I'm hungry to try something new and different and want to build a SET headphone amp. Does anyone have any weird and wonderful tubes they have tried successfully used for this type of project that sound decent and are still available
They are exceedingly uncommon/hard to find but have you considered a PX25? Similar to a 2A3, Art Audio produced a 5w power amp for years using this tube and it is an interesting middle ground between a 300B and 2A3.
I have a Will Vincent SET 45. Real nice amp! But its 1.75 wpc limits its useability with most speakers. My Sanei 560A with 2A3's is a bit better (3.5 wpc). Last, I have a custom-built SE amp using the 6BG6 tetrode. 6 wpc, the pair of output tubes are driven by a 12AT7 (each plate drives one output tube). Very good SQ, indeed! And 6BG6's are quite affordable compared to 2A3's and 300B's!
Cheers Audiofeil. My amp builder has similar tastes. You hit the nail on the head and here's the method behind my madness. I can run my AKG K 702 headphones with out the problem of limited headroom that speakers present for these musical tubes. Do you run 2a3 single plates?
Not unusual but the 45 followed closely by the 50 and 2A3, in that order, are my favs.
The higher output tubes, including 300B and 845, simply don't have the "sweetness" and linearity of the flea power single ended triodes. IMO of course; to each his own.
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