Tube professionals - a question 4 you

[deeaa*]

Hello,

I've been hunting for good preamp tubes for my Ceriatone 36 head.

It has 3 preamp tubes, all 12ax7. Now as usual, I find little difference in tone when changing the 2 later tubes, but the first tube is of course all-important.

I have a bunch of different EEC83S /12AX7WA/WB, plain 12ax7's from different manufacturers, plus a few 57xx etc. tubes (12ay7 etc.).

What I find is a regular 12ax7 or 's' is too dark and gainy for my taste in no.1. slot.
Currently I do have a 12ax7 there, BUT it's an old Siemens tube (1967 I think) and it is completely different sounding. Much less saturation, way more clarity and brightness. I have noticed that if I try a modern AY 7 or equivalent lower-power tube there, the sound is very much alike, but weaker and too 'glassy' i.e. lacking warmth.

Now, I'm VERY happy with how it sounds in rhythm and riffs - ACDC at its best, I drive it hard with EMG's and a compressor - but there is a problem with high notes. On very high notes it gets this high-frequency buzz that is kinda slight but clearly there, a glassy, annoying 'twinkle' in the sound. Like it overdrives smoothly elsewhere but distorts some very high frequencies something evil. It's not easy to spot always, but sometimes it is clear as a knife there when I play a high note bend over something quieter, and VERY annoying...something like 'Be Yourself' lead riff by Audioslave etc.

If I put in a JJ ECC83S or something more powerful, it becomes warm and saturated, which masks or doesn't do that annoying sound - but the sound is also nothing like it was before, all too warm, gainy, not nearly as 'big' and loses all clarity as well, becoming much more like any high-gain amp out there.

So my question after all this lengthy explaining is:

WHich preamp 12ax family tubes should be less gainy than the regular 12ax7's are BUT not as quiet and bright as a 12ay7?

If anyone can give me pointers as how to correct my problem with the sound, I'd be much obliged. Or any other tips to eliminate that extra sound.

The amp is all tube, 3x12ax, a 'Gz', uh, 37 or something? for a rectifier and a quartet of EL84's.

I do have a boxfull of different power tubes as well, ranging from mil-spec Sovteks to EH tubes...and a few NOS tubes but sadly no matched pairs of those...I feel it is the 1st pre tube that is the heart of the problem but maybe I'm wrong and would need to try some other el84's as well?

EDIT:

More clarification:

TUBE GAIN FACTOR CHART

12AX7 - (ECC83, 7025, ECC803, E83CC, 6681) - GAIN 100
5751 -------------------------------------- GAIN 70
12AT7 - ECC81, 6201, 6679 ------------------GAIN 60
12AY7 - 6072 ---------- GAIN 45
12AV7 - 5965 -----------GAIN 41
12AU7 - ECC82, 5963, 5814, 6189 - --- GAIN 19

My take: ECC83S is darker/warmer, EC83CC is clearer, more kick.

The tube I'm using now is a NOS Siemens E83CC - which seems to go for $150 on tube sites...well...
So the question clarified would be which tube would be closest to an ECC83CC in sound? Golden Dragon E83CC seems a reasonable bet...?


Cheers,

Dee

[Spudman***]

A 12 AT7 would lower the gain issue you mentioned.

[deeaa*]

Well! I did find the problem and corrected it.

I was simply driving the input too hard. Not a tube problem at all.

I use very powerful EMG 85 active pickups and when I also play hard, hit screaming lead notes - it just distorts the input some. I didn't realize it for a good while because _all_ my guitars have the same pickups.

SO what I did was set my volume pedal so that it won't go all the way down, but remains at a very slight 'cut' at all times...and problem solved. The sound doesn't change, or even volume, I guess because it was simply overloading and it couldn't get any higher anyway....but that tiny notch downwards and so long that annoying fizzbuzz in the higher frequencies.

I feel dumb not figuring it out before...on any SS amp and many others I have to turn the guitar volume to about '5' or it's VERY gainy to start with...just didn't come to think of the same underlying issue being the reason here.

Too much is sometimes too much :-)

[otaypanky***]

For many, many years I had my pickups adjusted higher than I do now, probably causing similar conditions ~
Bringing them down has revealed some nice results for what I like