Telefunken NOS 6922 tubes are they worth the Money?

[christoph]

Right now I'm looking at a pair of pair of Telefunken 6922/E88CC 1960-1961 on tubeworldexpress.com for $500. This is Brendan Biever's site (USA) that he moved over from tubeworld.com. Best tube dealer I know for over 20yrs although Andy Bowman is tops for 6SN7.

Marty is right, there are a lot of fine sounding 6DJ8/6922/7308 that are less expensive than the above example - if you can find them. The whole family keeps getting more and more expensive.

First thing you should do is read Parts 1 & 2 of Joe's Tube Lore written in 1999, posted on Audio Asylum. This is an excellent write-up. Wanna know what he says about the Telefunken 6922?

"Telefunken 6922 / E88CC (with shield, diamond bottom, gold pins) Slightly hollow mids, not as rich as the best Siemens and Amperex. A bit like the Siemens E288CC, though a bit better than that tube. A good tube, but the more common & cheaper Siemens 6922s are much better choices IMO. (Absolutely pounds the Russian tubes, though!)"

That was 1999 and the 6922 and 7308 were far more plentiful then though still somewhat scarce.

This is what Brendan wrote on his original tubeworld site:

"The Best Sounding 6922=E88CC ever made are:
------------------------------------------
6922 Amperex Holland "Pinched Waist" 1958, many branded Valvo
6922 or CCa Siemens Halske 1950's - 1960's (airy highs, great detail, solid bass)
6922 or CCa Telefunken 1950's - 1960's
6922 Amperex "PQ" Holland Gold Pins white printing 1960-1966 (older the better)
6922 Amperex Holland branded Amperex or Philips Miniwatt or Mullard Holland
or Philips Holland "SQ" 1960's
6922 Mullard 1960's
CV2493=E88CC-01 Mullard late 1960's to mid-1970's
6922 Amperex USA "PQ" white printing 1960's then orange printing 1967-1972
GB-6922 Sylvania GOld Brand Gold Pins 1960's
6922 Sylvania, many are branded RCA 1970's - 1980's
6922 Tesla Gold Pins - older stock (very good value)

I always bought top quality 7308s when I could fine them. Here's Brendan again:

---

*7308 Amperex Holland "PQ" white printing with 2 Stars on tube 1959 - 1960
7308 Siemens 1960's - 1970's
7308 Philips Miniwatt Holland 1958-1972 (the first series had 2 stars on each tube)
7308 Telefunken 1960's
7308 Mullard 1960's - 1970's, many have dimpled disc getter halo
7308 Amperex PQ USA white printing 1960-1967
7308 Amperex PQ USA orange printing 1967 - mid 1970's
7308 Amperex JAN and USN-CEP-7308 Amperex white label 1960's
7308 Sylvania JAN and Philips JAN USA late 1960's to early 1980's
7308 Siemens 1980's (avoid these, poor sound, all have getter halo on single post in center of tube)

* best 7308 I've used

6DJ8s don't last as long, are usually cheaper, and some sound fantastic. And again:

---

6DJ8 Siemens West Germany 1960's (nothing beats this tube; accurate, open, focused, detailed, airy, tight bass)
6DJ8 Amperex Bugle Boy Holland "D" getter 1950's (superbly musical 6DJ8, nice articulate bass, 3D sound)
6DJ8 Telefunken West Germany 1960's (a little bass shy, but superbly smooth and listenable long term)
6DJ8 Amperex Bugle Boy Holland 1960's
6DJ8 Amperex Holland 1960's and Amperex Holland Globe Logo late 1960's - mid 1970's (some are branded Philips Miniwatt)
CV5358=6DJ8 Mullard 1960's (smooth, good bass, the older versions are the best)
6DJ8 Mullard 1960's (either branded Mullard or Philips or Amperex Great Britain)
6DJ8 Sylvania late 1960's - mid 1970's (excellent sound for the money, best value)
6DJ8 GE USA 1960's - 1970's (good value)

My Lamm M1.2 Ref monoblocks take a single 6DJ8 family tube each so I only need two - which gives the opportunity to experiment. Here's a few from my box that should be less money than those Telefunkens and sound really good. Some tubes are definitely better than others in general and in specific components.

View attachment 78992
6922 Philips SQ Holland 1971
View attachment 78991
6922 Siemens 1965, branded RCA
View attachment 78993
Amperex 7308 Holland

And which ones are your personal favorites in your Lamm hybrids?

 

[Lampie519]

And which ones are your personal favorites in your Lamm hybrids?

Why not ask Lamm?

 

[christoph]

Why not ask Lamm?

The manufacturers often time advise against tube rolling
And I prefer first hand experiences from people outside the industry

 

[RDSChicago]

Plus the manufacturers often use less expensive tubes for obvious profit motives. That is unless we are all hearing things with these more expensive tubes that are subjective in nature and which we want to think we are hearing, and not necessarily objectively justified.

 

[Lampie519]

I am not convinced that they will not give you an honest answer...

 

[knghifi]

Plus the manufacturers often use less expensive tubes for obvious profit motives.+

Like power cables, IMO obvious motives manufacturers use less expensive tubes is they expect owners to tube roll unless designed for a particular tube, IE Shindo.

Also NOS tubes availability is limited to support a product line so most use new production.

 

[christoph]

Like power cables, IMO obvious motives manufacturers use less expensive tubes is they expect owners to tube roll unless designed for a particular tube, IE Shindo.

Also NOS tubes availability is limited to support a product line so most use new production.

I completely agree with all your points

 

[Lampie519]

You trust their products but you do not trust the company ?
These are all assumptions and as long as you did not ask them directly they will always be assumptions...

In some cases it is even meantioned in the user manual if tube rolling is recommended or if "no user servicable parts inside" is meantioned.....

Just because a tube is in a socket and easy to replace does not mean it should... (therefore make sure you have some more info about the amp).
A tube is not a passive component and has to be tuned (bias setting can differ) so even the sound is different with different tubes does not say anything about the tubes.... changing bias settings can change the character of a circuit more then the tubes used (plus it will change during the lifetime of the tubes).
I do not want to scare here but some knowledge of the design and the idea behind it would help.

 

[microstrip]

And reliable! Brent's tubes are the only ones that haven't broken down after a dozen plus unsuccessful punts elsewhere.

IMHO this says mainly that the equipment being considered was poorly designed or needed specific tube matching. Most equipment that uses dual triodes in parallel needs well matched plate current, otherwise one the triodes carried most of the current and breaks very fast.

Look for sellers that advertise an extra for "balanced triodes". Or build an adaptor to test them in your equipent - it is not too hard to do.

BTW, this is a classical problem with the 6dj8 tubes in some conrad johnson preamplfiers and power amplifiers - if you feed them with proper tubes they last for long.

 

[Lampie519]

For medical and military applications tube needed to be selected and out of a batch only a few could be used on crytical low noise places, others in power supplies etc. and the rest rejected... where do you think the rejected ones went? I have hundred's of rejected tubes and many of them measure just great, just not to be used in any life crytical application...... good enough for hifi ;-)

 

[marty]

Why not ask Lamm?

I had a Lamm phono many years ago and did just that. No surprise, he is fond of his Russian tubes for his gear. However as with any system, each component is an ingredient in a recipe and recipies are often seasoned to taste. Tube rolling can be an inexpensive thrill, especially when it results in a nice improvement for minimal cost. That said, Tele's are generally a very good, neutral tube to try in Lamm products. As usual, the only thing that matters is what works for you!

 

[Lampie519]

A bit off topic.... once i build a bespoke preamp and after some time i got the same question: "would a ECC803S be a better tube..... ?" . Then i replied that if he want i could modify the unit a little to "the latest insight" , he agreed...
There is no more ECC83 or equivalent in that amp as i replaced the tube with an ECC85 and adjusted the circuit accordingly. The owner is extreemly happy with this "upgrade" and now can sleep at night as he does not need to worry that there could be a "super" ECC85 somewhere he must have or even try...
(and if there is one i am not going to tell him)

 

[Lampie519]

Plus the manufacturers often use less expensive tubes for obvious profit motives.

Manufacturers will not use cheap tubes as cheap tubes cost money !
Think about the warranty claims in case they fail all the time...
A manufacturer need a lot of reliable tubes and can not risk buying NOS tubes that can fail. That is why the prices of NOS tubes are so high as many can not even be sold after all....

 

[microstrip]

Manufacturers will not use cheap tubes as cheap tubes cost money !
Think about the warranty claims in case they fail all the time...
A manufacturer need a lot of reliable tubes and can not risk buying NOS tubes that can fail. That is why the prices of NOS tubes are so high as many can not even be sold after all....

Exactly. Manufacturers such as Audio Research, conrad johnson , Lamm, Jadis or VTL only use tubes that are commonly available and carefully burn-in and test all the tubes they fit in their equipment - the last thing they want is a tube that fails. They were known to reject more than 50% of the tubes they buy, sending them back to the manufacturer/distributor. Guess where most of these tubes are sold?

Buying form a known dealer assures us that we are not getting rejects! Although I get mine from a reliable source, I always test, burn-in and re-test my tubes. Typically I reject around 20% of them because of excessive mismatching, noise or excessive grid current.

 

[spiritofmusic]

God, this explains the sheer drudgery of a dozen quads that have failed within days, or a month at most.
You don't know how precious my current quad from Brent Jessee are, near silent AND musical, 4 months now...

 

[tima]

And which ones are your personal favorites in your Lamm hybrids?

Over the last few years what I find myself using most frequently are Siemens and Amperex. The 7308 Amperex flagged in my earlier post is probably my favorite because it is balanced and does everything well. I'll switch out every 2-3 months, rotating through my options. Occasionally I'll pick up a new pair to try. They're all good, just a matter of what flavor strikes your mood.

You can read the sidebar to my M1.2 Ref review for a detailed answer about specific tubes. It's one of my favorite reviews. [Edit: I no longer use Stillpoints.]

With regard to asking Lamm... They will tell you what comes with a component but not recommendations. Vladimir is a realist, recognizing that people do roll tubes. Look on his web site or in the manual where he acknowledges a range of options but no specific tube. Like others mention, manufacturers buy v large quantities (which rules out NOS for lack of availability), do a burn-in and testing; as @microstrip notes that leads to a rejection rate typically of 1 of 3.

 

[cjfrbw]

One audio wag in the day said just buy a huge box of cheap tubes and grind through them with measurements until you find good pairs. Even marquee brands fail, as I and many others have learned, and can have problems.

To find a good pair of nuvistors means buying a sleeve of ten, and you might get two or three quiet ones. If you find a good, quiet pair, and they are still quiet a year later, then they will likely stay that way for their 50,000 hours of life expectancy.

The Philips/Amperex 6dj8/6922 later manufacture green/bluish labels had much poorer quality control, but if you bought a bunch of them, you could usually find really good pairs amongst them. I think I remember them being sold in bulk at about $3-5 per tube in big boxes in the olden days This kind of harvesting can be time consuming, however, because many of those green label tubes could really be wonky and weird sounding.

 

[christoph]

Over the last few years what I find myself using most frequently are Siemens and Amperex. The 7308 Amperex flagged in my earlier post is probably my favorite because it is balanced and does everything well. I'll switch out every 2-3 months, rotating through my options. Occasionally I'll pick up a new pair to try. They're all good, just a matter of what flavor strikes your mood.

You can read the sidebar to my M1.2 Ref review for a detailed answer about specific tubes. It's one of my favorite reviews. [Edit: I no longer use Stillpoints.]

With regard to asking Lamm... They will tell you what comes with a component but not recommendations. Vladimir is a realist, recognizing that people do roll tubes. Look on his web site or in the manual where he acknowledges a range of options but no specific tube. Like others mention, manufacturers buy v large quantities (which rules out NOS for lack of availability), do a burn-in and testing; as @microstrip notes that leads to a rejection rate typically of 1 of 3.

Thank you very much for your elaborate answer and the link to your wonderful review
What kind of feet do you use now after ditching the Stillpoints?

PS: I read your review after I bought my M1.1 many years ago and could very much relate with it. Have you been able to compare the M1.1 and the M1.2?

 

[tima]

Thank you very much for your elaborate answer and the link to your wonderful review
What kind of feet do you use now after ditching the Stillpoints?

PS: I read your review after I bought my M1.1 many years ago and could very much relate with it. Have you been able to compare the M1.1 and the M1.2?

Thank you for your kind words, christoph. I use Silent Running Audio Virginia Class amp platforms under the Lamm M1.2 monoblocks.

Wrt M1.1 and M1.2, unfortunately I have no experience with M1.1. I'll suggest asking David (@ddk), he has the M1.1, sells Lamm gear and will know.

 

[Lampie519]

To find a good pair of nuvistors means buying a sleeve of ten, and you might get two or three quiet ones

What audio equipment still uses Nuvistors?
I find them very microphonic and try to avoid them if possible. The sound quality is also not better then other HQ tubes in my opinion. I would give them a second chance if i can find a circuit that make them excell.