Cheap NEW Tube Pedal On The Way......................
- Thread starter Jeffblue
- Start date
Jeffblue
Well-known member
Re: Cheap NEW Tube Pedal On The Way......................
My new pedal arrived yesterday and I played with it today. I always test my OD pedals for transparency and this pedal sounded excellent and can be used for a clean tube boost pedal. I then tried various settings for overdrive and it sounded good. I then replaced the tube with an NOS 7025 and sounded even better. I then switched the tube for an NOS 5814A (military version of a 12AU7) and it sounded too treble with not enough bass. I switched back to the 7025 and all is good. I like this pedal.
My new pedal arrived yesterday and I played with it today. I always test my OD pedals for transparency and this pedal sounded excellent and can be used for a clean tube boost pedal. I then tried various settings for overdrive and it sounded good. I then replaced the tube with an NOS 7025 and sounded even better. I then switched the tube for an NOS 5814A (military version of a 12AU7) and it sounded too treble with not enough bass. I switched back to the 7025 and all is good. I like this pedal.
BlueFrankie
New member
Re: Cheap NEW Tube Pedal On The Way......................
Thanks for the review. Appreciate the advice on tube swapping.
Thanks for the review. Appreciate the advice on tube swapping.
JB_From_Hell
Jomo's Nimions
Re: Cheap NEW Tube Pedal On The Way......................
I heard Brian Wampler say many tube distortion pedals don’t really utilize the tube, that it’s there for show. I always wonder if that’s the case with my Tonebone, but it sounds good so whatever.
I heard Brian Wampler say many tube distortion pedals don’t really utilize the tube, that it’s there for show. I always wonder if that’s the case with my Tonebone, but it sounds good so whatever.
Jeffblue
Well-known member
Re: Cheap NEW Tube Pedal On The Way......................
Your always going to get some hiss, it doesn't seem too bad. The stock tube is a foreign cheap 12AX7 tube, maybe better than some.
Jeffblue
Well-known member
Re: Cheap NEW Tube Pedal On The Way......................
If you want to go through all of the trouble to remove the tube to find out if the Tonebone still works, you'll see that it won't. I have changed out the tube in my Radial Tonebone Classic to an NOS variant and it makes a huge difference.
If you want to go through all of the trouble to remove the tube to find out if the Tonebone still works, you'll see that it won't. I have changed out the tube in my Radial Tonebone Classic to an NOS variant and it makes a huge difference.
misterwhizzy
Well-known member
Re: Cheap NEW Tube Pedal On The Way......................
All tubes these days are foreign to an American.
All tubes these days are foreign to an American.
Joey Voltage
New member
Re: Cheap NEW Tube Pedal On The Way......................
He’s mostly correct, most in stomp box form running on a battery don’t. Most don’t even provide the necessary power to run the tube correctly nor use it for distortion generation. Tubes require massive current to run their heaters as well as a healthy voltage for their plate supply 9v volts doesn’t cut it for the plate supply unless there is a charge pump involved, (which may not be likely) and a single tube would require 300ma for the heaters running at 6.3v and 150ma running at 12v you would have to provide that somehow. There are some tricks you can use to sort of get them to operate, but no where near what it does in an amp. If it’s a battery operated pedal, chances are neither are fully utilized. Something like the matchless hot box, uses a transformer and plugs into the wall so it is really a tube preamp in a pedal sized box..
If the tube is in the signal path, removing it would interrupt the signal regardless of whether it’s really influencing the sound or not. Whether the pedal works or not is not really criteria for whether the tube is actually imparting it’s magic or not. If it’s even important that it really is, also shouldn’t really matter either if you like the result.
For example I have even seen some peddled as “tube” pedal designs that have done nothing besides connect the tube as diode and have used it in place of the typical silicon fair you see in most designs. This does nothing to skew the sprectrum towards “tubey” because in this operating circumstance a tube diode and silicon one are virtually indistinguishable, and operate with the same square power law.
He’s mostly correct, most in stomp box form running on a battery don’t. Most don’t even provide the necessary power to run the tube correctly nor use it for distortion generation. Tubes require massive current to run their heaters as well as a healthy voltage for their plate supply 9v volts doesn’t cut it for the plate supply unless there is a charge pump involved, (which may not be likely) and a single tube would require 300ma for the heaters running at 6.3v and 150ma running at 12v you would have to provide that somehow. There are some tricks you can use to sort of get them to operate, but no where near what it does in an amp. If it’s a battery operated pedal, chances are neither are fully utilized. Something like the matchless hot box, uses a transformer and plugs into the wall so it is really a tube preamp in a pedal sized box..
If the tube is in the signal path, removing it would interrupt the signal regardless of whether it’s really influencing the sound or not. Whether the pedal works or not is not really criteria for whether the tube is actually imparting it’s magic or not. If it’s even important that it really is, also shouldn’t really matter either if you like the result.
For example I have even seen some peddled as “tube” pedal designs that have done nothing besides connect the tube as diode and have used it in place of the typical silicon fair you see in most designs. This does nothing to skew the sprectrum towards “tubey” because in this operating circumstance a tube diode and silicon one are virtually indistinguishable, and operate with the same square power law.
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