pre-amp tube burner

[populartsl]

Any one know of a way of making a pre-amp tube burner to burn in say at least 10 tubes at a time more if possible.

Cheers

[Cliff Schecht]

Ten 9-pin sockets, a power transformer with a 6.3/12V 4-5A heater tap, a fuse and a power switch?

[Rich M]

Would that work or do you need some plate current to out gas the internals?

[selloutrr]

Maximatcher makes a powertube burn in

http://www.maximatcher.com/maxiburn.html

The MaxiBurner uses 100vdc for the plate.


It might help you design a preamp rack.

I also noticed they just released a preamp tube tester.

[selloutrr]

just had a thought you need a fault circuit for each tube to remove it from the chain incase it has an issue, might want to have the circuit hooked to an LED so you can weed out the lame tubes fast.

if you built a 50 9 pin rack it would be useful for testing half batches of bulk tubes. you could wire it in banks so if you only tested i.e.10 tubes you wouldn't have to power all 50 sockets.

[selloutrr]

This should help get things moving

signal flow....

AC City Power
IEC socket
( wired timer as the on ) - add meter for timer if rotary is not disired
CVT Fuse
Power switch / Pilot light
Constant voltage transformer
PT Fuse
Power Transformer

6.3V / 12.6V Heater Power Switch w/ LED on
Out to Banks buss on / off
Each bank then wires to each 9 pin heater pin in the bank of sockets

(the circuit breakers are going to take me a moment to figure out the best way to wire them for individual use and not effect the bank globally) may be individual

Each bank taps off to the Rotary pot linked to the Voltage Meter

Power Filtering Section and SS Rectifier.

100-200VDC Plate Voltage Power Switch w/ LED on
Out to Banks buss on / off
Each bank then wires to each 9 pin plate pin in the bank of sockets

(the circuit breakers are going to take me a moment to figure out the best way to wire them for individual use and not effect the bank globally) may be individual

Each bank taps off to the Rotary pot linked to the Voltage Meter

Plug preamp tubes into the sockets. Cook for 24 hours. and Enjoy!

[Alexo]

If you really wanted to drill a lot of holes and do a lot of soldering, you could throw in a test point for each triode, so you could rate/match for current pull. You'd prob want to use mil spec R's if you did that though.

[Phil_S]

Find one of those monster filament transformers from an organ. They typically weigh about 10# (~4.5 kilo) or so and provide 6.3v @ ~ 9.5A. That would power ~30 tubes. eBay is a good place to shop for one of these. If you can control the shipping cost, you should be able to get one for under $25. People don't want them because they are so big and heavy.

[Alexo]

....s'pose you could just run 20 tubes in series off of AC mains?

[selloutrr]

how many poles / positions do they make rotary switches in?

you could do 5 banks or 5 sockets and use the organ transformer? what is the voltage on a giant organ transformer- power the plates?

then divide the 5 sockets to the 9 pins with another rotary switch for matching.

my only thought is at this point you are making a tube tester and may need to have additional variable power to be accurate.

[selloutrr]

It would be a really nice feature to add a CVT Since the voltage differences can effect the readings of tubes. IMHO the most important part of testing tubes accuratly is consistant power. You could exclude the constant voltage transformer from the build and save a couple hundred dollars. Though they can be purchased on ebay for cheap.

[jborders5]

Just wanted to bump this to the top and see if anyone has built a similar device. I've been cleaning up my shop and found everything I need to build a 24 socket burner. I have an extra twin style power transformer with a 7.5A filament winding. Any thoughts on a good plate voltage and/or the best way to distribute the HV between the sockets? I'm looking to build a simple burner (heater and plates) to weed out tubes and also age them.