Best kt88 for VAC Avatar Super

Maineiac
Have you tried Svetlana winged c?

VACMAN, I don't believe I have tried the Svetlana winged C.

Maineiac,

After reading your enthusiastic post, I ordered a matched quad of Gold Lions from Tube Depot (on sale for $109 for a matched pair). They will be going into my VAC Phi 200 amp.

Questions for you or anyone with opinion and experience:

1. How long did it take them to burn in?
2. Did you keep your VAC powered on 24/7 during the initial burn-in?
3. I read the RAM Tubeaudiostore.com site, which has them on sale for $75 each, but tubes are matched by a proprietary computer program. Anyone with experience with this, is it worth the added cost?

I buy my tubes from Jim McShane, he is great to deal with and provides top notch service. I just received a back-up quad as the set I am running now have been at it for over 1 year in my amp. I think you will find that they will work pretty well out of the box and it won't take too long for them to settle in (30-40 hours). I would never leave my amp on 24/7 for burn-in and always turn mine off if I am not going to be listening to music in the next hour. I was talking to a dealer the other day who told me about a customer who blew up a set of new tubes in a VAC amp because he didn't properly mute the unit when he was getting initial bias set. With new tubes I always start at lowest bias setting and let tubes warm up for 10-15 minutes before bringing up the right voltage.

Thanks Maineiac, I'll report back once the Gold Lions settle in.