Anybody blow a ceramic woofer with an OTL amp?


I would appreciate anybody's experience with transients (such as a tube blowing) in an OTL amp that results in breaking the ceramic driver in a Kharma 3.2. I just had this happen to me - a driver tube blew, terrible noise from the woofer and it broke. The Kharma distributor said this was only the second he had heard of with an Atma-Sphere amp, but that it was much more likely with an OTL amp because of the lack of transformer. Ralph is interested in the frequency with which this occurs, as he feels it only happens with ceramic woofers, which are much more likely to blow than non-ceramics. Have any other OTL owners had this happen to Kharmas? I guess the lesson is to keep testing tubes or keep a careful eye on them to prevent this happening, but I would like to know if this was a freak happening or more common than has been generally accepted? Judging from the number of Tenor-Kharma combos out there, it should be more common than I thought if the combination of OTL and ceramic woofers is a problematic one.
springbok10
Tireguy is right. It can be easier to damage a speaker with a 20 watt amp than it is with a 400 watt one. On the other hand, it's true the ceramic drivers are more fragile - damage most often occurs in transit.

Ralph is doing well, and sales are way up in the past month or so.
Springbok10- Don't worry about the driver replacement it really is very easy to do. If you have little to no experience soldering ask a friend to help you, if you can't find that practice on some scrap wire until you get the hang of it. Have a friend hold the driver and you solder it, should take less then 15 minutes, even if you work really slow.
Springbok10. I hope you keep us up to date on the repair process. I for one remember my work with a soldering iron *shivers* I do believe that there are some things that are worth the effort in dealing with the inconveniences and music is one of them.
Soldering is done. 15 minutes. So far, so good...........:)Thanks for the interest.
I'm sorry to here of you lose Springbok10.(belated)Hope all has been well since.

I'll have to stay in touch with this issue as I poses newly updated Atma-Sphere MA-1 Silvers that Ralph and his fine crew just updated. I feel the new caps are finally burned in, and could not be a happier camper than with Ralph's OTL's. Simply brilliant! But I'm running them through... Coincident PREt's with the Accuton's. Again, Israel Blume and his speaker designs, have just brought the whole thing together. At this point, no problems and no need to expect any... the music and performance is lovely.

I too am unwilling to part from my Atma-Sphere's, I'm OTL hooked.

Never had one of Andy's choice Sylvania 6SN7's go yet either, but have had two 6AS7G/6N13S Svetlana power tubes go, in over seven years of faithful service, but when they did, it was absolutely frightening! Yet, no damage.

Happy Listening! ;^)>