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OPT as Impedence Matching Device

Posted by Mr_Steady (A) on December 1, 2014 at 17:07:42

In Reply to: RE: if money wasn't a consideration... posted by maxhifi on November 30, 2014 at 10:09:40:

Hi Max,

First you are right about a higher impedence does not result in more power out of a tube amp. Klyle I hope you are reading this.

OTOH,

I finally remembered why higher speaker impedences are better for SET tube amps. It's because an OPT is an impedence matching device that steps down the impedence to a speaker level impedence. Of course it also transforms high voltage low current to low voltage high current.

I have read several places that running higher impedences extends tube life.

Now the following quote is the evidence I found to back up my argument. The link below is the cite. It even uses your powertrain analogy.

"Basically, and OPT is like an electronic gear box to couple a high revving engine with low torque
to slow turning wheels with high torque which is the case when we drive up the hill with truck
load of bricks. There are limits on the rev range, and the engine has bandwidth, like the OPT.

Now there is an odd thing about the load of bricks. The more bricks on the truck, the harder it
is to make it up the hill. But in electronics, the more ohms there are, the easier it is to sustain a
voltage across the load. That's because when you have less ohms, there is more current, because
Ohm's Law says that I = E / R, so with more current there is more power required.
So more ohms are easier to drive than a few ohms."

Now if you say, "We all know that," then I am going to feel ill, because it's what I've been trying to get across for a while. It's one of the reasons I was interested in 32ohms in the first place.

As an aside, I have Radiohead, "The Bends" on right now and it is coming on hard with the horns and SETs. Love it.

Jamie

Big speakers and little amps blew my mind!

• http://www.turneraudio.com.au/output-trans-theory.htm   (Open in New Window)

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