[beat]

Hey all,
it's been a while since I have posted. The new restaurant is opening in a few weeks so I have been hella busy...good to be back to audio. I'm putting together a system for the kitchen. It will consist of an nec transport, apogee dac, bottlehead foreplay pre, vintage monoblock tube amps.. which support kt88, 6550, or 6L6 tubes for power. Which would be the ones to go for if I'm driving small speakers with titanium dome tweets and 6.5" kevlar midbass...they are very b&w ish but are homebrew..substantial bass for the size but will consider a sub later. What I'm asking is: should i go for kt88, 6550, or 6L6 for these puppies? It is a push pull design producing around 60w.
thanks alot for your input,
beat

[Rob Babcock]

Yikes!   That's quite a kitchen system!  I assume you're gonna be doing the cooking?  You'll never want to leave the kitchen!

I used to work as a chef, and I ran the kitchen for a couple different restaurants.  I had a pretty decent stereo for me & my guys at work (Pioneer reciever, Philips CD carousel, Infinity sub & JBL HLS-610 bookshelf speakers), but nothing compared to that.  On occasion, I'd boost morale by letting my cooks bring in some of their own stuff (mostly pretty crappy stuff, IMO, like Limp Biscuit, Linkin Park, 311, Orange 9MM).  For the most part I played my own stuff when I was there (which of course was practically all the time.

BTW, what type restaurant is it?  I work for a local bank now, but I often really miss the restaurant biz.

[beat]

I know the amps are probably overkill for those little speakers so I will probably move up eventually. I'm thinkin the only time I will only be able to rock out will be in the early morn before the peoples start comin' in. Did I mention that I am roasting up a nice blend of sumatra, guatemala, and yemen mocha sanani? and was willing to send off a half pound to everyone who replies with the winning tube selection? That is not to say that the BEST tubes win but the ones I end up going with. So, if 15 people say kt88s and I go with kt88's then I will send off 15 half pounds of my house blend...and say sorry to all the 6L6 people... get it? Why am I doing this? I don't know. I am just stoked to be roasting and want to share with those who share insight with me...I suppose I should make a cut off date because this thread could go on forever. Lets say by feb 12? Maybe we'll extend it for lack of activities sake.

[beat]

Hey Rob,
I am stoked you can relate. It really can be fun, cant it? It is going to be mostly coffee focused with a rotating menu of semi fancy panini sandwiches of plates of the day type of thing...light baking in the morning. Yes, I will keep in locked in my office when I'm not there. I'm stinkin excited about this whole thing.

[JohnR]

What amp is it? Personally, I think I would go for EL34s, if the amp can be biased for kt88 and 6l6 then el34 should be ok too.

[beat]

Hmmm,
Well, The brand is called Conn..??? I dont know if that means much. They look pretty homebrew really. Is the pin arrangement the same for el34? Im a tube newbie and have an el34 amp now but never a kt88 and was under the impression the pin arrangement was different not to mention voltage diffs. thanks for any insight, john
best regards, beat

[Juan R]

Where is your Restaurant? I go to Santa fe almost every sept-oct to an annual meeting  at El Dorado.

[JohnR]

Oh, from an electronic organ. Hm... you didn't happen to get those on EBay - ? He says he "tested" them with 6550 but I doubt the biasing was right, I'll look it up tonight

[beat]

Hey Juan,
we are actually in albuquerque, just off of I-25 on the way to SF. It is all brand new construction so I'm sure you havent seen it. Next time you are coming through abq let me know.

John, I don't know if they are from an organ but I see where you are going with that. There is a very simple circuitry layout. No circuit board whatsoever. It is all point to point. Should I be concerned mostly with (and make my decision from) the voltage range coming from the sockets?

thanks for your input,
beat

[mgalusha]

If the EL-34's will work they should sound very nice and have no problems driving the speakers your describing.

Even if you don't pick the EL-34's I want some of your blend!

Good luck with the new restaurant.

mike g.

[Captain Humble]

Beat,
Best of luck with the restaurant.

We just celebrated the second anniversary of my restaurant on January 10th.  Having grown up in New Orleans, it's a blend of New Oleans French, Creole and Cajun cusine.  We also serve boiled crawfish, oysters on the half shell and chargrilled oysters. My avatar is a shot of the bar.

If your thinking of doing a website for your restaurant, the www link below will take you to mine.  You can check out the menu and some of the party pictures are pretty good.  I'm the guy in the "KISS" warpaint under Halloween Party 2003.

May the Force Be With You
Jeff

[Tonto Yoder]

... Did I mention that I am roasting up a nice blend of sumatra, guatemala, and yemen mocha sanani? and was willing to send off a half pound to everyone who replies with. ....

Dude,  I think I did some of that yemen mocha sanani right before Woodstock  (yeah, man, I was there).  Bought mine from a guy in a saffron robe (think his old lady was named "Moon Unit" or something?).

We never called it "roasting up" though.  Maybe "firing up."

[beat]

Thanks for the encouragement Jeff. Your place looks like a lotta fun. If I'm ever down that way I'll have to look you up. BTW, love the hair.

Tonto, this is some killer stuff. Really seedy though..

[JackD]

Beat

The pin placement is the same.  My mono's use all of the tubes your mentioned plus the EL-34.  Comapny just reccomends a lower bias point with the 34's versus the 88's. 35 vs 40

Jack

[beat]

thanks jack,
so the 88s will run alittle hotter I guess? If you've rolled tubes ever, what is your preference?

[JackD]

Beat

I prefer the sound overall of the EL-34's,  a litle smoother in the midrange, toobier if you will.  The 88's will give you a little more bass weight and extension on both ends.  You might want to go over to the Tube Asylum at AA and ask one of the Vintage experts and rebuilders like Jim Mcshane for his opinions about this amp.

[beat]

thanks jack,
I signed up over at AA and asked a couple questions. The more I look into this, the more I am realizing that the tubes in question are not directly swapable..Is this correct?

[JohnR]

Sorry, I forgot about this Tubes can be swapped *if* the amp is designed for them to be swapped. This one most likely isn't, but only small modifications would be needed.

If you were going to use EL34s, then you would need to make sure that pin 1 was connected to pin 8. Doing so will not prevent you from using 6L6s, pin 1 is not connected on the 6L6. See pinouts here:

http://tdsl.duncanamps.com/show.php?des=6L6
http://tdsl.duncanamps.com/show.php?des=EL34

With that, the amp should "work." However it might be worth adjusting the cathode resistor(s). If you can post pics and want to proceed (and don't mind measuring high voltages) then we should be able to sort it out

Another approach would be to just put a set of 6L6s in it for now and mess with other tubes later if/when you feel like it.

[beat]

Dang,
it has been a nonstop opening..this is my first day off in like 6 weeks or so. Lots of troubleshooting for equipment, staff and so on. Well, in a nutshell, I went with the 6l6 and they sound good enough for now. Really good actually. However, the monkeys who made the triple wall duct for my coffee roaster blew it..well, not really blew it but came in one day and installed this frankenstein looking pipe system and moved the roaster to accomodate it screwing up my legal clearances for the roaster...so, I havent roasted yet but probably will in the next week or so. What we are going to do is remake some zero tolerance pipe and run it through the cabinetry. So, why don't all you guys who have replied (no matter which tubes you suggested) PM me with a mailing addy so I can hook you up soon.
Hows that? Happy easter to all.
Beat

[Figo]

EL34 because they are hella cheap, plentiful, and sound good too