In praise of EL84

[andrew Ivimey]

I built this a while ago and raved about it then. Then it went into the shed as there was far too much else going on. I can claim nothing for it's design but if you scroogle 'simple el84amp' you will find a wonderful and very gentle website where you wil be encouraged to dip your feet in.

Perhaps I underestimated KEL84, my dodgy memory says this one is SO much better but I will agree that the EL84 is a superb valve.

So what is this amplifier?

A very chunky solid state power supply. You can use almost any driver valve. I settled for EL84. I was nearly happy with 12GN7. The website reckons ECC99 or 5687 is good. They are; very good.

But EL84 has symmetry! The driver drives the output pair. The lazyman's CCS is a MUST as it pulls together any battered, poor, weak sick or huddled masses of EL84s into beautiful pairs (Surely this is magic!) This partic. chassis is an old Leak Stereo 20 which had caught fire by the look of things. But the chassis and the output transformers were fine after a little cleaning up.

It really is SO SIMPLE! And it is superb - fabulous grunt, everything else you need and very loud indeed; silly levels with Fostex!

It is enough to cheer me up after all the dreadful hassle I have had this weekend with a phono stage that refuses to bow down and worship at the altar of pure music in my front room. GGGGGrrrrrrrr! I will subject this phono project to greater scrutiny and effort. I will!

I could be persuaded that PP is better than SE ...... nearly.

[Cressy Snr]

Steve