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In Reply to: service life of Gold Lion KT66 reissues? posted by paul2 on April 17, 2014 at 05:54:12:
These are made in Russia by New Sensor. I have been re selling their tubes since more than 10 years, but I recently decided to stop with this company. You can PM me for the reason.
Problems I had myself with their KT... tubes were always related to gas. This was never immediately detected as such. When I had such tubes, they would at first show the bias go down, or hum, or have a tendency to occaisional grid shorts. And not show a problem on the "gas test" with any of the tube testers I have, and getter was looking good still.
That is why I always say, any getterology is for the birds. A bad tube often has a good getter. Just, a really bad getter is white or half-eaten, but long before that happens, the tube malfunctions while the getter looks nice still. So a nice getter often means nothing.
I threw all the bad testing NEW SENSOR tubes in a box, and many came out a few years later with a white getter, showing the true cause of the problem. I still have this junk box, and more and more tubes are getting white getters.
When they start to hum after 3000 hours, it can have many causes. Like too early wear out of one tube of a pair. Or one changed it bias so much, the pair is off balance because if that. So you still have two good tubes in the pair, but no matched pair any more. Or, it is related to gas problems, like described above.
KT66 should to my opinion run much longer than 3000 hours, as this is by itself a very rugged design. With this I mean the real KT66, with the vintage shape KT66 plates. So not the modified 6L6.
I had a major dispute with them, as they refused to give incoming inspection criteria to me, which I can use to test their tubes. That was a few years ago, you can search for that on AA under the EML Moniker. I guess it's still online.
Jac
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Follow Ups
- These are not the best KT66. - EML 08:42:44 04/18/14 (2)
- RE: These are not the best KT66. - Michael Samra 17:51:43 04/19/14 (0)
- RE: These are not the best KT66. - jusbe 22:38:05 04/18/14 (0)