Why are tube amps so expensive?

  • Thread starter Thread starter Greg_L
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Greg_L

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Because they can be? Because people will gladly pay whatever for 100 yr old technology? Because they just sound better?

All of that is probably true, but fuck, it's not like tube technology hasn't been around forever. It's not a new science that commands big bucks because of the research and parts involved. Tubes are cheap and printed circuit boards are in everything now. There's no reason for a good 100w tube amp to be over a thousand bucks. Or even 500 bucks. :cursing:
 
It's because of the transformers; they are large heavy hunks of copper and nickel and iron, etc. that are expensive to manufacture.
 
The Cheapest Xformer set I know of rated at 100W runs about $150 retail. The cheapest Sovtek 6L6s or EL34s go for about $25 a pair. It takes 3 pair to get to 100W. Add in however many 12AX7s at $15 per. Include the cost of tolex, wood, speakers, the chassis, metal corners, jacks, pots, components, etc.

If you cut those prices a bunch figuring the maker doesn't pay retail and you still come out at a chunk of money just in parts. $500 bucks for a cheap 100W tube amp seems pretty good.
 
Don't forget the power transformer is another $80.

All of this compared with a few $1 power transistors and maybe a $40 power transformer . . .
 
ido1957 said:
My JCM900 cost me 1200 wayyyyyyy back in the 90's when I bought it new....
Believ it or not Axe is advertising these still with a jacket!!!for $1435...
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Good LORD! For that kind of money, you should get a vest and two pair of pants, too! :D

Seriously, there is the matter of selling old tech for high prices. Seems anything that has somehow gained some "vintage cache'" will sell for prices way out of proportion to the R&D costs, which were paid for decades earlier. Consider motorcycles: Hardley Davidson's "newest" motor was introduced in 1999*- that being the Twin Cam, and the motor in the Sportster is hardly-davidson changed since 1984- or 1957, depending on how you look at it.

Contrast that to sportsbikes, which receive a major redesign every 2-4 years (Suzuki is the best/worse, usually redesigning their GSX-R motors every TWO YEARS!)- at least major enough that you can not use, say, a 2002 GSXR motor in a 2000 bike.

My point being, once folks get nostalgic about something, the rules all change. That said, of the guitar amps I own and have owned, my favorites are all... tubes.

(*The "Revolution" motor was introduced in 2001, but that motor is widely ignored and/or hated by both the HD Motor Company, and the HD faithful. Further, the motor was NOT developed with Hardleys in mind- it was supposed to be the "new" Buell motor, but HD could not leave well enough alone, choosing instead to insist that Porche Design (who acually developed the motor, making it more of a Porche motor than a Hardley one) modify the design from it's original, to the point where the motor was completely unsuitable for use in the Buell sportsbikes- Eric Buell came to hate the motor, too, but for entirely different reasons that HD did. Hardley, having spent millions on what became a white elephant, had little choice than to develop a bike to put it in. Few if any of the Hardley faithful like that bike.)
 
I say the same thing on a daily basis about the cost of the Axe FX.
 
Go price a high end violin, or trumpet. Amplifier, and guitar prices will seem a little more in line. The brass in a trumpet can't amount to more than a couple bucks. (american slang for dollars) That converts to about 27 pesos, or one chicken.
 
JCH said:
Go price a high end violin, or trumpet. Amplifier, and guitar prices will seem a little more in line. The brass in a trumpet can't amount to more than a couple bucks. (american slang for dollars) That converts to about 27 pesos, or one chicken.
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my sax retails for around $5500.
 
As was said waaaaaaaaay back; tube amps are expensive because all of us suckers will pay it. It ain't the transformers; why is Mark Bass shit so expensive with switch-mode power supplies and no transformers? Also, look at the price difference between say a 50-watt amp and a 100-watt amp; a lot more than those two extra power tubes. It's a marketing perception. If you want to be in the exclusive club, along with 10,000,000 other tube amp owners, you have to pay the cover charge at the door.
Not that long ago, I worked building car batteries. It's a lot of fun spilling sulfuric acid all over yourself, but I learned something else that stuck with me. I could put one of maybe a dozen labels and face plates on that same battery, and they were all priced different. A 'stock' BMW battery was more expensive than the same battery going to Pep Boys. I didn't think it was right, but I sucked it up and collected my paycheck every Friday like a good lemming.
You can look at anything like this. Look at other musical instruments. All the boutique drum builders just use Keller shells, yet their prices are all over the map. The same maple and mahogany goes in a PRS, a Gibson, or any of the 'boutique' builder like Collins, or the budget Peavey electric guitars. Now compare prices. Why is a Bogner more $$$ than a Carvin or a Peavey tube amp? Because we'll pay it, thinking we are getting value for our dollar, and a better product.
Someone playing a high end violin will likely earn double the sticker price after a year of Philharmonic concerts. I don't feel like paying just under $4K for a Bogner Ecstasy to shlep to a $40 bar gig playing to the chairs. I'll pay under $500 for a B-52 head, though. So I don't look cool. I haven't before, and I still get laid once in a great while. ;)
 
yep ....... I'm an audiophile and every once in a while Stereophile will review some relatively inexpensive piece of gear and make the remark, "How can they provide such good performance for so little money?"

A better question qould be how come the other guys charge so much?
I have a Mark V Mesa and it's a very full featured amp ..... LOTS of parts in it and a lot of R&D went into it.
It retails for 2200 ....... so why would some of these boutique low powered amps cost twice that? While there are economies of scale that give Mesa an advantage ...... there is still no reason why a minimilist amp with few parts should be thousands of dollars.
 
Guitargodgt said:
I say the same thing on a daily basis about the cost of the Axe FX.
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Because the guys who developed and designed the Axe FX put a lot of hard work, time, design and original thinking into their product, and want to earn a living. Keeping the cost high helps them recoup all those years of design work. They aren't at the price point or market presence yet, to be able to sell their gear at Line 6 prices and still sell them in Line 6 quantities across the globe.

Their stuff is the highest of high end quality amp modeling. Therefore, they can command a high end quality price tag.


This argument is the same as saying, "Well a Ferrari is still just a car, why isn't it the same price as a Fiat?"
 
Lt. Bob said:
yep ....... I'm an audiophile and every once in a while Stereophile will review some relatively inexpensive piece of gear and make the remark, "How can they provide such good performance for so little money?"

A better question qould be how come the other guys charge so much?
I have a Mark V Mesa and it's a very full featured amp ..... LOTS of parts in it and a lot of R&D went into it.
It retails for 2200 ....... so why would some of these boutique low powered amps cost twice that? While there are economies of scale that give Mesa an advantage ...... there is still no reason why a minimilist amp with few parts should be thousands of dollars.
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Best answer in the thread so far.

That Mesa Mark V is a beast of an amp, has too many variables and switches and tone-tweaking options to make your head dizzy with. There was a TON of research to build that amp. It ain't minimalist in any stretch of the imagination. So you can justify some of its cost, because you get a helluva lot of bang for that buck.

And there ain't an Uberschall or Herbert or TriAmp or Shiva or Slash Signature amp out there, that can do better for twice the price.

But people still fork over the cash, for that BOUTIQUE prestige.
 
ranjam said:
...why is Mark Bass shit so expensive with switch-mode power supplies and no transformers?...
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This is a joke, right?

You're declaring Mark Bass products to be expensive?




You are right, however... Mark Bass is shit.
 
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