Any Bogner Duende Owners Experiment with NOS Tubes and Speakers?

[Josh O]

Just curious if anyone has played around with any NOS tubes for their Duende and if so, what were the results.

Also, any speaker changes?

 

[gtrs]

Yup
Jan Philips 12AX7WA in V1-V3
I think I'm using a Tung-Sol in V4 (the only tube that's not NOS in the entire amp)
Jan GE 5751 in V5
Jan Philips 6V6GT in V6+V7
NOS Rectifier, can't remember which one though.

All made a huge difference

 

[Josh O]

Yup
Jan Philips 12AX7WA in V1-V3
I think I'm using a Tung-Sol in V4 (the only tube that's not NOS in the entire amp)
Jan GE 5751 in V5
Jan Philips 6V6GT in V6+V7
NOS Rectifier, can't remember which one though.

All made a huge difference

Sounds like a cool compliment of tubes. How did they change the sound exactly?

 

[gtrs]

Rectifier tightened things up a bit, maybe a touch more clarity. The improvement in tone and feel is not huge but it was definitely there. The reliability of NOS rectifiers is worth the price of admission alone (usually).

With the pre tubes I had better touch sensitivity and could work my guitars volume controls a lot more. The amp seemed to open up quite a bit, more sparkle. It simply seemed to wake up, big improvement over the Tung-Sol's that were in there which are good tubes but not for this amp. Not for me anyway.

The output tubes had more of a 6V6 flavor (of course) over the JJ's that were in it, which sound a bit like 6L6's to my ears. Once again, the amp seemed to open up and breath. It seemed with every change, rectifier, pre and power tubes seemed to open the amp up. It sounded less cholked if that makes sense.

5751 phase inverter mellowed out my signal the output section. Gave it a touch more clean headroom and smoothed out the amp ever so slightly.

Each thing on it's own wasn't really a giant change in tone or anything. But when you add up all the little things these changes make the end result is pretty significant.

 

[Last Nerve]

This kind of surprises me, in that I've always heard Bogner recommends Chinese tubes.
I have experienced tonal changes, for the better, with NOS tubes in other amps, but thought the Bogners sounded good with the Svets or JJs, or whatever they stick in them.
I have a Duende now and will try some different tubes in it then.

ALSO - anyone find a "better" speaker than the G12H30?

 

[Ramblin' Ghost]

I know this thread is old, but I thought I'd try and resurrect it. Anyone tried different speakers in their Duende? Very curious. People complain these amps are dark, but I don't know that I've ever read anywhere about speaker swaps to accommodate for that.

 

[jp1977]

I got a brand new duende 15 combo, I installed a smaller nos sylvania 5yu3 rectifier tube in place of the larger 5ar4 and I preferred the tone and overdriven tones better with the change. It looses a few watts when u switch the 5ar4 to the 5yu3. ???(not sure if I remembered the type correctly)