Quickie in Finland

[aholata]

Used to run Seduction couple of years ago and wanted to get some of that tube heat again here to heat up the cold Finnish winter days...Jokes beside I'm running couple of fully modded and beefed up chip amps. A pair of Musical Laboratory Maedeup Gainclone loaners (Dutch company long gone by now. the jewelry boxes in the pic) and Diy TI tpa3116 chip mono amps with silver inductors, Lundahl ll1540 transformer inputs and so on... So i wanted to try some tubes in front of the to warm up the sound. I've been using Pass B1 and Salas DCB1 with good results but last summer i got a loaner tube pre and that combo really hit the nail in the head. So the decision to get a tube pre was made and with past experience with bottlehead stuff and quick check around the web and wallet rounded the options to Quickie.

Chassis plate is see through green and it sits on diy butyl dampened bambu base. That and cork-rubber footers keep the ringing while walking or tapping the hifi stand almost non existent. Only other up grade at the moment is Cardas multistrand wire in signal path.

PJCCS is still waiting in package and other up-grades on the way too, at least caps, pot and i have some nos Mullards waiting too.

 

[cpaul]

So how does it sound?  Does it meet your expectations?  Interesting plate.  I have a green one but it's opaque.

 

[aholata]

Final jury is still out for the sound, but i can say of the bat and still burning tubes and all in, that it sound great for the price of it. Highs are clean, natural and all there, midrange is great, natural and full, bass is only area that has trouble, its little shy in lowest region and little smeared in all bass region. But i'm hoping that burn in and up-grades bring some help in the bass. But still it is what it is and being realist it won't deliver all the goods even with up-grades, thats what its bigger brothers are for. But i'm sure i'll be happy with it until it's time to up-grade to one of it's bigger brothers.

Put in the Mullard CV820's and can hardly get any ringing of tubes, i have to tap really hard on chassis plate to get some ringing and it dies out really fast. With no dampening of the tubes, just cork/rubber footers and butyl plating the base

-Tatu-

 

[Natural Sound]

The bass will get better with the PJCCS.  Upgrading the output capacitors might help a bit too too.

 

[aholata]

Update... After putting the Mullards in and burning them and Quickie in almost a full battery cycle the bass has improved a lot. Now its very thight and easy to follow. Next is putting the PJCCS in and see what changes...

-Tatu-

 

[aholata]

Recent update...    Have changed to some vintage RCA tubes, sound improved alot but little more microphonics than Mullards.  Still haven't done PJCCS, Pot or Capacitor upgrades, too happy with the sound of this little buddy to hurry with the upgrades, and think that its good too so i get really familiar with the sound before upgrades.  Other observations...first set of 9 volts lasted 3 months in daily few hours use, D sells last about 2/3 of the time of 9 volts.

-Tatu-

 

[cpaul]

Have you tried the PJCCS yet?  It really should address the bass issue pretty well.  Lucky you to have so little microphonics.  I haven't tamed mine yet (though a cathode follower version I built is pretty much free of microphonics).

 

[aholata]

Nope, PJCCS is still waiting to be installed, i really should get it in but sound of my system is on very good level at the moment so i haven't really longed for upgrade for a while now, well since i got quickie in and some omega speakers.

I'm sure that when i get it in it will be so big of an approvement that i'll be sorry that i didn't do it earlier. Life is just too hectic at the moment that i just haven't gotten around to do almost any audio projects just listening.

Rca's are definitely more microphonic than the mullards i have but sound wise Rca's are winners, microphony doesn't bother too much, only when i touch the quickie or play really, really loud. But it's all just vibration control. I have been every now and then looking for some other nos tubes to try but as everything else right now it's work in process.

Which prompts a guestion....What is the mechanism here behind the microphonics, i don't understand too much of tubes but seems that there is too ways to tackle it here. Mechanical damping and or using it as cathode follower. Do these address the same "problem" from different angle or what happens here.

Just being curious mechanical engineer.

Sound wise the Quickie is so good to my taste that i haven't had any thoughts of upgrading to anything else for a while, but this is just in my "low budget" carefully with thought assembled diy system.

-Tatu-

 

[Paul Joppa]

What's happening is vibration of the interior elements, changing the spacing between electrodes and therefore the electric field. It's usually more severe with directly heated filaments, which are thin wires.

With the common-cathode (normal) circuit, the grid-cathode variation is amplified by the gain of the tube.

In cathode follower, there is no gain, and the smaller noise is further reduced by the negative feedback.

 

[aholata]

Cool, just keep learning new things about tubes, man are they complex to implement. I guess it will still be a while when i'll build anything but ready designed kits.... But now i at least understand that you can wire same tube different ways to get different results sound wise, and as i gather it that different voltages, resistor and cap values affect the sound too, so almost endless possibilities. Man how do you guys do it, the final products, i guess it takes a hole lot of testing.

-Tatu-

Ps. Well, enough of this of topic. I'll try to do some DIYign so i'll get that PJCCS in. And keep posting my adventures in quickie land here.

 

[aholata]

Scored pair of Telefunkens from eBay, and HOLY COW BATMAN!  What a difference, these really are worth the hype. And this is compared to not so bad sounding NOS Rca's. Way more natural sound, more controlled bass with more flavor. And minimal ringing probably least of what i have tried so far. Sound is giving me goosebumps, which hasn't happened with earlier tubes.

-Tatu-

 

[brucef]

I have tried some nos Brimar tubes that are really, really nice. Typical British warm. Currently using some RT, La Radiotechnique tubes made in France. Nice mids and high end. Have some RCA tubes to try next. Nice that these 3S4 tubes are inexpensive.

 

[cpaul]

I have tried some nos Brimar tubes that are really, really nice. Typical British warm. Currently using some RT, La Radiotechnique tubes made in France. Nice mids and high end. Have some RCA tubes to try next. Nice that these 3S4 tubes are inexpensive.

Ah, but where to get some Brimar 3S4 tubes???

 

[4krow]

For the love of COW, you Must install PJCCS. Batteries will last longer, and the sound, well, you might as well just slap your forehead now for not doing it sooner.

 

[brucef]

Ah, but where to get some Brimar 3S4 tubes???

I was fortunate enough to find nos Brimar tubes on the bay a while back. He even sent me an extra pair at no charge. He was happy that someone could use them and didn't want to see them end up in a landfill.

 

[IndyNate]

If I'm not mistaken, Joppa has said the PJCCS will actually reduce battery life by ~17%. This isn't a problem for me, as life without the PJCCS isn't worth listening to! It's a truly astonishing and needed upgrade. And yes, upgrading the coupling caps to anything Soviet makes a huge improvement. I use MBM paper-in-wax. You won't go back to poly caps.

 

[aholata]

Man, i still haven't had the stroke if inspiration or time (read being just lazy) to install the PJCCS...I'm sure i really should do it but just don't seem to get myself around to do it. I was really close though other day, i started some modifications on my quickie, installed mundorf caps and better potentiometer, the dact copy from ebay. But run out of the time to get to the PJCCS installation.

One question about it too, mine replacement pot is 20K, odered originally for B1 project, Is it Ok or should i oder 100k one?

The cap upgrade was very hearable betterment, potentiometer might made the sound little leaner, hence my question about the resistance of the pot. I'm running HQMC phono and Soekris DAC in to it soekris is 20ohm out and could't find the HQMC specs but the effect was same with both sources.

It could be just driving the pot in situation since it doesn't bother me that much any more and it was unused part, or sound might just goten little cleaner witch releted to me as leaner since there wasn't so much extra stuff coming out.

-Tatu-

 

[Paul Birkeland]

A 20K pot will work, but is a pretty hefty load for some tube output stages compared to a 100K pot.

 

[aholata]

Finally got the PJCCS in tonight...Listening impressions have to wait for few days, will be going to Rammstein concert tomorrow night so slight ear ringing will be around for few next days.

Also had some trouble with installation, voltages didn't match at first.  A6 was 35V, B6 was 25V and A5 was 3.07V, B5 was 2.07V.
After intensive couple of hours at forum found similar symptoms and solution.
Transistor leg near A0 of PJCCS board is little hard to solder, needs little more heat, Desoldered it and also at same touched up all other joints on PJCCS once i had it handy.

Now everything checks out ok and is up and running.

-Tatu-