DSL40CR tube help

[Oldfart_Shredman]

Hello all,

I've got a friend whose been through the ringer, his 17 yr old son had to have heart surgery and there were tone of complications. He had to be rushed back to the hospital from home multiple times, his blood pressure bottomed out and he had ht least one stroke. His left eye pupil is a pinpoint, unreactive to a flashlight or darkness at all.

This poor dad is also the other guitarist in my band, so I want to do something to make him smile.

I went and found some decent old stock pre tubes (a Matsu****a Japanese Mullard and a Sylvania).

Now i have plenty of experience with 3 pre tube amps as the biggest difference is made upgrading V1 and V3 Phase Inverter to my ears.

His DSL40CR will be my first time with an amp that has 4 pre tubes.

So is it the same here v1 and PI or are there other places where an upgraded pre will have more of a pronounced effect like v2 etc?



PS I know alot of folks dont put much or any stock into old tubes, but once you play a quality Marshall style amp with a Mullard in v1 you'll get it all from hitting one chord!

[devastone]

V1 should still be the most affected position, that's the initial gain stage. I would make an educated guess that V4 is the PI, as the PI is the last "preamp" tube before the power tubes, it's the tube that splits the signal and inverts one side for the AB power section. So, yes, in pretty much all AB power amp designs, whether 3 tubes, or 6, the last "preamp" tube is the PI (I use "" because it's really part of the power section but is a "preamp" style tube).

[jeremy]

id think v1 for first stages and v4 for pi. i like to swap v1 to find the best tone but the pi can be the hardest working tube in the amp so i just make sure whatever goes in there is strong

[Oldfart_Shredman]

Most definitely!!!


I've found a great combination to be a Mullard or Japanese Matsu****a Mullard in v1 and a Sylvania in the pi. The Mullard gives it the wonderful full midrange that only a Mullard can, and the Sylvania takes that signal and seems to make it a bit leaner and meaner in a good way. I've always heard EVH used Sylvanias almost exclusively in the early days (because they were cheap), and the tone in Sylvania pres in amps really demonstrates it. I played through one of my amps after just putting in a Sylvania, remembered the EVH thing, suddenly started playing some older VH tunes and bam!!!! There was definitely something there in the sound that wasn't before.

And yes I know many say the pi is a functional tube that only serves an electrical purpose and is part of the power amp, not a pre amp tube, but it DEFINITELY exerts it's sonic signature on the tone.

I played through a Hughes & Kettner Tube 50 head for years. The Tube 50 and 100 were H&K'S forerunners to the Triamps. The Tube series amps had 2 channels with A and B switches instead of 3 Channels. When I first started collecting a few NOS and OS tubes the next time the Huey needed a new set of EL34s I put in a Japanese Mullard in v1 and a Sylvania 7025WA in the PI. For those not aware H&Ks are built like a tank and the chassis is held down to the head case with way more Allen wrench screws than can possibly be necessary, so that's why I waited until it needed a power tube change (must be what it feels like to break into a bank).

The results were astonishing!
The amp went from what sounded like an intended Mesa Killer to an amp that attempted to answer the question "What if a SLO100 and Marshall had a baby?"

Even more astonishing is that alot of H&K amps including the Tube 50 have a silicon preamp just on the other side of the input jack and then the silicon preamp is fed through the tubes.

On other NOS and OS Preamp Tubes:

I played a Marshall 1959SLP copy (a Metro Kit if you remember those) and there they made a huge difference!!! The 1959 is what got me into trying out tubes.
Mullard in v1 sounds amazing,

-RFT in v1 sounds great but in a different way, it's like the rowdy bar room brawler of 12ax7s. as someone once said "You can hear the blood on it."
-An Amperex Bugle Boy was way too clean for my tastes in the 1959. Great tube if you have some mud in your amp and want to clean up the sound a bit. It really is a High Fidelity stereo tube. I had a rather dark sounding guitar that I played through a Tiny Terror and the result was the Orange got some of that Stoner Metal sound that many Orange amps do in the lower mids. I am not a fan of that sound, so I put an Amperex in v1 of the Tiny Terror and it cleaned it right up.
-The king of all tubes for the pi position according to many is the Telefunken smooth long plate. I was lucky enough to get one before people went insane and started charging 3 figures for them. The Tele has a really nice way of filling out some of the old Super Lead Marshall sound in my opinion.
-Tung Sols are nice and sound like they're kissing cousins to Sylvanias.
-The GEs I've tried all seem to rob a good amount of the bass while having wonderful high end characteristics. I don't have much experience with these so it could have just been the couple of tubes that I tried.

[Oldfart_Shredman]

On the Tung Sols:
There's a certain overall sound that comes from BOSS pedals. It's not a bad sound at all neccessarily (bothers some people though), even with a BOSS pedal off I can hear that BOSS influence on the tone (am thinking it's gotta be the buffer).

The Tung Sols are like if BOSS made their version of a Sylvania lol.

[Oldfart_Shredman]

Here'a an update: Finally got to my buddy's amp to put in the tubes. The PI went in fine but I am having difficulty getting the shield off of V1.
I've dealt with tube shields before on a head. There is a gromet around the tube and I am wondering if that may be catching at this point.
The shield turned enough to where it should come off but there's zero budge when trying to remove it. I don't want to try to force it, last thing I want to do is to tear up something on the amp.
Any suggestions extremely appreciated.

[beaubrummels]

My Marshall SL-X has 4 pre tubes and just putting a Mullard 10M in V1 was night and day. Power tubes was the next tone changer, for me. It came with Teslas and Svetlana replacements were thinner and flatter. I'm looking to put TAD STRs in next, or perhaps a switch to KT77 or 6CA7s.

[Oldfart_Shredman]

In that DSL40CR putting a Sylvania in the PI made it a little brighter and more articulate.

Now to figure out how to get the Mullard in the V1...

That's my fav combo: Mullard makes it nice and round with really tasty midrange while the Sylvania in the PI makes it a bit leaner but adds alot more note definition.

With just the Sylvania the clean channel actually has high end sparkle now.