MULLARD EL34s

[JacksonRR]

As far as I know, 6CA7 is just the American designation for EL34 and there's no difference between them. Here is an auction for a quad from the seller I bought mine from. He had the highest amount of good reviews with many of the comments on the Black Treasures. Seems his shipping is still free, but the wait looks longer due to Christmas time postal complications. I had a good experience though. I'd buy again.

http://cgi.ebay.com/4pcs-Matched-ShuGuang-50years-TREASURE-Tube-6CA7-Z-/320577803285?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item4aa3ed1415

[JacksonRR]

And yes, they are different in construction. I'm not real studied on their plate structure or anything like that, but the black coating minimizes electron swirling. I did use Paypal, just in case I had a problem. They are valves after all.

[HTH AMPS]

EL34s and 6CA7s are different valves with different spec, however they are interchangeable and were labelled pretty freely back in the day.  TRUE 6CA7s do sound different to EL34s, sort of halfway between an EL34 and 6L6.

[ericsabbath]

200 bucks???  :o
hell no!  :?

[HTH AMPS]

aye, they're a bit pricey - I'd be trying out a pair first to see how good they are before dropping $200 on a quad.

they would need to be pretty special at that price though, you're in NOS land with that kind of cash.

[jpfamps]

As far as I know, 6CA7 is just the American designation for EL34 and there's no difference between them.

Although they are practically the same valve, they have different internal contruction and work on a slightly different principle.

6CA7s are beam tetrodes (like 6L6s) designed to have very similar specs to the EL34 which is a pentode.

Sylvania 6CA7s sound fantastic, and were rumoured to be Eddie Van Halen's valve of choice.

[JacksonRR]

This store has some NOS Siemens EL34s for $250 a quad. http://www.vacuumtube.com/guitar.htm They have a 30 day warranty, so that's good. Information I've found on them is that they are nearly identical to the Mullards until pushed very hard. I think I may pull the trigger on a quad just to see what they sound like. Perhaps they'll be as smooth in the top end as the few reviews I've read have stated.

[ericsabbath]

regular $10 shuguang EL34's are smooth enough for me
they have a compressed and fuzzy character
maybe a bit too much for cranked settings

[HTH AMPS]

Siemens EL34s are really nice, very crunchy and aggressive.  They're not like Mullards though, Mullards just have 'IT' - fat, warm and crunchy all in perfect measure.  I have two of each in my 100w HTH high gainer, best of both worlds.

I will say, I can never get a plexi to sound right unless it has Mullard EL34s in it - those amps just sound too thin otherwise.  As always, ymmv etc.

With higher gain amps, Siemens are great - I had a 2203 from '81 that didn't sound right unless it had those EL34s in it.