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6P45S vs, EL509

70.173.239.44
Posted on December 11, 2020 at 10:10:03
LtMandella
 Hi Guys,

I have a much loved 20 year old Transcendent Sound T8-LN OTL amp. Factory built unit and the manufacturer (Bruce Rozenblit) originally supplied the unit with Svetlana EL-509s.

I want to obtain some addl. 509s for backup. I see a ton of Ebay EL509s shown as Svetlana 6P45S.

Anyone know if these are identical replacements for the original Svets? Same specs on all parameters?

I understand that there are various tubes marketed as "equivalents" of the orignal 509s but they are not identical in specs and have less output.

Aside from the fact that I want the original power for my Ref3A DeCapo speakers, I don't want to mix tubes with mismatched specs in the amp.

That seems like a prescription for problems.

Years ago I tried to get clarity on the transcendent site, but no luck.
It would be great if someone had example of the original Svet 509 spec sheet so I could verify in the future against Ebay offerings.

{EDIT}
Looks like I found an original spec sheet so that's a start:

http://www.ne.jp/asahi/evo/amp/device/el509.pdf


Thanks!

 

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Actually the Russian EL509s are 6P45Ss marked as EL509, posted on December 14, 2020 at 10:44:54
Ralph
Manufacturer

Posts: 4778
Location: Minnesota
Joined: April 24, 2002
 So you should be fine. Svetlana is one of the best manufacturers to have made this tube.

 

RE: Actually the Russian EL509s are 6P45Ss marked as EL509, posted on December 16, 2020 at 19:46:09
LtMandella
 OK, thank you!

 

RE: Actually the Russian EL509s are 6P45Ss marked as EL509, posted on December 18, 2020 at 00:44:09
Volker
Audiophile

Posts: 22
Joined: May 23, 2001
 I have built a pair of Futterman H3AA/Nyal OTL3 clones with 6P45S and they work perfect with this tube.

 

RE: Actually the Russian EL509s are 6P45Ss marked as EL509, posted on December 19, 2020 at 09:45:32
airheadair
Audiophile

Posts: 393
Location: California
Joined: October 18, 2010
 NYAL OTL3 uses 6LF6's. Aren't these really different from EL509's?

(replying to :
Posted by Volker (A) on December 18, 2020 at 00:44:09
In Reply to: RE: Actually the Russian EL509s are 6P45Ss marked as EL509 posted by LtMandella on December 16, 2020 at 19:46:09:

I have built a pair of Futterman H3AA/Nyal OTL3 clones with 6P45S and they work perfect with this tube. )

 

RE: Actually the Russian EL509s are 6P45Ss marked as EL509, posted on December 21, 2020 at 11:29:08
Volker
Audiophile

Posts: 22
Joined: May 23, 2001
 "OTL3 uses 6LF6's. Aren't these really different from EL509'" -not so much as one might expect (except different base). This were all the last great sweep tubes for big colour tv sets.
6LF6 is rated at 40W Pa Max, EL509 at 30W, EL519 at 35W.
The 6P45 has an anode that looks as beefy or even fatter as in 6LF6. Ua=175V, Iquiescent=180ma / 3tubes = 10WPav per tube. No problem here.
More interisting for OTL is peak current capability. I tested my 6P45s according to parameters from the George Kay site and all delivered more than 1A peak current, most ~1.2A, some up to 1.5A. EL519 is rated for 1.4A pulse. At 7.5 ohm load i get 28V/100W output, at 15 ohm 49V/160W.
This should not be considered permanent output, but for music pulses it is fine. I drive Stax F81 and Quad63s with them.


 

RE: Actually the Russian EL509s are 6P45Ss marked as EL509, posted on December 21, 2020 at 19:54:00
airheadair
Audiophile

Posts: 393
Location: California
Joined: October 18, 2010
 Fascinating.

I use my NYAL OTL3's to drive Stax F83's. Nothing else that I tried (way back when) could
handle them at all. The OTL3 + Stax combination amazes everyone who listens. When my supply of tubes runs out, I don't know what I'll do.



 

RE: Actually the Russian EL509s are 6P45Ss marked as EL509, posted on December 21, 2020 at 21:55:23
rivervalley817
 maybe look at the link

[no affiliation]

regards,

 

RE: Actually the Russian EL509s are 6P45Ss marked as EL509, posted on December 22, 2020 at 02:27:41
Volker
Audiophile

Posts: 22
Joined: May 23, 2001
 Due to printed circuit construction you can not simply change the compactron sockets to 6P45 magnoval. From electrical view 6P45 should work in OTL3. There is a ebay seller in Hongkong ( xulingmrs ) who produces very good tube adapters. Maybe we convince him to produce 6LF > 6P45/El509 adapters. Possible group buy?
I do not know if this works for F83 too, but for F81 an other amp which really drives them good is the Radford ESA225 (modernized Version of the famous STA25). This one runs on E34, so no retubing problem. 25Wpc sounds small, but for F81 it works. Clean LF (as far as the Stax can deliver)and crystal clear Hf.

 

There are always solutions., posted on December 22, 2020 at 13:01:47
Ralph
Manufacturer

Posts: 4778
Location: Minnesota
Joined: April 24, 2002
 Your NYAL amps are now old enough that if the filter capacitors have not been replaced, you should get that done fairly soon! Otherwise the power transformer is at risk, and that will be harder to source than the output tubes!

 

RE: Actually the Russian EL509s are 6P45Ss marked as EL509, posted on December 23, 2020 at 09:22:40
airheadair
Audiophile

Posts: 393
Location: California
Joined: October 18, 2010
 Very interesting. Does this amp have output transformers? If so, what tap do you use? I think the F81 has even higher impedance peak than the F83.

I use subwoofers with my F83's, so the low frequency impedance dip to 4 ohms is not an issue.

 

RE: There are always solutions., posted on December 23, 2020 at 09:24:31
airheadair
Audiophile

Posts: 393
Location: California
Joined: October 18, 2010
 Thanks for this advice. Actually a few years back I needed to have one of the amps re-tubed,
and Roger Modjeski checked out both amps fairly thoroughly. He said the caps are fine, and recommended against replacing them. I am certainly not able to do this myself, and I don't know any local technician any more I could trust with them.

 

RE: There are always solutions., posted on December 23, 2020 at 10:54:10
Ralph
Manufacturer

Posts: 4778
Location: Minnesota
Joined: April 24, 2002
 Filter caps are the thing that limits the life of almost any electronic circuit that uses a power supply.

I can't speak for Roger's reasoning at the time so I'll put it this way:

Electrolytic capacitors have a sort of 'half life'. Depending on the application, usually after about 20-25 years, half of the filter caps installed are defective in some way. This idea falls apart after that, because by the time you hit 40 years its more than 75% of them have failed. Now if heat is involved, the caps fail sooner; this is why filter caps last a little longer in solid state equipment. The quality of the part makes a difference too, as well as the age of the part prior to installation.

I mention this last bit because Harvey Rosenburg told me that he was sourcing a lot of his filter capacitors from a surplus source for the NYAL amps. That source was (Bill) Godbout Electronics. These parts, if in your amps, were photoflash capacitors and not well suited for use in a tube amplifier (not good at ripple current), although they were very good at having a lot of capacitance for their size. Harvey also told me that he stripped the casing off of the part, since they were made in Japan (by Rubycon) and the Japanese didn't like to see Japanese parts in their amps at the time. By stripping the plastic case off, the parts looked American unless you looked closely. This part BTW is a 600uf 360WV capacitor, slightly over 1" in diameter and about 4" long. This is an unusual form factor and might be part of the reason Roger didn't want to mess with them.

Harvey also told me that the source dried up (I didn't tell him that I knew the person that bought out the remaining stock) so he had to find something else. The point here is that filter cap was used when it was installed. Its also possible that your amp does not have this part if it was made a bit later.

Roger was a great guy and very competent. But in his last years (and I don't know how long because he kept this under wraps) he was in pain dealing with cancer and this affected his mood and judgement.

So you might want to revisit this issue. Put another way- 'nice amp you got there- it'd be a real shame if something happened to it'... :)

I can also tell you that we used brand-new parts in our amps and any of our product made in the early 1990s is needing new filter caps at this point.

 

RE: There are always solutions., posted on December 23, 2020 at 14:14:41
airheadair
Audiophile

Posts: 393
Location: California
Joined: October 18, 2010
 Thanks for this additional input. If I knew a local technician, I would ask them to look again. Does anyone know of a reliable and competent place in the Bay Area?

I don't know what sort of capacitors my amps have. The main power supply capacitors are covered by a special metal case with DANGER HIGH VOLTAGE plastered over them. There are also some fairly large black capacitors with red ends eternal to this case but next to it. Finally there are some wonder caps, which were added later, but I think these are to replace and/or bypass the coupling capacitors.

I suppose I should take the covers off and clean everything at some point. It is dusty inside.
But the covers are a real nuisance to deal with, held on by a plethora of small machine screws.

I still have the original boxes, so I guess I could ship them somewhere if necessary----a terrifying prospect nonetheless.

 

Doesn't Bruce Moore run a shop near there?, posted on December 23, 2020 at 15:00:58
Ralph
Manufacturer

Posts: 4778
Location: Minnesota
Joined: April 24, 2002
 Bruce Moore designed amps and is the 'M' of MFA years back. He's still doing amplifier work, including repair.

 

RE: There are always solutions., posted on December 23, 2020 at 20:11:31
Lew
Audiophile

Posts: 10912
Location: Bethesda, Maryland
Joined: December 11, 2000
 What's scary to me is that many of the Japanese companies that for a while made the best available high voltage electrolytics (Panasonic and Nichicon) have ceased or are in the process of cutting back their production. Since, I think, electrolytics go bad even faster if they are stored and never used, I don't know what to do about this eventual problem. Or maybe I'll go before my capacitors go.

If you have an amplifier or preamplifier that needs the axial lead form factor, you are almost out of luck already. Panasonic makes none, and Nichicon makes only a few. There are those German capacitors sold by Antique Audio, still.

 

RE: There are always solutions., posted on December 24, 2020 at 19:11:32
airheadair
Audiophile

Posts: 393
Location: California
Joined: October 18, 2010
 Hmmm..... do you know if the NYAL OTL3 falls in this category. You folks are scaring me. I may indeed go before my amps do---I'm almost 75---but I still would want to save these gems for posterity.

I haven't been able to locate Bruce Moore.

 

RE: There are always solutions., posted on December 25, 2020 at 09:56:39
Lew
Audiophile

Posts: 10912
Location: Bethesda, Maryland
Joined: December 11, 2000
 I don't think the output coupling capacitors required by the Futterman type design need to be high-voltage types, so you are probably OK in that regard. But upstream from the output the NYAL amplifiers are just like any other tube amplifier, in that they operate at hundreds of volts. It's those voltage ratings, say, above 100V, that are becoming less and less available.

 

RE: There are always solutions., posted on December 30, 2020 at 10:47:16
rottenclam
Audiophile

Posts: 184
Location: Santa Fe, NM
Joined: May 31, 2002
 Bruce is a regular character that hangs out at the Analog Room in San Jose.

Brian, the owner of the Analog Room, could likely put you in touch with him. Best bet is to just go down to the Analog Room on a Saturday afternoon, buy a few records, and ask around.

 

RE: There are always solutions., posted on December 30, 2020 at 18:32:02
airheadair
Audiophile

Posts: 393
Location: California
Joined: October 18, 2010
 Thanks very much for the information about the Analog Room. Unfortunately, this is already too late:

http://www.theanalogroom.net

(They have closed, but a relative will reopen a store in Huntington Beach.)

I might try to follow up nonetheless.

 

RE: There are always solutions., posted on January 1, 2021 at 11:50:49
Volker
Audiophile

Posts: 22
Joined: May 23, 2001
 The output capacitors in a Futterman type amplifier (SEPP) need to have the same voltage rating as the power supply caps. In case one of the upper bank tubes shorts out, bias fails or something else goes wrong full supply voltage will get applied to the output capacitors.
Caps should be rated minimum 400V working voltage for safety.

 

Thanks., posted on January 12, 2021 at 10:03:33
Lew
Audiophile

Posts: 10912
Location: Bethesda, Maryland
Joined: December 11, 2000
 It's been more than 25 years since I owned a Futterman type amplifier, so my memory of the circuit has faded. Good point.

 

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