pair of Mesa 415 tubes. Loaded them in my blond IIC+ with some El34 440's(?) and they seem a little tighter and more tonefull than the Mesa Chinese 440's.

 

[RR]

Duh

Sylvania's 415 -vs- Chinese 440s.

I'm sure you know that Mark I (original), II, III were design around Sylvania's STR415.

 

[Boogiebabies]

Thats cool. Even just having NOS tubes is not always the answer.
I just stuffed 4 Sylvania 7581A's in my tolex IIC+. I am going to fire it up tonight. The 440 is an offshoot of the STR-415, but it's mostly pot luck anyway. The old STR-420's that were original in my MK IV sounded superb. I demo'ed it at the GC where I bought it and it had the original 420's and all Chinese silver plate 12AX7's. It was amazing. I have the Mullard GT copy in the V1 and V5 and the GT 6L6GE and GT 6CA7GE in there now. I swear that those old chinese tubes sounded better.

I have a quad of NOS STR-415's. They are a definite improvement in the IIC+. They offer the build quality and longevity and tonal spread that no current production tube seems to capture. I still feel bad when I use them.
It is like I want to save them for when I am 67 or something. For me, the GT American made stuff is close enough for me to hoard my NOS stuff.

 

[MesieBooga]

Thats cool. Even just having NOS tubes is not always the answer.
I just stuffed 4 Sylvania 7581A's in my tolex IIC+. I am going to fire it up tonight. The 440 is an offshoot of the STR-415, but it's mostly pot luck anyway. The old STR-420's that were original in my MK IV sounded superb. I demo'ed it at the GC where I bought it and it had the original 420's and all Chinese silver plate 12AX7's. It was amazing. I have the Mullard GT copy in the V1 and V5 and the GT 6L6GE and GT 6CA7GE in there now. I swear that those old chinese tubes sounded better.

I have a quad of NOS STR-415's. They are a definite improvement in the IIC+. They offer the build quality and longevity and tonal spread that no current production tube seems to capture. I still feel bad when I use them.
It is like I want to save them for when I am 67 or something. For me, the GT American made stuff is close enough for me to hoard my NOS stuff.

I will try out the GT 6L6's. I am passionate about those GT Mullards! Hard to find those Sylvanias! $$$$

 

[RR]

Sylvania's 6L6s,
Mullard's EL34s

Holy Grails of power stage tubes.

What about me? I have Mark IIB Colesium using a sextet of ST415. I only have two sets of them. I don't use the amp too often anymore, unless my friends want to jam and they don't like their neighbor. :twisted:

But I'm sure there's substitude that perform close enough. Maybe?
So I'm relying on you guys what are good substitiution tubes :wink:

 

[axwielding1]

I found the str454's to sound close, but not exactly the same. I had the 454 and 442 in my simulclass mark III and loved them. But recently, I dug out the 415's and they've been in awhile... I may go back to the 442 454 soon though. I hate the thought of using up the sylvannias. (blue label)..
ax. :twisted: