Anyone ever have, use or hear this tube?


I always thought that the pinnacle of the ecc82/12au7 type tube was the Telefunken ecc802s. Even better than the Amperex 7316. But, I recently found out that there is an extra special designation for some ecc802's dubbed the G73R. These are supposed to be unmatched in quality and longevity, said to last 40,000+ hours! Anybody familiar with, heard or own these things??

 

 

 

thecarpathian

Thanks, David.

I have about 14 pair of 12au7 variants. CBS /Hytron one of my favorites.

Mullard CV4003 is another good one. Telefunken red tips labeled for Tektronix equipment, Westinghouse 337 a surprisingly good tube if you can find them, Amperex, Amperex 7316 with ’D’ getter (my favorite), regular Telefunken long and short plates, Cifte, RCA black plates...can’t remember the rest.

The G73R’s would go in a Simply Italy integrated I’m contemplating buying. Last gear I had that the 12au7’s went in was an Odyssey Audio Candela preamp. Gone for a few years now. They're all just sitting in my safe, for lack of a better place to store them.

Total BS onthe hype even these so called10,000 tubes that’s not  realistic under laboratory perfect circumstances, that’s made up ,even if a tube could play that long it’s far past it’s optimum .I have had tubes since the 1970s  .

these rare tubes youtruly don’t know if they are matched, or even used unless 

you have a tube tester.tube sellers put out ads and buy these  from all over the world in lots from people’s garages cellars used in equipment .

believe inly1/2 of what you read . I have been there done that ,and true vintage tubes are getting more rare ,anything NOS will be a premium over $500-$1k a pair 

such as these Tele tubes mentioned , 

@audioman58 

Are you the Yoda of A'gon? Or perhaps James Joyce?

I re-read your posts multiple times.....

Spellcheck and editing would help.

Just sayin'

And yes, NOS are harder to find. As are good tube testers.

 

@thecarpathian 

Yes, yes, yes. You named some terrific tubes.

I haven't heard of Simply Italy. Will look it up.

When my F-I-L passed we inherited BOXES of signal and rectifier tubes and a Hickok tube tester. I spent the better part of a summer testing tubes. Most were microphonic. The ones saved are in plastic boxes...never used, rarely thought about.

I'll be interested hearing what you end up doing.

David

Don't know about the 12A family, but I did a bit of rolling when I had an ARC SP10. Very good were Telefunken 6902, but standard T 6902 were almost poor beside the Telefunken 6902 specially selected by HP. They came with both T and HP seals.

Rumour in 1970's LA was that engineering co-op students spent a lot of time at HP testing tubes, discarding more than 95% to the dumpster. Which explained why HP want 10x the price for their tubes.