Why a NOS 12ax7 Mullard is still better than a 'NEW' Mullard

[rol123]

I found this and it was a great read-had to share it with everyone

Mullard ECC83 (12AX7) Reissue vs Original – A Physical Comparison | effectrode


Cheers,
Roland

 

[miroslav]

It's cool that he completely dissected the tubes to their smallest components and did all that measuring...
...but honestly, what was the point of even comparing them?

I mean....the ONLY thing the two tubes have in common is the name and the tube type.
I could see if New Sensor went to the trouble to do what he did, and then tried to recreate the original Mullard down to each and every component and measurement...
...but all they did was slap the "Mullard" name on tubes they were already making.

He might as well compare the original Mullard to just about any other brand...it would be the same outcome.

 

[rol123]

Having the same name and calling the tube a 're-issue' of an original, it is a good idea to explore how much of a 're-issue' the tube really is, which is the main point of the article.

The article also gives good insight into differences in build of A NOS vs NEW tube, which I'm sure has significant impact in the type of sound a tube adds when a signal passes through it.

 

[LToro]

Having the same name and calling the tube a 're-issue' of an original, it is a good idea to explore how much of a 're-issue' the tube really is, which is the main point of the article.

The article also gives good insight into differences in build of A NOS vs NEW tube, which I'm sure has significant impact in the type of sound a tube adds when a signal passes through it.

Great link and great point Rol123! I am a big fan of both new tubes and NOS. For the most part I'd find tubes
to be different not better or worse. IMHO of course.

 

[haunt]

Phil@Effectrode is a great resource of tone. He builds some of the best sounding pedal effects ever designed and offers an interesting article from time to time. It was he who introduced me to the Binson Echorec...and vacuum tube phasers! I have his phase-O-matic Deluxe...plus a PC-2A Compressor...and I've owned the Blackbird pre but wound up selling that to fund a pair of vintage EHX Muffs. Nevertheless, all 3 of them are in another class w/r/t their respective type.

It's cool that he completely dissected the tubes to their smallest components and did all that measuring...
...but honestly, what was the point of even comparing them?

I mean....the ONLY thing the two tubes have in common is the name and the tube type.
I could see if New Sensor went to the trouble to do what he did, and then tried to recreate the original Mullard down to each and every component and measurement...
...but all they did was slap the "Mullard" name on tubes they were already making.

He might as well compare the original Mullard to just about any other brand...it would be the same outcome.

Phil's post confirms what I had known all along. I'd be interested to see how much deviation might be revealed by a similar dissection/comparison with all of the various reissue tubes and their familiar trademarks.

The point was to illustrate to those who are unaware of the dramatic (or not) physical differences, in old and new tubes, let alone the tonal differences. He, you and I too am preaching to the choir here; we know the old tubes were developed and built for use in cutting edge military, medical, professional and consumer electronics throughout the golden era of HiFi. Numerous competing industrialized nations trying to 1up each other through manufacturing and technology....vs a handful of repurposed and retooled plants in Russia & China feeding the 21st century demand of niche markets based around vacuum tube audio amplifiers.

There is clear distinction that should be obvious to anyone who's paying attention. Nevertheless one needn't look far to find critics who swear none of this stuff makes any difference...and their minds are made up. YMMV. They may be right, you don't know until you try for yourself. For the lucky few...rolling tubes can be like an adventure for hidden treasure; finding the formula to make your favorite amp sound better
Old tubes, new tubes...all of the above are tools available for use, there's no accounting for taste...but there is no mistaking a British Mullard for a Russian one!

 

[miroslav]

Having the same name and calling the tube a 're-issue' of an original, it is a good idea to explore how much of a 're-issue' the tube really is, which is the main point of the article.

OK...I guess for those folks who these days simply know that "tubes" go into "amps", etc...yeah, the article is probably revealing.

I'm already a bit too far off in the other direction......cases of all kinds of tubes, tube tester equipment, etc...
...so I knew right away when they first came out with the Mullard and Tung Sol "re-issues" that they were all just Russian tubes with new names and not actual copies of the originals.
I guess that's why I thought the outcome in the article was predictable...but I'm sure there are folks who are fooled by the "re-issue" name branding thing, so it's good for them to see the facts.

One thing though....people shouldn't take the article a negative view of current manufactured tubes.
They make some nice tubes in Russia...Svetlana EL34 tube are quite good. The "re-issued" Tung Sol 6V6 tubes kick ass.
Also the JJ tubes out of the Slovak Republic are very well made and very sweet sounding....great 12AX7 preamp tubes and their EL34L is super creamy.
Even some Chinese tubes can sound pretty decent...though their QC is not as tight.

 

[mdainsd]

Im the opposite. I have vintage tube gear and I keep them running on vintage originals.

They can be expensive (price any NOS 5 star 6386s lately?), yes, but you get consistent results. I just dont need to inject the possibility of substandard materials, workmanship or design, I dont have the time or interest to fuss with it. Im not saying all the repops are questionable but I think it is safe to say that none of them are made to the standards of the originals.

 

[miroslav]

Im the opposite. I have vintage tube gear and I keep them running on vintage originals.

They can be expensive (price any NOS 5 star 6386s lately?), yes, but you get consistent results. I just dont need to inject the possibility of substandard materials, workmanship or design, I dont have the time or interest to fuss with it. Im not saying all the repops are questionable but I think it is safe to say that none of them are made to the standards of the originals.

Well...just to give some more food for thought.
I too use NOS tubes as often as I can....I mean, I have enough tubes to outfit plenty of gear, but honestly....sometimes they are not the best choice....and in this case I'm mostly talking about amps. I have rack gear that is tube based, which for the most part has some of my best NOS tubes in it.

What I mean is...just the other day I went through a dozen NOS 12AX7 tubes in one of my amps, and ended up with a pair of JJ tubes. All the NOS tubes were noisier. In another amp they may sound just fine, but this particular amp was in a pretty high-gain mode, so it was accentuating the noise....but man, the JJ 12AX7 tubes were absolutely dead-quiet, and they sounded just as good.
That said...the power tubes are NOS GE 6V6GTs.

Also....the NOS market is IMO starting to dwindle. There's way too much "NOS" floating around considering that old-school tube manufacturing ended 30 years ago, and the "stashes" that were laying around undiscovered have mostly been found.
With the Internet...everyone that finds NOS tubes these days in some basement closet, quickly learns of their market value and prices them usually way to high right off. What is still unsold, true top-shelf NOS, that's been tested properly, is as you say, very expensive, and at the end of the day, it may be a bit of hair-splitting. Like will $200-$300-$400 for a set of power tubes really sound THAT much better...?

 

[mdainsd]

Yes. IMHO. Im adding tube power amps to the control room over the Holidays. NOS Mcintosh Gold Lion KT-88s sound better (to me) than any other KT-88s I have tried. Also, in my experience, where you have a piece of equipment that uses a number of the same tubes in tandem, the NOS ones seem to always be closer in performance to each other. So a repop, while cheaper, might necessitate buying more of them to go through them and get good matches.

I had the pleasure of working in a vacuum tube factory years and years ago. Let me say, everything about the Engineering and production of them effects performance.

 

[miroslav]

Yeah...the consistency with current tubes is sometimes the worst thing. Chinese tubes being at the bottom of the QC pile.
Like I said, the JJ stuff tends to be pretty consistent....so it's just a matter of tube tastes.

I don't have anything that needs absolutely "pristine" tube performance. I mean, with guitar amps, a little bit of "dirt" is never a bad things.
I do have my one higher-end tube preamp (Groove Tubes SuPre) which doesn't use the more typical 12xxx tubes. It has 6922/6DJ8/ECC88 tubes in the front and 6GH8A tubes driving the output. I have a nice stash of both from Sylvania/Amperex/Phillips.

On the 6386 tubes....if I owned a Fairchild 670, I might spring for real expensive NOS tubes, otherwise, JJ is also has new production 6386 tubes, though even they are not cheap - $120/tube.
http://www.jj-electronic.com/pdf/6386LGP.pdf

I had the pleasure of working in a vacuum tube factory years and years ago. Let me say, everything about the Engineering and production of them effects performance.

You would think that with modern, computerized/robotic production that it would be easy to create tubes that equal or exceed the NOS standards, and to be able to copy NOS tubes down to the smallest component.

 

[mdainsd]

This is how I like to find them