From pcaiken2000@yahoo.com Wed Sep 14 16:54:34 2005
Subject:The Changing of my XK-3 tubes...

Took the plunge.
I bought a pair of NOS GE 12AX7A's and popped them in today. The
procedure is not that difficult, and is described elsewhere on this board so I
won't repeat it here.

It's a pretty big difference.

Someone else here described a tube change and said that their new ones
sing before they scream. That is a good description. The real distortion kicks
in much later with my tubes....around 46 to 48 on the drive setting, which is
around 1 or 2 o'clock. The distortion is richer and fuller. Turning it up all the
way doesn't put it quite into the over the top sizzle mode.

Thus far I tested them deirect into a Barbetta 41, and also into a Speakeasy
classic into the Barbetta, using the internal Leslie. Having more usable
distortion pre-Leslie allowed me to not run the Speakeasy quite so hot, and
helped lessen the negative side effect of having the Speakeasy distortion post
Leslie. I was able to get a better sound this way.

I will be trying it through my 122 tomorrow, which is how I plan on using it
most of the time. What I really want out of this is to play without it on, or on
very low, and then to kick it on (or turn it up) for extra oomph and distortion at
the appropriate times. I kind of got that out of the old tubes, but I felt unable to
turn them up too much because the quality of the distortion wasn't to my
personal liking when I did so.

Film at 11.