Leaving tube amps on.
This is a question I had for a long time. I know it’s not a good idea to leave tube amps on all the time because of tube life and safety reasons. But sometimes I don’t have the opportunity to listen to my system / music for hours at time at one sitting. Sometimes I can only listen to it 45 min - a few hours at a time during the day / night. So my question is would it be better to leave the amps on all day / evening and listen when I can or turn them on / off every time I listen even if is only 45 min at a clip. But to just clarify when I don’t intend to listen that day/ night they will be off. Does turning the amps on / off throughout the day / night do more harm than leaving them on ? Tube life , wear and tear on amps etc. btw I have the Audio Research Ref 750s. Ea amp has 18 KT150 , 6550WE , 6H30.
ghdprentice Plus 1! Even with solid state, unless the amps have been unplugged for months, they will sound 99% after 15-30 minutes. My preamp and amps are hybrid, where the input stage (where the tubes are) shuts off, but the rest of the unit is left on. I turn everything one and after 5-10 minutes, they sound swell.😊 |
@pindac , well, the amp had been in service for many years and caps do occasionally fail, and I think that this failure was due to a mistake I made when I was doing something with the amp. But, my point was: that if the amp was fully powered on and idling and that cap would have failed and no one was anywhere around, the bias would have climbed and continued to climb until I do not know what then happens. I did have an output tube fail catastrophically a long long time ago (I assume it was an internal short in the tube) and it blew the tube fuse on that side, but I still wouldn’t (on purpose) leave my amp on & unattended for an extended period of time. |
