Changing to El34 in DR

[Undeadpaladin]

Hey guys, first post here. Long story short just got back into playing recently, my DR has been sitting there not getting much use. Anyway I was wondering what exactly switching to some type of EL34 tube would do to the tone. I'm running the DR(3 channel) with a mesa boogie recto 4x12 cab, the guitar i'm using is a PRS custom 22, with the stock neck pickup and i switched out to the much hotter Tremonti treble in the bridge.

I like my recto tone, but i find it to be... not sure the word but maybe "dry" sounding sometimes. I want to smooth it out a bit and maybe have a bit less "in your face" crunch. I don't use modern as much as vintage and raw for the gain, and i'm looking for a tube that would keep my cleans well defined and as clear as possible(This amp is used for both). I'm not looking for any type of extreme metal tone here(Far from it). Just nice crunch with a little warmer tone. I enjoy when the amp gets very compressed and a bit warmer sounding as i said. I enjoy using the amp right now in tube rect and spongy if that helps.

I checked out the Eurotube site, and there is alot of good info but i'm not sure what would work best for me

Can you run the El34's with just 2 power tubes like the stock ones, cutting the power in half?

I'd be really interested in anyone who has made the switch, i figure its a worth a try... I don't see it being a huge investment for what i may get out of it. Please no posts of "Oh you should get this amp instead" etc... This is what i have, i really can't afford to change anything and honestly i just think a little tweaking will get me where i want to be.

Hope that made sense, i'm still trying to find my sound out of this thing. It's more versatile then i think gets credit for just trying to tap into some of that. Thanks in advance!!

 

[Platypus]

Wild, I used to run EL34's with a PRS Custom 22 and a tremonti bridge so I can answer your question pretty well.

Anyway.. the EL34's definitely give you a different sonic palette to play with, more pronounced midrange, less bass, crisp upper mids... but it still sounds like a Rectifier at the end of the day. I say try it (be sure to switch the bias on the back before you do) and see if you like it more. It was an improvement for me but I just found the Recto to not really be my style so I sold it awhile ago.

Also, halving the power tubes only produces a 3dB difference in volume so you're not going to really gain much from doing that. It's up for debate if you get that much of a noticeable difference from it tone wise. Also remember to choose the correct impedance for your speakers if you pull two tubes.

I'll see if I can dig up some old sound clips for you. Let me know if you have any more specific questions as I tweaked that amp constantly for a few years

oh, and welcome!

 

[stompboxfreak72]

I have used EL34's in my DR on several occasions to get something different tone wise. I won't say better but definetly different. Clarification : I liked the cleans sounds better with el34's.

Make sure you switch your bias switch and bear in mind to not run your DR in solid state mode because it will substantially lower the el34 tube life. I burned out tubes in about 3 months of gigging when I failed to flip the switch to vaccuum tubes.

Maybe my experience is not usual but I thought I'd add my 2 cents nonetheless.

Good luck and let us know how things pan out.

 

[ToneAddictJon]

I could never nail my tone with the recto until I started using the JJ e34l's in mine. I use the high gain retube kits from eurotubes.com with the e34l's and love them. I pretty much just use vintage and raw as well, and I'm happy with the cleans they produce. I would second the try them and see what your ears tell you, but in my experience they made a big difference for the better.

 

[alex1fly]

I swapped Mesa's Semiens EL34s into my Roadster after having 6l6s for 4 or 5 months. I really like the tone, its crunchier, punchier, a better balance between upper and lower mids (more upper, less lower). The highs are more present and pleasant to my ears. It's a more accessible amp for me with the EL34s, more tweakable... less like a standard Recto but still has the Recto bite. Right now I'm using a boost pedal to overdrive my channel 4 Modern to get a super saturated sound (but not too fizzy) and to overdrive my Fat channel 1 for a more vintage type rhythm tone. I can't comment on the cleans because I don't use them as much, but they sound good enough for me

 

[Undeadpaladin]

If you had sound clips that would be great. Any settings you liked with the El34's in practicular?

There seems to be alot of options, just judging by Eurotubes site. Any specific types of tubes of the El34 i should look for?

 

[redmax61]

I've been running EL-34's in mine almost since it was new back in 2002. I've really come to like the sound of it a lot. The last time I retubed, I switched to JJ EL-34L's and I like the sound of them even more. The JJ's give back some of the bottom end that you lose going from a 6L6 to an EL-34. The cool thing is that you don't lose the way that EL-34's open up relatively quickly as you turn the amp up.

I actually think that the overall sound of the DR tightens up a LOT when you move to EL-34's and you lose the fizzyness that's inherent in 6L6's.

 

[TP Parter]

Below is my post about my T-Verb running with 2 x EL34, but first let me say this.

I would definitely recommend SED EL34 tubes, they're considered by most people with a clue to be the best power tubes made today. Alot of people are giving the Ruby EL34's some love, and some prefer JJ KT77, but for rich smooth mids, airy topend and low end punch all at all volume levels the Svets can't be touched.

You also might want to look into replacing your preamp tubes, as they can have a pretty solid impact on the tone and clarity of the amp.

I've got a '96 Tremoverb 2x12 that I run with a pair (2) of Svetlana EL34, and a JJ 5AR4 rectifier. I love this set up, it really brings out the life in the tone from the power section when cranked, ala master at 2:00 or more on both channels. I play either my '87 Am. Stand. Strat with Lace Sensors, or my 71 Les Paul through it.

I also retubed the preamp with Mullard ECC83's, RFT ECC83's, and GE 5751's which eliminated the slightly harsh midrange response on lower gain settings of the modern red, and just really brought the tone of the amp out from behind the blanket is was hiding under. This amp kicks out killer clean, clean/crunch, rock, punk, old school metal, and beyond to stoner/death metal heavy tones.

I love stuff like COC, the Melvins, High On Fire, Alabama Thunderpussy, Halfway to Gone, etc..., and the amp kicks all kinds of *** for those tones. I typically run the amp on the modern red channel, power set to bold, tube rec, gain at 12:30-1:00, Treble 3:00, Mids Max, Bass 2:30-3:00, Presence 12:00-1:00, and Master 2:00 to max, no verb. This gives a biting and ballsy crunch tone that excels for rock, punk, and some metal tones.

When I want a little more, I hit this with a clean boost from my SansAmp set to boost the lows, and mids. This tone smokes for most all metal tones, and heavy stuff like COC, Soundgarden, Slayer, Metallica, DRI, etc...

When unreal amounts of low end grind are called for I also use a sweepable eq with control for center frequency and bandwidth called a Systech Harmonic Energizer to get some beyond thick doom/stoner tones.

This way I get a great stock crunch tone from the amp itself, and then layer certain frequency boosts and gain boosts to achieve a huge variety of outstanding uber heavy tones.

The mid-gain tones, which I felt were the amps one relatively weaker point when I first purchased it (still better than most non-vintage/boutique amps I've heard) have now been tweaked and this amp smokes for mid-gain rock and blues. Between my guitar set up (thicker pure nickle strings), the new tubes, and time spent with the amp I would proudly put this up against any vintage Marshall, Hiwatt, Orange, Ampeg, or Fender, or any boutique amp for outstanding mid-gain tones.

The clean channel yields tones from angelic and airy to jangly upper mid brilliance to full and furry to raunchy and stinging if you like, and the reverb is tasteful without getting too splashy. It's not a 3 knob Fender, but it's more than I need as I like a fairly dry signal anyways. All the wet subtracts from the raw wet glassy tone of the guitar after a while, unless you're using it for extreme atmosphere. BTW, this amp absolutely adores positions 2 and 4 on my Strat, and smokin country, southern rock, and blues licks abound there.

With the pair of EL34's and the 5AR4 rec on the spongy setting you'ld almost swear you heard a JTM45 under there cranking out some sweet vintage clean to clean crunch tones.

I've used the amp with a decent variety of speaker set ups including;

The 2 V30's in the combo

The 2 V30's in the combo, and 2 EV12L in a halfback cab, holy Metalocalypse Batman.

2 EV12L in the halfback cab (absolute clarity clean and driven, and powerful low end attack for heavy styles, with a warm, smooth, and overwhelmingly powerful sound)

1 EV12L in the ported bottom section of the halfback cab (above times 1/2, great for lower volume jamming)

Peavy 5150 Sheffield Cab (blech)

Bogner 4x12 with V30's (I miss that cab, but the two set ups below sound better, excelled for all clean to high gain rock and metal tones, with that V30 grind)

Halfback cab loaded with 2 Fane Alnico AXA12 (YUMMMMMMY, excels from vintage clean to heavier than hell tones, but does it with a vintage smoothness, brilliant glassy and ripped upper midrange grind and warm fuzzy lowend punch)

Halfback cab loaded with 1 Fane in top section, and 1 EV12L loaded in the ported bottom (SUPER YUMMMMMMY, excels from vintage to heavier than hell tones, and does it with a vintage smoothness, brilliant glassy and ripped upper midrange grind and warm fuzzy low end, paired with utter clarity and punishing low end attack). This set up gives the most incredibly powerful, thick, and evil sounding mechanical grind when cranking the amp that I've ever heard. In fact, it convinced me within two seconds flat that I'm gonna yank the two V30's in the combo soon, and replace them with my other Fane and EV in the next week or so, and sell the V30's. These two speakers blend so **** well it's unreal. The EV is a little louder, but the Fane has this mid-grind that just slices through without ever sounding harsh like a V30 can at times.

I've had the opportunity to run the combo's two internal V30's with the last two cab setups, and it also sounded deliciously evil in both cases.

Finally, I've got two panels for the upper open bout of the halfback cab. One that makes it a fully closed back 2x12, and one that leaves the back semi-open, like a traditional widebody boogie 1x12, so I can get more air into my clean tones and mid-gain tones through the cab, and more chunk from my heavy tones, depending on what I want.

As of tomorrow I will have back from the shop a second amp running 2 6550 in the power section (an old KMDXV100SD running at half power) to run in stereo with the T-Verb, by sending the fx out on the T-Verb to my Chopper (stereo trem pedal), sending one side back to the Mesa powering the combo's two V30's, and the other side to the KMD to run the halfback loaded with the Fane and EV12L. Needless to say the neighborhood will be rockin' come tomorrow afternoon.

Peace.

 

[Undeadpaladin]

What about warmth redmax? Does it give it a little warmer of a tone? I feel like sometimes my DR is a little harsh and in my face and was hoping to tone that down some.

Also did you just swap the power tubes or do a whole tube swap of everything(Like eurotube's kits).

 

[redmax61]

What about warmth redmax? Does it give it a little warmer of a tone? I feel like sometimes my DR is a little harsh and in my face and was hoping to tone that down some.

Also did you just swap the power tubes or do a whole tube swap of everything(Like eurotube's kits).

Yes, it is most definitely warmer with EL-34's! However, when I tried EL-34's by themselves, I thought it actually lacked bite. At the recommendation of my brother, I tried a set of THD Yellowjackets. I didn't care for the Yellowjackets by themselves either, but with the YJ's in the outside sockets and EL-34's in the inside sockets, that's about as close to tonal nirvana as I can get!

The resulting combination is the best of both worlds. You get the warmth and roundness from the EL-34's, and the shimmer and teeth from the EL-84's. It's got a vintagy vibe to it, but it still gets very aggressive. In my opinion, it's much less harsh than the amp was with 6L6's.

At first, all I did was swap power tubes. But the amp was only about three months old at the time. Last time I retubed, I went with Eurotubes "stock" JJ 12AX7's in the front end, plus two JJ EL-34L's (first time I had tried these) and two JJ EL-84's for the Yellowjackets. I'll definitely be keeping this combination for a while.

 

[Undeadpaladin]

These are the suggestions Eurotubes sent me based on what i said. Anyone have any expierence with a similar setup?

The first power tube option I would suggest would be one that we put together especially for players that want a clean on steroids and a super thick harmonically rich drive tone. This option uses an Integrated quad consisting of a pair of KT88’s and a pair of KT66’s matched up to run together. It’s great way to go if a BIG punchy tone is what you want but you would like to get a little power tube distortion at less than kill on contact sound levels. These tubes can be run with the amp set in the EL34 position when in tube rectifier mode with 5U4's or in the 6L6 position when in solid state mode or with GZ34's.


Another option that we have been using in lots of Dual Recs is an Integrated quad using two 6V6’s in the middle two sockets and two KT77’s in the outside two sockets. This gets a great clean tone and the 6V6’s have a deeper thump than 6L6’s do. At higher volumes the 6V6’s break first and the mixture of these with the complex harmonics that the KT77’s have is a killer combination. These are run in the EL34 mode using the GZ34 rectifiers in either the Bold or Spongy setting.

 

[Eclipse]

I run JJ EL34L's in my Trem-o-verb and I prefer them over 6L6's. Thighter low end and more upper mids makes the T-verb come alive. I think I prefer 6L6 for cleans though, but for everything else; EL34L. As mentioned earlier; it's still going to sound like a recto with EL34, but with a different flavor.

 

[alex1fly]

I have used EL34's in my DR on several occasions to get something different tone wise. I won't say better but definetly different. Clarification : I liked the cleans sounds better with el34's.

Make sure you switch your bias switch and bear in mind to not run your DR in solid state mode because it will substantially lower the el34 tube life. I burned out tubes in about 3 months of gigging when I failed to flip the switch to vaccuum tubes.

Maybe my experience is not usual but I thought I'd add my 2 cents nonetheless.

Good luck and let us know how things pan out.

What makes you say that running EL34s in Diode mode kills the tube life? Is that just from your experience, or does it apply to EL34s in Rectos in general? I'm not trying to argue, I'm just curious because I have EL34s in my Roadster and my two main gigging tones are with the Diode rectifier and I wouldn't want to burn my tubes faster just for the sake of a little tighter attack.

Has anyone else had experience with EL34s in a Diode vs Tube Rectifier situation as far as tube life goes?