Do tube dampers really work?


Tube dampers are relatively cheap; but will they REALLY improve the sound of my Audible Illusions preamp?
rockyboy
I'm using a set of 6 Hal-O tube dampers from Herbie's Audio Lab (on both preamp and amp). The cost was $95 with a 90 day money back guarantee. There's no way mine are going back. The change in my system was dramatic.
Karls,
If you remember I was posting about microphonics in tubes since I had them in freequent practice for quite a-bit working with powerfull UHF radio transmitter.

Tapping tubes is NOT a microphonic test since it exceeds air pressure gazillion times. I urge NOT to do that test.

What you can do is tap on chassis or interconnect wires and if you hear clicks-pops than you have a case with bad tube you need to examine.

As to dampers they eliminate vibrations of "bottle" but found tube coolers at www.percyaudio.com can prolong a tube life. Still not sure how it affects sonics since it's simply to say a teaspoon in the ocean to the different components speakers room, temperature and even air content.
Yes, I know that tapping tubes is a much more severe G load than typical air loads can impart. However, it is significantly closer in magnitude to conceivable chassis-borne vibrations. (Have you ever put your hand on your preamp's chassis while loud music is playing?) Still higher, I grant you, but this is really a matter of simple physics. In fact, one of the simplest of all physical equations. Namely, that a specific force will cause an acceleration (and yes, a subsequent ringing) that is exactly proportional to the magnitude of that force. Moreover, a simple fingernail tap is about as close to a step function as you can get in a no-cost test, which has all kinds of benefits in analyzing how a tube (or any other physical/electrical system) reacts to transient perturbations (which is about as close to a general definition of a musical signal as you can get). So yes, the test I proposed is more severe than the tubes are going to see in normal service, but it is nevertheless a totally valid way of easily demonstrating that tubes are indeed sensitive to vibration. Anyone who denies this as an absolute impossibility has their head in the sand. (And I'm being polite here.) Go reread Hee's post above and then tell me that this problem doesn't exist.
The Hal-O tube dampers work good for me. It's a sultle improvement but worth doing! One thing I have noticed is you can fine tune your system some what by moving them up or down the tube, I have the Hal-O about 1/3 down from the top as this gives me the most improvement. Happy Listening!