Edcor vs. Heyboer

[Rattler66]

How good are their(edcor)trannies compared to Heyboers, their prices are very attractive?

[Structo]

I haven't heard one bad report about them.
My next amp will use one of those brands.

[M Fowler]

I use both and have had no problem with the Edcor and great service from them as well. They also have a forum that Brian runs if you want to ask some quesitons before buying.

[David Root]

I have an Edcor OT in my Dumbleized 5F6A 100W. It is in UL with 520V on the CT, rated 70W 30-20K Hz and handles 100W effortlessly, not even warm. Highly recommend Edcor.

[Rattler66]

thanks guys, much appreciated

[Zippy]

RJ Guitars (member of Ampgarage) has been working with Edcor to get trannie sets at good prices. I'd suggest you contact him. He and several other members have used these trannies with great results.

[krash]

I have had excellent service from Heyboer and not so excellent from Edcor. I built my first couple of 72 amps with Edcor PTs and Heyboer OTs, and the Edcor PTs mounting system (standup transformers) was not nearly up to the task of holding those transformers. They bent after shipment and it was a royal pain. And one of them failed for no good reason (out of three). I contacted Edcor but they were not interested in helping out, fixing the mounting problem, or replacing the bad PT, so I gave up on Edcor.

I do have an Edcor open-tab type OT with 10K primary rated at about 10W in my prototype Serena build and it sounds absolutely great and has worked just fine in there, but I have also switched vendors on OTs for my low-watt amps in favor of transformers with wires and not open terminals. I had no complaints with this particular Edcor transformer and if you are putting one in an amp with the OT enclosed in the chassis then this could be a real winner in a low-watt amp. However, most of you guys are not interested in low-watt amps and this thing is way too small for 6V6s or EL84s. Works great for a push-pull 12AU7 though!

I have had much better service, frankly, from Weber. I use Weber PTs most of the time, and some Weber OTs. I ordered some ClassicTone OTs to try since they have some with specs more in line with what I want in Roxie amps and if it turns out to be a winner then I'll likely switch and use those in Roxies and 72s in the future. I have built 72s with a number of different Heyboer OTs and they all sounded and worked great. I have no complaints about Heyboer, except the cost. In my amps, the single most expensive part in the whole thing is a Heyboer OT.

[Rattler66]

RJ Guitars (member of Ampgarage) has been working with Edcor to get trannie sets at good prices. I'd suggest you contact him. He and several other members have used these trannies with great results.

yeah that's where i saw them, and when i'm ready i'll get from him

[Rattler66]

I have had excellent service from Heyboer and not so excellent from Edcor. I built my first couple of 72 amps with Edcor PTs and Heyboer OTs, and the Edcor PTs mounting system (standup transformers) was not nearly up to the task of holding those transformers. They bent after shipment and it was a royal pain. And one of them failed for no good reason (out of three). I contacted Edcor but they were not interested in helping out, fixing the mounting problem, or replacing the bad PT, so I gave up on Edcor.

I do have an Edcor open-tab type OT with 10K primary rated at about 10W in my prototype Serena build and it sounds absolutely great and has worked just fine in there, but I have also switched vendors on OTs for my low-watt amps in favor of transformers with wires and not open terminals. I had no complaints with this particular Edcor transformer and if you are putting one in an amp with the OT enclosed in the chassis then this could be a real winner in a low-watt amp. However, most of you guys are not interested in low-watt amps and this thing is way too small for 6V6s or EL84s. Works great for a push-pull 12AU7 though!

I have had much better service, frankly, from Weber. I use Weber PTs most of the time, and some Weber OTs. I ordered some ClassicTone OTs to try since they have some with specs more in line with what I want in Roxie amps and if it turns out to be a winner then I'll likely switch and use those in Roxies and 72s in the future. I have built 72s with a number of different Heyboer OTs and they all sounded and worked great. I have no complaints about Heyboer, except the cost. In my amps, the single most expensive part in the whole thing is a Heyboer OT.

cool stuff on your site BTW. I'm sure if I get from RJ Guitars, he'll make sure the mounting is good. thanks

just a heads up, the link for littlerock & fully custom amps on your site doesn't work

[M Fowler]

As far as transformer mounting being bent its been a long time since I haven't seen one not bent, and my list includes the following:

Heyboer, Magnetic Compoents, Pacific, Edcor, Hoffman, TriodeStore, and Weber.

I had what I thought was a problem with an Edcor tranny and they sent me a new one immediately. Edcor has been in the tube Hi/Fi market for years the open platform chassis and that is why there covers are so clean and neat. I agree the mounting tangs are a little thin but they straighten out with a pliers.

I have used both my own designed from Edcor as well as from rjguitar.

[Rattler66]

yeah , i think i had a bent tab on a heyboer, just put the mounting screw through it and tightened down. never gave it much thought.

[dartanion]

I'll stick with Pacific, Heyboer, and Magnetic Components for now. The Weber stuff is okay, but I hope you like Chinese steel and manufacturing. The last Weber I used stunk so bad of varnish/solvents that my garage reeked of it for months. Not so with others.

[RJ Guitars]

I sell a lot of EDCOR so I can't be without prejudice but I think the attention to detail and customer service is excellent. Edcor is easily cosmetically a couple notches above everybody else.

Heyboer is no doubt the best to deal with for a decent price and a quick turn around and there is just no denial of the terrific sonic results with their products. Phil over there is just altogether decent and helpful. Pacific has been agreeable but you interface to the sales staff and not the technical folks. At Edcor the winders and sales folks are all the same people.

Mounting tabs are almost a dead even tie between all of them. You need all four mounted down or something is gonna bend.

Packing and delivery service from Edcor leaves the other two with a sore butt. I've never had one of theirs arrive bent. They are individually wrapped in a plastic bag then individually soft packed before they put them into a box.

Edcor built up their business in support of the audiophile HiFi community. They use M6 steel exclusively so that will flavor things a bit.

The Pacific power tranny used in the Trainwreck builds strikes me as a a refined Heyboer. The output tranny is pretty much a dead clone of the Stancor A3801 and is again really similar to the Heyboer HTS-9384. Pacifics are cosmetically a bit classier than the Heyboers.

They are all heavy beefy units and conservatively rated. No bad reports have come back to me on any of them.

Recently the Edcor stuff has been selling overseas about 2 to 1 over the others. I dunno what that is all about? There should be enough builds out there now using Edcors that we may get some reports and even some sound clips.

*important note - Edcor and Pacifc rate their trannies loaded. Heyboer rates theirs unloaded. For those that don't already know this - Simply you get more volts than the rated voltage with an Edcor or Pacific tranny. Example - Edcor and Pacific 280-0-280 secondary is approximately equal to a Heyboer 300-0-300 secondary.

rj

[Rattler66]

thanks for the detailed info rj

[krash]

I'm not talking about bent mounting tabs on a standup PT that arrived bent from shipping, like you might find with a Heyboer OT or whatever.

I am talking about transformers that were about 3x too heavy to be secured by the flimsy mounting tabs on the transformer and there was NO work-around. These transformers might be ok if you had them in a hifi amp with the mounting tabs towards the bottom of the rig, but if you have them hanging below a Fender-style chassis then they will not even survive shipping the amplifier, certainly not if the amplifier is shipped or transported laying on its back so there is torque on the mounting tabs.

I'm sorry folks but there is absolutely no excuse for shipping out a transformer whose integral mounting apparatus is not strong enough to bear the weight of the transformer. None. Saying "oh, they all do that" is baloney. The tabs on a Weber "Princeton Reverb" type OT are the same gauge steel as what is used on the Edcor PTs I abandoned, and that OT is about 1/6 the total mass and size of the Edcor PT. I have never, ever had a Heyboer transformer bend once it was installed in an amplifier and every Edcor PT I used wound up bending after the amp was shipped to the customer.

Now, I have no interest in bad-mouthing Edcor and if you guys are having good response from them, then more power to you. But there are alternatives that do not suffer these problems and I just don't have the time or energy to debate with a transformer vendor. Since I have to stand by the quality of my amps, I can't risk this kind of thing, so I have gone to using only lay-down type PTs for the added strength of the mounting on all of my big amps, although I still use (lightweight) standup PTs on my low-watt amps.