bluesky636
Member
I picked up a mint condition Ceriatone 5E3 Delight at my local pawn shop for $355. I wasn't that impressed by the sound and I had heard of the Dumble Tweedle Dee Deluxe through The Amp Garage. So I did some research, found the Ceriatone Tweedle Dee Delight layout and the Rob Robinette layout. I also conducted a lengthy email conversation over a couple of weeks with Nik from Ceriatone who was a huge help in modding my amp. After reading several Tweedle Dee Deluxe threads on TAG, I decided to build what I call a 99% Tweedle Dee Delight. I called it that because I didn't install the PI balance adjustment pot, and I didn't change the power supply caps to 32mfd. The 5E3 Delight uses 22mfd power supply caps and I had a 20mfd cap in my parts drawer that I could use to build the 4th power power supply node.
I didn't want to unsolder all the wires to the board and remove the board, so I had to be a little creative in adding the new components and swapping out the 5E3 components and replacing them with the Tweedle Dee components. The two blank boards are the same but some components on the Tweedle Dee board are in different locations then they are on the 5E3 board. To add the 4th power supply node I had to add a couple of brass eyelets. I had no way to easily permanently affix them to the board so I carefully applied superglue to the outside of the eyelets and held them in the holes with pliers until the glue set. Worked great. There is a wire the runs under the board that feeds the plates of V1 from the stock 3rd power supply node. I was able to unsolder the wire from the top of the board and pull one end of the wire out with a dental type tool, grab that end with needle nose pliers and pull the unsoldered wire out. I needed two wires now to make the 4th node so I ran those on top of the board around a few components. To make the PI negative feedback circuit I soldered the 3.3M resistor to the 0.002mfd cap and soldered it to the board where pins 6 and 7 of V2 connect, floating it above the other components. I replaced the 5 watt 250 ohm power tube cathode resistor with a 10 watt resistor of the same value. All the other mods were just parts swaps of different values.
Tubes are all by JJ, GZ34 rectifier, 6V6S power tubes, and 12AX7s. I run my amps at about 116 to 118 VAC as the wall power at my house runs 122 to 124 VAC.
The amp sounds great. Much tighter and with a smoother overdrive than the stock 5E3. It does run warm but the voltages are within a couple of volts of the factory Tweedle Dee Delight.
Here are some photos starting with before and after shots of the full amp, followed by close ups of each mod.
https://www.flickr.com/gp/89312486@N03/8J2B2XUh65
https://www.flickr.com/gp/89312486@N03/9499Hk7N24
https://www.flickr.com/gp/89312486@N03/614fR012d7
https://www.flickr.com/gp/89312486@N03/ND40w984Qy
https://www.flickr.com/gp/89312486@N03/1r508u2vSv
https://www.flickr.com/gp/89312486@N03/018d0sVw0h
https://www.flickr.com/gp/89312486@N03/0NbY67H9P7
https://www.flickr.com/gp/89312486@N03/G0J1AEkbqi
I didn't want to unsolder all the wires to the board and remove the board, so I had to be a little creative in adding the new components and swapping out the 5E3 components and replacing them with the Tweedle Dee components. The two blank boards are the same but some components on the Tweedle Dee board are in different locations then they are on the 5E3 board. To add the 4th power supply node I had to add a couple of brass eyelets. I had no way to easily permanently affix them to the board so I carefully applied superglue to the outside of the eyelets and held them in the holes with pliers until the glue set. Worked great. There is a wire the runs under the board that feeds the plates of V1 from the stock 3rd power supply node. I was able to unsolder the wire from the top of the board and pull one end of the wire out with a dental type tool, grab that end with needle nose pliers and pull the unsoldered wire out. I needed two wires now to make the 4th node so I ran those on top of the board around a few components. To make the PI negative feedback circuit I soldered the 3.3M resistor to the 0.002mfd cap and soldered it to the board where pins 6 and 7 of V2 connect, floating it above the other components. I replaced the 5 watt 250 ohm power tube cathode resistor with a 10 watt resistor of the same value. All the other mods were just parts swaps of different values.
Tubes are all by JJ, GZ34 rectifier, 6V6S power tubes, and 12AX7s. I run my amps at about 116 to 118 VAC as the wall power at my house runs 122 to 124 VAC.
The amp sounds great. Much tighter and with a smoother overdrive than the stock 5E3. It does run warm but the voltages are within a couple of volts of the factory Tweedle Dee Delight.
Here are some photos starting with before and after shots of the full amp, followed by close ups of each mod.
https://www.flickr.com/gp/89312486@N03/8J2B2XUh65
https://www.flickr.com/gp/89312486@N03/9499Hk7N24
https://www.flickr.com/gp/89312486@N03/614fR012d7
https://www.flickr.com/gp/89312486@N03/ND40w984Qy
https://www.flickr.com/gp/89312486@N03/1r508u2vSv
https://www.flickr.com/gp/89312486@N03/018d0sVw0h
https://www.flickr.com/gp/89312486@N03/0NbY67H9P7
https://www.flickr.com/gp/89312486@N03/G0J1AEkbqi
