Good, relatively inexpensive tube tester options?

[Racerxrated]

I had one year period to find “user friendly” tube tester, but testing tubes is a huge rabbit hole.
I had discussions with old “ masters of tube science” , and at the end I finished the project.
For non tube amp technicians is the best solution is buying tested/selected/matched tubes from trusted professional sources.

Makes sense….until one of the tubes you bought turns out bad. After installing it, power on the amp and the bad tube shorts out and tries to take a transformer with it. Hopefully the fuse goes first.
I’ve had a bad tube show up from sellers with great feedback online, forums etc …ya just never know. My tester will at a minimum prevent that scenario from happening.

 

[Andor006]

Makes sense….until one of the tubes you bought turns out bad. After installing it, power on the amp and the bad tube shorts out and tries to take a transformer with it. Hopefully the fuse goes first.
I’ve had a bad tube show up from sellers with great feedback online, forums etc …ya just never know. My tester will at a minimum prevent that scenario from happening.

Thank You for the sharing the negative experience. Orange valve tester is able to select shortage causing bad tubes?

 

[OUTLAW1969]

Makes sense….until one of the tubes you bought turns out bad. After installing it, power on the amp and the bad tube shorts out and tries to take a transformer with it. Hopefully the fuse goes first.
I’ve had a bad tube show up from sellers with great feedback online, forums etc …ya just never know. My tester will at a minimum prevent that scenario from happening.

THIS.

I almost had this exact scenario happen to me. It was late at night / early morning, and was a very tense couple of hours, while waiting for a decent time to call my tech, the next morning. At that point I did not care about the tubes, and was concerned that I had fried my "hard to find" original transformer. Thankfully the fuse did its job.......and the tech brought it up very slowly on a Variac, after ruling out a couple of other things via cursory checks, first.

Because of that situation, I adopted a new motto about buying NOS tubes from anyone, after seeing it printed on the money that it almost cost me:
"In God We Trust, all others get run on the Hickok......"

 

[MadAsAHatter]

I had one year period to find “user friendly” tube tester, but testing tubes is a huge rabbit hole.
I had discussions with old “ masters of tube science” , and at the end I finished the project.
For non tube amp technicians is the best solution is buying tested/selected/matched tubes from trusted professional sources.

I don't know what all you were looking at, but tube tester aren't that complicated of instruments. All I needed was a consumer grade one that would test for shorts and tell me if the tube had some life left. I wasn't trying to match tubes. I found what I was looking for and it's already saved me from using a bum tube that was on it's last legs.

Buying from a reputable source doesn't mean a bad tube isn't ever going to slip by every now and again. Doesn't mean the tube won't get damaged in shipping either. What makes sellers reputable is them knowing that though not often, sometimes shit happens and you end up with a dud. They make it a no hassle process to send you a new tube. Don't know about you but I'd rather take a few minuets with a simple tester to know I didn't get that 1 in 1000 dud than have it take out my expensive amp.

This video might help you out...

 

[Andor006]

I don't know what all you were looking at, but tube tester aren't that complicated of instruments. All I needed was a consumer grade one that would test for shorts and tell me if the tube had some life left. I wasn't trying to match tubes. I found what I was looking for and it's already saved me from using a bum tube that was on it's last legs.

Buying from a reputable source doesn't mean a bad tube isn't ever going to slip by every now and again. Doesn't mean the tube won't get damaged in shipping either. What makes sellers reputable is them knowing that though not often, sometimes shit happens and you end up with a dud. They make it a no hassle process to send you a new tube. Don't know about you but I'd rather take a few minuets with a simple tester to know I didn't get that 1 in 1000 dud than have it take out my expensive amp.

This video might help you out...

You are right, shipping … etc. are source of danger. The best user friendly solution I find, was that tester:

https://maximatcher.com/product/maximatcher-ii/
They are offering separate testers for power and preamp tubes. Not cheap, and not complete testing.

 

[Racerxrated]

Thank You for the sharing the negative experience. Orange valve tester is able to select shortage causing bad tubes?

I don’t have experience with the Orange tester; I have a fairly small and simple one from the 1960s that tells how strong the tube is, and whether shorts exist but won’t identify exactly the short location.
Either way it does enough to protect me from putting a bad tube in any amp.

 

[matttornado]

I have an old tube tester a co-worker gave me that I sometimes I use but most of the time I just use my guitar amp with a couple fuses handy. LOL Best tube tester there is as it tests everything including how good it sounds. I use my amp too when matching a bunch of various used power tubes to match a quad.

 

[Racerxrated]

I have an old tube tester a co-worker gave me that I sometimes I use but most of the time I just use my guitar amp with a couple fuses handy. LOL Best tube tester there is as it tests everything including how good it sounds. I use my amp too when matching a bunch of various used power tubes to match a quad.

Lol I did the same with one of my Marshalls to all of my EL34s…then my Mesa with my 6L6s. Great way to get good sets.