[fz1jmp]

Hello again;

After my prerequisite search, I thought I would ask. My living room, where my audio equipment is, is usually a pretty cold room. We live in a very old house and have no central heat. We usually use 2 pellet stoves to heat the house and supplement them with electric heaters. While we have oil heat, we have not used it regularly in a good 6 years. 1.5 tons of pellets is usually a winters worth. Anyway, my question is this. Being we usually don't heat the living room during the day, when I come home I will usually put on a heater and then turn on my tube amp. Is there any concern regarding the tubes heating up, being they were cold and all. I could always leave on a heater near the tubes, but would prefer just letting them heat as needed.

Thanks in advance!!
Jack

[Scott F.]

Jack

You have no concerns whatsoever about starting your tubes in a cold room. They work just fine in the cold. Think about all of the pre-1960 cars that had tube radios that made it through all of the northern winters 

[fz1jmp]

Scott; great answer, I would not of thought of that. I hate to sound naive but did car radios have tubes in them? How did you change them. Jack.

[Scott F.]

They were pretty easy to change out. Those old cars were cavernous under the dashboards unlike today's vehicles. The radios typically had two nuts on the face of teh unit that held them to the face of the dash then there was a single bracket on the back of the radio to keep it from shaking. You'd pop the power/speaker plug, pull the antenna plug and undo the two front nuts and back bracket and the radio came right out. A few of screws and cover pops off and exposes the tubes.

I can't tell you how often I was standing on my head working under the dash of old cars. Car stereo was a whole lot easier back then

[medium jim]

Heck, if they can handle being cryogenically treated, they should be able to handle a cold room and the resulting warm-up.

Jim

[mgalusha]

I used to use my Atma-Sphere M-60's to heat my listening room in the basement, it could easily drop to ~55F in there without heat, no worries at all. Usually the only time you need to worry much about powering up cold electronics is if they have been really cold, like in the back of a UPS truck in January and the brought into a warm house. Then condensation can occur but that is extremely unlikely for amps in your living room. We too use a pellet stove, in fact it's happily cooking away in the corner at this very minute.

[Kim S.]

I have a similar situation, cold room, and have never had a problem with my tubes.  I too have a pellet stove for heat and absolutely love it.  Central heating is overrated

[Guy 13]

Hi all Audio Circle members.

I wish I had a cold/cool basement.
here in Vietnam, no basement,
plus the average temperature is 30C+ (85F)
sometimes going up to 35C  (95F)
that's not too good for the electronics under the hood.
As a preventive mesure,
I have a quiet running cooling fan on the amplifier
when I am having a long listening session.

Guy 13


Guy 13

[fz1jmp]

OK so it seems that a cold room is fine. Its never cold enough to be frosty so I won't worry about condensation. I didn't think of the reverse of being too hot. I feel for you guy 13, while I don't like the cold all that much, I think the heat can be worse. And yeaa to all us pellet stove folks. Saves a bundle and works great. We have a battery backup so if the lights go out we r still nice and toasty. Thanks for the great answer.  Jack

[medium jim]

fz:

Heat is not good for electronics in general, but amp designers know this too and design them with this in mind.  I shut down my tube mono blocks during the summer and hot spells only for my comfort and switch over to SS.

Note:  I live in the Northwest San Fernando Valley where it gets well over 100 degrees, and hits 110+ every now and then.  I've run my tubes on occasion in the midst of said heat with no ill effects other than a hot room.

Jim

[Ericus Rex]

Hi all Audio Circle members.

I wish I had a cold/cool basement.
here in Vietnam, no basement,
plus the average temperature is 30C+ (85F)
sometimes going up to 35C  (95F)
that's not too good for the electronics under the hood.
As a preventive mesure,
I have a quiet running cooling fan on the amplifier
when I am having a long listening session.

Guy 13


Guy 13

With the filament running at 1,100+ degrees C I doubt that an increase in your ambient room temp of 5C would make any difference to the tube.  But, better safe than sorry!

[geezer]

Can a pellet stove work when the power (electrical) is out?

[twitch54]

Car stereo was a whole lot easier back then

not much 'stereo' back then, mostly 'monural' !

[jimdgoulding]

No, jes give em a little time to warm up.

[asmoday]

Thanks for the information guys, I too have been wondering the same thing. My listening room is in the back corner of the house and doesn't get the full heat the rest of it does. So I was a little worried too, but glad to hear that it isn't a issue!!

[Kim S.]

Can a pellet stove work when the power (electrical) is out?

Unfortunately you need electric for the fan and heater element that ignites the pellets so a pellet stove will not work during a power outage.  I never thought of a battery backup.  We have a propane stove as a backup.  Fortunately power outages a petty rare where we live.

[Scott F.]

not much 'stereo' back then, mostly 'monural' !

True dat 

Most of my retrofits were doing street rods as a young pup. Then came three kids, clothes, food, houses and general reality of being broke for 20+ years. Although, I just hit momma up with the possibility of a new toy...

 

....and she didn't say no     I may find myself standing on my head installing another stereo before too long. We'll see how the negotiations go with the current owner tomorrow

[SteveFord]

Will that truck have tube gear in it when you're done? 
I think it should!

[SET Man]

Hey!

   Well, better run tubes in cold room than a hot room for me

   My system make my room warm and cozy during winter months but hot and steamy during summer months here in NYC. 

    Tubes won't mind cooler temp and that also keep other components inside like capacitors cool extending it's life. Well, if incandescent bulb work in the north and south poles than electron tubes would be just fine in your cold audio room 

Take care,
Buddy