Is this rumour or are the Wreck clone OT's actually 50w OTs and not 35w? so if I fancied running my amp with higher B+ to get more watts it wouldn't fry the OT?
Anyone? specifically like to hear from the guy who makes em!
Is the toneslut standard OT actually a 50w OT?
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JamesHealey
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Re: Is the toneslut standard OT actually a 50w OT?
James
Email Phil at Heyboer and he'll tell you. Let me know if you need his contact details.
Paul
Email Phil at Heyboer and he'll tell you. Let me know if you need his contact details.
Paul
Re: Is the toneslut standard OT actually a 50w OT?
The designer of this OT will tell you - if he actually visited this site - that it is a 30 watt OT. If this surprises you then I think maybe you are missing the point of OTs. Typically 'frying' an OT takes a bad install job (faulty ground), or product abuse (playing the amp at volume without a speaker connected). So the middle ground is 'saturation' pretty much. However, if you run a dinky little piece of iron, say a Fender Princton OT with a 100 Plexi tube compliment at 500 plate volts you might run into something beyond saturation - OT failure because the wire used might be so small that it cannot deal with the current. Which means the wire will heat up and the insulation will burn off and the coil wil short out. And sometimes, in older OTs using paper interleaving, notably the OTs used in Danelectro amps like the Silvertone Twin 12 or the 6 ten model, the insulation might not burn off the wire, but it would heat up the paper enough to actually light the paper on fire. And here, the amp might be performing properly but VERY typically one of the power tubes might be going south, causing an electrical change in the current to the OT.
I am told the vintage Vox AC30 OT could do this too, yes, and it would be specifically because the tube compliment had failed, 1 or more of the quad.
So this is why people fuse the OT B+ on such amps or any amp that might be at issue. This is the 'HT' fuse found on Marshalls, typically 1/2 amp value. On my Rocket and AC30 builds I use a fuse here, but a 1 amp value. Have I needed it? Yes, one time with a bad quad right at startup, other than that, knock on wood, it hasn't come into play.
...OK, back to your question. Modern OTs, are using wire that is coated differently than some vintage wire, with typically higher temp ratings overall. Which prevents a lot of issues like those found in the Dano OT or Vox. But you still need to consider the size of the iron to make a judgement call on whether you use it in a higher current amp than the one it was typically made for. For an example, I have run a '67 Fender Vibroverb OT - 40 watts - in a 100 watt Plexi, running two of the 4 power tubes - not a problem. I did this for an impedence match more so than a current consideration. Would it have worked for the whole quad? Well, maybe, but remember this amp had the 1/2 amp fuse in place so I was somewhat protected if I ran that way. But I only did this to check the amp - trying to determine if its original OT was burnt. It was, BTW, but this happened because one of the tubes had an intermittant pin 8 ground issue. ...Which takes us back to the first part of this post I think. Here, it turns out that the customer had replaced the 1/2 amp HT fuse with a 10 amp fuse - because he was have issues. ?? Had he not done this, and had he not loaned it out to a friend who immediately took it on stage, turned it on ten, and tried to get through a night with it - he made it 3/4s of the way - any of this might not have happened...
Eh, OK, this is looong, but I hope you see what I am gettin at. Basically, if you had a running amp, and it was too clean and too loud, you might then consider swapping for a piece of iron that was smaller physically, in hopes of trying to find that 'saturation' sweet spot. And here you would be on your own. Fuse the B+ to the OT and try some things. You might like what you hear, you might not. I really don't think you are going to find a definitive list of OTs that will swap out like you are thinking. I think most builders just experiment, some more than others. Oh, back to the TS OT, remember to compensate for the secondary if you run it with a quad, right?
[Refreshed myself on original posted question: Regarding the almost 500VDC @ plates and the TS OT, obviously I think you are not hurting it. I think the Heyboer product is very bullet proof. You may however, find a different OT that responds better sonically, and/or saturation-wise to that kind of current. I say experiment a bit.] OK, hope this helps.
I am told the vintage Vox AC30 OT could do this too, yes, and it would be specifically because the tube compliment had failed, 1 or more of the quad.
So this is why people fuse the OT B+ on such amps or any amp that might be at issue. This is the 'HT' fuse found on Marshalls, typically 1/2 amp value. On my Rocket and AC30 builds I use a fuse here, but a 1 amp value. Have I needed it? Yes, one time with a bad quad right at startup, other than that, knock on wood, it hasn't come into play.
...OK, back to your question. Modern OTs, are using wire that is coated differently than some vintage wire, with typically higher temp ratings overall. Which prevents a lot of issues like those found in the Dano OT or Vox. But you still need to consider the size of the iron to make a judgement call on whether you use it in a higher current amp than the one it was typically made for. For an example, I have run a '67 Fender Vibroverb OT - 40 watts - in a 100 watt Plexi, running two of the 4 power tubes - not a problem. I did this for an impedence match more so than a current consideration. Would it have worked for the whole quad? Well, maybe, but remember this amp had the 1/2 amp fuse in place so I was somewhat protected if I ran that way. But I only did this to check the amp - trying to determine if its original OT was burnt. It was, BTW, but this happened because one of the tubes had an intermittant pin 8 ground issue. ...Which takes us back to the first part of this post I think. Here, it turns out that the customer had replaced the 1/2 amp HT fuse with a 10 amp fuse - because he was have issues. ?? Had he not done this, and had he not loaned it out to a friend who immediately took it on stage, turned it on ten, and tried to get through a night with it - he made it 3/4s of the way - any of this might not have happened...
Eh, OK, this is looong, but I hope you see what I am gettin at. Basically, if you had a running amp, and it was too clean and too loud, you might then consider swapping for a piece of iron that was smaller physically, in hopes of trying to find that 'saturation' sweet spot. And here you would be on your own. Fuse the B+ to the OT and try some things. You might like what you hear, you might not. I really don't think you are going to find a definitive list of OTs that will swap out like you are thinking. I think most builders just experiment, some more than others. Oh, back to the TS OT, remember to compensate for the secondary if you run it with a quad, right?
[Refreshed myself on original posted question: Regarding the almost 500VDC @ plates and the TS OT, obviously I think you are not hurting it. I think the Heyboer product is very bullet proof. You may however, find a different OT that responds better sonically, and/or saturation-wise to that kind of current. I say experiment a bit.] OK, hope this helps.
Most people stall out when fixing a mistake that they've made. Why?