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6.3vac heater windings

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cytovette

Mar 26, 2021
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I am in the process of building a low wattage tube amp (3wpc) that uses two 6E5P tubes per channel wired PP. I am using an Antek AS-1T200 power transformer that has two 6.3 windings (3A each). Would it be better to use one winding for each channel or parallel them and run all 4 tubes from that?

I was thinking that there may be better channel separation using separate windings for each channel but with them both being on the same transformer I am not so sure. Or it may not make much difference either way, I am really asking for my own knowledge, my training is in repair not engineering.
Thanks!
 

Audioguru

Sep 24, 2016
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Why are you using antique tubes?? Do you like their distortion, poor frequency response and poor speaker resonance damping?
 

crutschow

May 7, 2021
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Why are you using antique tubes?? Do you like their distortion, poor frequency response and poor speaker resonance damping?
Probably the same reason they like the reduced frequency response (called "warmer sound") and inner groove distortion of the old vinyl records.
Go figure.
 

WHONOES

May 20, 2017
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Old vinyl records have a wider bandwidth than you are insinuating. And they do sound better than CD's. They generally have a superior sound stage as well.
I can remember experiments with quadrophonic sound in the seventies. This required a bandwidth of at least 50KHz.
 

Ylli

Jun 19, 2018
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In general you do not want to parallel two transformer windings, even if they do have the same voltage rating. It is not physically possible for those two 6.3VAC windings to be identical, and as such any imbalance will cause energy loss and heating in the transformer.

As an example, assume one secondary has an output voltage of 6.25VAC and the other has an output of 6.30VAC. Also assume each winding has a resistance of 0.25 ohms. If you hook those in parallel you would have a 0.05 volt difference and a total resistance of 0.50 ohms, creating a circulating current of 100 mA which is doing nothing more than heating the transformer.
 

cytovette

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Why are you using antique tubes?? Do you like their distortion, poor frequency response and poor speaker resonance damping?
I guess that I don't have your extreme amount of knowledge and people skills.
Thanks for pointing out to me the quality of people in this group, I obviously made a mistake joining. I apologize for that.
 

Audioguru

Sep 24, 2016
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I made a Heathkit vacuum tubes amplifier 60 years ago. Every few months it produced distortion that measured 10% or more then I replaced the output tubes to make the distortion low. Tubes wore out so often that they were sold in convenience stores.
Then I made a kit FM tuner that also had vacuum tubes and when FM stereo was invented I made a kit multiplex stereo adapter for the FM tuner.
57 years ago I bought a solid state FM stereo receiver that sounded great and was still used until a couple of years ago. It played fine until its switches wore out.
My compact cassette recorders/players did not use tubes and neither did my MP3 and CD Players.
 

davenn

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I guess that I don't have your extreme amount of knowledge and people skills.
Thanks for pointing out to me the quality of people in this group, I obviously made a mistake joining. I apologize for that.


Dont take it personally and not everyone here is like that :)
there are a great bunch of people here

AG gets a bit grouchy in his old age


to your transformer, I see no problems with using one 6.3V winding for each channel :)


Dave
 

WHONOES

May 20, 2017
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Not to my ear.
And I've listened to a lot of vinyl in my day.

What has the sound stage have to do with the method of recording?
Firstly. I have listened to many many vinyl recording over the last 70 years or so and ran a mobile disco in the 1970's, played in a band through the 80's and have built many speaker systems and designed and built many power amps for both Hi Fi and band use. I had to train my ears for building High quality speakers which gives an insight to the vagaries of Vinyl and CD.

Secondly. The sound stage has everything to do with the method of recording. Sound engineers spend a lot of time trying to get it right. The sound stage that your speakers produce locates all the performers between them. A good set of speakers will produce a sound stage that has width, depth and height.
 

Audioguru

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Since I am old then I played with vacuum tubes 60 years ago and see that a solid state amplifier is much better.
Today some younger people might like to try old stuff like a vacuum tubes amplifier, an old car or an old TV.
 

crutschow

May 7, 2021
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The sound stage has everything to do with the method of recording.
By method of recording, I mean vinyl or CD, and that obviously doesn't affect the sound stage, which you stated in post #5.

If you prefer the archaic tubes and vinyl for listening, that's fine, but I never want to again listen to the the distortion (especially the inner grooves) restricted frequency response, and the pops and cracks from dust and scratches, that the mechanical recording system invented by Edison introduces.
The more mechanical devices introduced into the music train, the more inaccuracy added, so I prefer that the only mechanical devices left in the chain that can cause distortion are the microphone and the speaker. A CD, although mechanical, reproduces the original digital studio recording signal without error
Vinyl adds the recording lathe, the record processing, the turntable, the needle and the cartridge, all of which can have inaccuracies that can affect the sound.
 

Audioguru

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When I was younger I used hand-me-down very expensive and high quality Shure phono cartridges from my wealthy friend and they produced the clicks and pops from vinyl records with good accuracy.
Since it was a normal mechanical problem, I ignored the poor high frequency response and high distortion caused by the much slower speed of the inner grooves.
 

WHONOES

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The thing is, because they are analogue, you get much more definition from vinyl. I have some identical copies of albums in Vinyl and CD. I much prefer the Vinyl recordings for reasons stated.
As for the sound stage, it does make a difference whether they are on Vinyl or CD.
 

crutschow

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The thing is, because they are analogue, you get much more definition from vinyl.
That is an opinion and has no basis in fact.
The CD accurately reproduces the original analog signal more accurately than vinyl ever can.
And all modern recordings start out being recorded digitally, so how can you then get extra more definition if you convert it back to analog to put on vinyl?
As for the sound stage, it does make a difference whether they are on Vinyl or CD.
Since the sound stage is determined by the microphone placement and mixing, how can it make a difference in the sound stage if it's Vinyl or CD for an identical recording?

But I can see I'm beating a dead horse, so I'll let you and your golden ear enjoy your vinyl and tubes.
 

WHONOES

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How very kind of you to allow me to enjoy listening to recordings in a manner of my choice.
 

davenn

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OK time to close thread as it has veered way off topic
 
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