Mullard EL34?

[doucanoe]

You reminded me...
I have a box of about 47 mullard EL34s. In the 80's I found a guitar shop that had a ton of them that were pulls from where people had put new rubys in their amps. I bought all that he had at the time and then he called me a year later and had a dozen or so more. Some of them are marked Mullard, others just Great Britain on the glass in capital letters. All of them tested very good, some better than others but none were sub-par.

I just went and dug them out to ogle them a little. Not often in my life I have a story of lucking into something like this and it turning out to be a small goldmine later down the road. I paid $1 per tube at the time.

Sad thing is the amps I have that use them are all in storage. My MC225 is all I need Oh well, one day my kids will enjoy them.

-Grim

Nice!

RC

 

[FalconEddy]

Some Additional Info For You. . .

RC,

Yes, three of those Mullard EL34's have welded plates, and one has stapled plates.

The three xf2 series were produced in the 60's and the single xf3 series were produced starting in 1974. Tooling of the plates (and other internal components) for the EL34 were changed to cut production costs and improve assembly time.

I see one of the xf2's was made the fourth week of May 1963 at the Blackburn UK facility, and the single xf3 series was made the fourth week of August 1975 at the same location.

One of the other xf2 series was made the first week of December 1962.

Now, with that said, bear in mind that Mullard may have made these tubes in one place, then labeled them completely differently than the actual location. I've seen Mullard produced tubes with multiple (conflicting) date/location codes on them, three different sets of EIA codes on them, tubes that didn't get date code labeled for a couple of years after production, and tubes that were cleaned and reprinted 12-15 years after they were produced (e.g. GZ34's made in 1959 and printed with the new Mullard shield from the 70's).

However, in the end, they're all still Philips-Mullard produced tubes; and generally sound pretty sweet.

. . Falcon

 

[doucanoe]

RC,

Yes, three of those Mullard EL34's have welded plates, and one has stapled plates.

The three xf2 series were produced in the 60's and the single xf3 series were produced starting in 1974. Tooling of the plates (and other internal components) for the EL34 were changed to cut production costs and improve assembly time.

I see one of the xf2's was made the fourth week of May 1963 at the Blackburn UK facility, and the single xf3 series was made the fourth week of August 1975 at the same location.

One of the other xf2 series was made the first week of December 1962.

Now, with that said, bear in mind that Mullard may have made these tubes in one place, then labeled them completely differently than the actual location. I've seen Mullard produced tubes with multiple (conflicting) date/location codes on them, three different sets of EIA codes on them, tubes that didn't get date code labeled for a couple of years after production, and tubes that were cleaned and reprinted 12-15 years after they were produced (e.g. GZ34's made in 1959 and printed with the new Mullard shield from the 70's).

However, in the end, they're all still Philips-Mullard produced tubes; and generally sound pretty sweet.

. . Falcon

Interesting stuff Falcon, Thanks:thmbsp:

I don't have an amp for them at the moment but who knows. Things seem to change around here quickly

RC

 

[seta1]

Well, I have some good news and some bad news. They look to be late 60's Mullard tubes. But, if you look at the plate structures, you can see that they were run real hot. By this I mean red plates. I can clearly see the classic Mullard Burn as I used to call it. Also, unless your picture is yellowed, the getter flashing looks kind of brownish which in these tubes generally signals a lot of use. I guess all you can do is try them in an amp and see how they sound and work.
Question - Are they Mullard?

RC[/QUOTE]

 

[doucanoe]

Well, I have some good news and some bad news. They look to be late 60's Mullard tubes. But, if you look at the plate structures, you can see that they were run real hot. By this I mean red plates. I can clearly see the classic Mullard Burn as I used to call it. Also, unless your picture is yellowed, the getter flashing looks kind of brownish which in these tubes generally signals a lot of use. I guess all you can do is try them in an amp and see how they sound and work.
Question - Are they Mullard?

RC

[/QUOTE]


Yup, I have a feeling that they have seen better days. 3 of the 4 anyway.

RC