VH tube recommendation?

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My VH4 blew its #1 and #2 power tubes last night during a show (thank you so much Peter for making this thing not totally die when that happens!), and I think I want to just completely retube it. (I've had the amp since October 07 - is this a normal tube lifespan?) It's been used twice a week or so for practice and about 3-4 times a month for shows. I never run the master more than about a quarter of the way up.

I'm thinking about using 6L6's instead of the stock EL34's - I kinda don't like my clean sound right now and I know 6L6's will help with that. I'm also going to be using the VH4 partly as a power amp for my Fractal Axe-FX's preamp too, and I'd think the 6L6's would provide a better platform for doing that as well.

Probably gonna order online from Doug's or The Tubestore - couple specific questions:

1. Doug has his power tubes rated for early, average, and late distortion. Which one is gonna be best for the amp?

2. Similarly, there's a "balanced triodes" option for the preamp tubes he sells, do I need that?

3. The stock 1st preamp tube has "TAD 7025/E83CC Highgrade" on it and the rest say TAD 12AX7-C on them - what's the purpose of that first tube and do I need to replace it with something similar? I can't find anything on either website with that type of description...

Thanks!
Ryan
 
my VH4 sounds great with 6l6s. i like the jj's. kt77s sound good too. sort of a mix between el34 and 6l6 with rich lows and a distictive tone of their own.

get late distortion. that's peter's recommendation b/c they're higher quality tubes.

you don't need balanced triodes, but its recommended for the phase inverter, which is V7 on the VH4. it also doesn't hurt to use balanced triodes on the mixer and send buffer and the return driver(V5 and V6 on the VH4).

i've wondered about finding "high grade" 12ax7s also. sometimes they're called "selected". i think Doug's Tubes says that all of his 12ax7s are already tested and are "high grade". but when i buy another 12ax7 for the V1 position, i'm going to email him with my amp's info and request a high grade/selected tube.

hope this helps... METAL!!!
 
Thanks man, appreciate it!

Have you tried the SED Winged C 6L6s? I was gonna go for those since the SED EL34's are what the amp comes with by default, but if they're not as good as the JJ I'll have to rethink that.
 
Thanks again man.

I'm thinking that "wall of sound" thing is probably best for me and I think I'll go with the SEDs. We're a modern alt-rock band, not really metal or anything that requires me to play a lot of intricate riffing stuff. There's a few sections that are single note stuff, but most of the time I'm doing power chord strumming or arpeggiated chord type things. Ocassional lead too and if these tubes aren't harsh then that'll work great.

Your band is really sweet btw, nice riffing stuff.
 
thanks brother! i just checked out your myspace and same to you. good sounds and songs. the SED 6L6s should work well for you. especially with the clean stuff... ROCK ON!!!
 
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