DR w/ 2-6l6 and 2-EL34

[OneMoreAugust]

I have heard of this before and want to try it. Would I switch the bias to 6L6 or EL34 position? Or do I have to actaully have the bias set?

Anyone try this? I am kinda of looking for a mix between both sounds...seems logical to achieve with 2 of each of them!

 

[FPFL]

I'm a troll on this subject but I think its a truly bad idea.

Want an amp that mixes power tubes types - buy one that does that or recognize you are taking a real risk with your amp.

The amp is not just tubes - other parts behave differently based on the tubes and the setting for the tubes, like the transformer! Doing something it wasn't designed to do is at best a risk even if it sounds good. Can you afford to possibly trash parts of your amp?

I like Bob in general but in this kind of advice he's gambling with other peoples stuff and voiding their warranty for them which as a business practice I cannot endorse. Look at what happened to the Peavey JSX amps that he recommded EL34-L tubes when the screens were not big enough to handle them.

Peavey's fault? I'm really not as sure as Bob is on his site about this. These were not the tubes the amp was designed for, period. They draw differently than regular EL34s. He's got a disclaimer up there now, which is great, but it still emphasizes that stuff like this is a risk which is my point.

Thats all I'm saying. Again, I'm not hating on Bob, just recognizing that he's a guy with amps plural and some of the guys here have one precious Mesa and I'd hate to see them possibly toast it and void their warranty too.

-P

 

[Botch]

I wouldn't do it. I've tried in my Dual Rec before and it sounds awful. It's like both the natural characteristics of each tube are compromised by the other type rather than you getting the best of both worlds. Your cleans will suffer also.

 

[OneMoreAugust]

good looking out...that's why I asked! I have been using the EL34s for a while now, but I want to revisit my 6L6s to see what I changed. I'll do that this weekend.

Maybe I'll try plucking in some new preamps and see what happens instead.

I know this is probably dumb, but it would be unsafe to use EL38s in place of the EL34 w/o getting the amp adjusted....right?

 

[stratman62]

I bought and tried the integrated quad in my roadster. It sounded pretty good actually. But after about a week I went back to the stock mesa tubes (6l6's) and decided I liked those better. I did a bunch of tube swapping but finally came back the original mesa's in the end. Best sound (to me) and less risk.

 

[domct203]

I tried the Intergrated Sextet (2xE34L & 4x6L6GC) in a Triple I owned and found the sound to be inspiring and different, but one of the E34L's went red plate on me. The whole Extremly Hot Chassis / Burnt Tube / Popped Fuse thing was enough to scare me. I have not tried them again since.

FWIW - Bob at Eurotubes was excellent w/ his customer service. He gave me the options of either a new pair of E34L's, or a complete new Intergrated Sextet, or 3 matched pairs of the same type. I took all 6L6's, and played them steady (4 hrs per wk + gigs) for over a year with ZERO problems.

Dom