Tube Headphone Amp Kit Option

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From time to time, I've seen inquiries here about tube headphone amp kits. I found and just completed one, so I thought I'd report briefly.
What I found was a headphone amp kit called the HD83 by World Audio Design, apparently related to the UK magazine Hi-Fi World. Shortly after I ordered the kit, I think I saw some posts complaining about the company, so I awaited the arrival of my order with some concern.
Not to worry. Although shipped from the UK to the US, where I am, the kit arrived within a week, well packed. The only things missing were the standoffs for the circuit board. The instructions are quite good. Since I didn't need to correspond with the company to troubleshoot, I can't comment on their service in that respect.
I won't go into a circuit description -- you can read it for yourself at worldaudiodesign.co.uk. It features two ECL83's, and the output transformers can be wired for different impedance ranges.
Parts quality seems good, but as I typically like to do I switched a number of the parts. Among other things, I changed the stock diodes (BYV96D) to Harris FREDs, the resistors to Holcos, and some of the caps to Hovlands. I also used Kimber wire.
Ergonomically, the kit features the usual advantages and disadvantages of circuit board building. The circuit board is easy enough to load, but once you wire it up, God help you if you ever need to remove it, if you try to keep your wiring relatively short, as I do. For this reason, I generally prefer non-pcb designs. At any rate, for this reason (and because I was waiting for some parts), I proceeded very slowly, testing each connection carefully as I went.
I finished last night, having wired the outputs for high impedence headphones (Sennheiser 580's). Voltages tested OK, so I put it in my system and listened. While it's hard to comment in any detail on the sound -- I've only listened for an hour or two -- I can say that the amp is so dead quiet that I was concerned it wasn't working until the music started. Subjectively (as they say), the amp sounds very good, although I'm certainly biased at this point.
I'm not affiliated.

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Topic - Tube Headphone Amp Kit Option - Bob K 05:59:16 12/27/00 (1)

Re: Tube Headphone Amp Kit Option - zonklord 07:32:00 12/27/00 (0)

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