custom component stand options?

MylesBAstor said:

HRS, Adona, Silent Running Audio, Symposium, and Stillpoints would be on my list.

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whart said:

I use an HRS under my big Kuzma table. It worked when others failed to isolate. I use the GPA stands, carbon shelves, apex footers, etc. for the line stage, power supply and amps. BTW, I just got my little Adona platform for the phono stage power supply. It is tiny and really nicely made- was pretty cheap and simple- just the constrained layer platform, in black, with some narrow spiked cones. It looks great, and for now, I'm using the cheap man's isolation- vibrapods plus their cones, between the stand and the power supply chassis. I'll shoot a pic. (BTW, i was quite surprised at how effective those vibrapod/cone combinations work, particularly since they cost almost nothing. I'll probably upgrade that, but I keep saying I'm not going to throw money into the system given that I'm gonna move, and I keep throwing money into the system anyway.

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audioarcher said:

I have some Stillpoint Ultra SS footers also. I am currently using them under my TT but have tried them under the H3000 PS. They are an improvement over the stock feet but not as good as my home made rollerblocks. The H3000 head unit is also sensitive to different footers so I would experiment with it as well.

I have a set of Aurios Classsic bearings and the only thing I liked them under was a couple of older TT's I had. I have not tried them under the H3000 because I did not have success with them on most other equipment. I recently took apart one of my Aurios to see how they work. They are very similar to rollerblocks but use 3 bearings instead of one. The 3 bearings have a plastic keeper to keep the bearings spaced equally. I can try them and see how they compare.

I have tried a few different rectifiers. I have a vintage Tung Sol 5U4GB that is pretty good. Also tried a Create Audio 5AR4 and it isn't bad. I have not tried a Mullard because I am told it is softer sounding than my RCA and that is not the direction I want to go with my system. I may try one at some point for a different flavor but they are pretty spendy.

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audioarcher said:

I have some Stillpoint Ultra SS footers also. I am currently using them under my TT but have tried them under the H3000 PS. They are an improvement over the stock feet but not as good as my home made rollerblocks. The H3000 head unit is also sensitive to different footers so I would experiment with it as well.

I have a set of Aurios Classsic bearings and the only thing I liked them under was a couple of older TT's I had. I have not tried them under the H3000 because I did not have success with them on most other equipment. I recently took apart one of my Aurios to see how they work. They are very similar to rollerblocks but use 3 bearings instead of one. The 3 bearings have a plastic keeper to keep the bearings spaced equally. I can try them and see how they compare.

I have tried a few different rectifiers. I have a vintage Tung Sol 5U4GB that is pretty good. Also tried a Create Audio 5AR4 and it isn't bad. I have not tried a Mullard because I am told it is softer sounding than my RCA and that is not the direction I want to go with my system. I may try one at some point for a different flavor but they are pretty spendy.

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MylesBAstor said:

I greatly preferred the RCA 5U4G to the Mullard GZ37. Didn't like the sound of the Mullard at all in my system. Sounded whipsy, etched and flat dimensionally. RCA might have been slightly darker and lost some detail but much more listenable. In the end, it's not really about the brand of the rectifier tube in the PS but how "stiff" the power supply is with the given tube. And that will vary according to brand and type of tube.

This note was sent to me from Charlie/Stellavox here on WBF some time ago in regards to the interaction of rectifier tubes and power supplies.


Yes there are a number of rectifiers like the 5R4, 5U4 and the 5AR4 that can be used interchangeably - kind of. However if you look at their specifications, you'll see that (when warmed up) they all have different VOLTAGE DROPS drops, which means that they have different effective internal resistances. I used this to my advantage when I designed the power supply for my Stereo 70; 6B4G "conversion" project a number of years back. The 6B4's can't withstand nearly the same B+ as an EL34, so I substituted a 5R4 instead of the stock rectifier (5AR4?) For the same output tube current draw, the 5R4 dropped 60 volts more than the 5AR4 and 20 volts more than a 5U4 (I guess you could say by comparison that a 5U4 would drop 40 volts more than a 5AR4.

Now the tube manufacturers didn't try to design a rectifier for a certain voltage drop but higher efficiency and greater voltage / current handling capability, so the more modern rectifiers did have a lower voltage drop, which if you think about it means that they can run "cooler" for the same current passing through it (extra voltage drop has to be dissipated as heat) - which would undoubtedly lead to much longer life. Also, the 5AR4 can pass a lot more current - overall a much more "robust" tube.

The less the voltage drop, the lower the internal resistance and the "stiffer" the power supply will be. I think this is why people may hear differences between rectifier tubes (nomenclatures).

Now the above doesn't deal with sonic attributes between DIFFERENT manufacturers of the SAME tube type. I never thought to try this - at the time I was too busy comparing 6B4's and (the) 6922 drivers. Gut feel is that any differences would be subtle - nowhere near the differences between manufacturers of the same nomenclature amplifying tubes.


Just did some on-line searching of tube characteristics and found that while the voltage withstand and current carrying capability of the 3 tubes are similar, the plate resistance of the 37 and AR4 is 75 ohms while the resistance for the U4 is close to 200 ohms and my lowly 5R4 is almost 300 ohms (these characteristics are either directly given or can be calculated by using Ohm's law and dividing the given voltage drop by the given current that produces that drop). Now the "stiffness" of the power supply is determined by the sum of the transformer secondary and the rectifier resistance, with the lower total the better. To get an idea of transformer resistances, I just measured a few small power transformer secondary resistances and got 100 to 200 ohms (I'll bet that a larger transformer resistance could be down to 50 to 75 ohms). SO you can see how the rectifier resistance could play a big part in the "stiffness" and perceived sound. Of course the stiffness is also determined by the amount of filter capacitance in the "smoothing" circuit.

Compare this with a silicon power rectifier that has a resistance of well under 10 ohms !.
[/QUOTE
No doubt correct Myles, and thanks for including CKing's explanation. The GZ37 that i had on loan to try i sent back, in part based on your earlier postings to this effect. The Mullard I'm using is a GZ34, a so-called 'Fat Base' from the first series of those tubes. I gather it is has different characteristics than the GZ37, but I'd have to do a little digging. There is a site that has all the original specs for these tubes that I looked at a few times when I was trying to get a handle on these very tubes.
BTW, can you speak to the Aurios at all- they are noticeable in adding a level of clarity and tightening up the bass, but on a record i always find a little too shouty on my horns - the 200 g pressing of Neil Young's Greatet Hits, particularly, the cuts Old Man and Heart of Gold, it was too much. I stuck some old Mod Squad hard rubber pucks on the Aurios and it tamed them. On other recordings the effect was not so pronounced. (For me, those two Neil Young tracks on that record (Classic) is always a test for the extremes). When you had the Allnic, what did you do to decouple/isolate the power supply?

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whart said:

I have NOS RCA which i will try. My concern with the Aurios is potential brightness. I have some old Mod Squad hard rubber pucks that I may insert between the Aurios and the PS if I need to tame them. The Nimbus couplers will be here in a couple days and I will try them as well. Interesting that you like the rollerblock better than the Stillpoint Ultra SS. Maybe you should go into business! I'm just warming up the system now, so i haven't gotten a grip on the Aurios yet.
At some point, I may try something under the phono head as well. I don't want to many variables going at once, or in the context here, 'too many balls in the air."

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whart said:

MylesBAstor said:

I greatly preferred the RCA 5U4G to the Mullard GZ37. Didn't like the sound of the Mullard at all in my system. Sounded whipsy, etched and flat dimensionally. RCA might have been slightly darker and lost some detail but much more listenable. In the end, it's not really about the brand of the rectifier tube in the PS but how "stiff" the power supply is with the given tube. And that will vary according to brand and type of tube.

This note was sent to me from Charlie/Stellavox here on WBF some time ago in regards to the interaction of rectifier tubes and power supplies.


Yes there are a number of rectifiers like the 5R4, 5U4 and the 5AR4 that can be used interchangeably - kind of. However if you look at their specifications, you'll see that (when warmed up) they all have different VOLTAGE DROPS drops, which means that they have different effective internal resistances. I used this to my advantage when I designed the power supply for my Stereo 70; 6B4G "conversion" project a number of years back. The 6B4's can't withstand nearly the same B+ as an EL34, so I substituted a 5R4 instead of the stock rectifier (5AR4?) For the same output tube current draw, the 5R4 dropped 60 volts more than the 5AR4 and 20 volts more than a 5U4 (I guess you could say by comparison that a 5U4 would drop 40 volts more than a 5AR4.

Now the tube manufacturers didn't try to design a rectifier for a certain voltage drop but higher efficiency and greater voltage / current handling capability, so the more modern rectifiers did have a lower voltage drop, which if you think about it means that they can run "cooler" for the same current passing through it (extra voltage drop has to be dissipated as heat) - which would undoubtedly lead to much longer life. Also, the 5AR4 can pass a lot more current - overall a much more "robust" tube.

The less the voltage drop, the lower the internal resistance and the "stiffer" the power supply will be. I think this is why people may hear differences between rectifier tubes (nomenclatures).

Now the above doesn't deal with sonic attributes between DIFFERENT manufacturers of the SAME tube type. I never thought to try this - at the time I was too busy comparing 6B4's and (the) 6922 drivers. Gut feel is that any differences would be subtle - nowhere near the differences between manufacturers of the same nomenclature amplifying tubes.


Just did some on-line searching of tube characteristics and found that while the voltage withstand and current carrying capability of the 3 tubes are similar, the plate resistance of the 37 and AR4 is 75 ohms while the resistance for the U4 is close to 200 ohms and my lowly 5R4 is almost 300 ohms (these characteristics are either directly given or can be calculated by using Ohm's law and dividing the given voltage drop by the given current that produces that drop). Now the "stiffness" of the power supply is determined by the sum of the transformer secondary and the rectifier resistance, with the lower total the better. To get an idea of transformer resistances, I just measured a few small power transformer secondary resistances and got 100 to 200 ohms (I'll bet that a larger transformer resistance could be down to 50 to 75 ohms). SO you can see how the rectifier resistance could play a big part in the "stiffness" and perceived sound. Of course the stiffness is also determined by the amount of filter capacitance in the "smoothing" circuit.

Compare this with a silicon power rectifier that has a resistance of well under 10 ohms !.
[/QUOTE
No doubt correct Myles, and thanks for including CKing's explanation. The GZ37 that i had on loan to try i sent back, in part based on your earlier postings to this effect. The Mullard I'm using is a GZ34, a so-called 'Fat Base' from the first series of those tubes. I gather it is has different characteristics than the GZ37, but I'd have to do a little digging. There is a site that has all the original specs for these tubes that I looked at a few times when I was trying to get a handle on these very tubes.
BTW, can you speak to the Aurios at all- they are noticeable in adding a level of clarity and tightening up the bass, but on a record i always find a little too shouty on my horns - the 200 g pressing of Neil Young's Greatet Hits, particularly, the cuts Old Man and Heart of Gold, it was too much. I stuck some old Mod Squad hard rubber pucks on the Aurios and it tamed them. On other recordings the effect was not so pronounced. (For me, those two Neil Young tracks on that record (Classic) is always a test for the extremes). When you had the Allnic, what did you do to decouple/isolate the power supply?

Click to expand...

Haven't played with the Aurios and it's been some time since used something similar like the Symposium Rollerblocks.

My Allnic sat in the SRA Craz rack and had the PS sitting on the floor on top of Goldmund cones.

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