Frankenstein's Woo

Discussion in 'DIY' started by m17xr2b, May 21, 2020.

  1. m17xr2b

    m17xr2b Friend

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    What's the best tube amp one would like to have, wildest dreams come to life?

    Before I knew anything about the inner workings and started to build my own I tried think of what tick boxes such a beast should have:
    - be able to run any sort of popular DHT output: 45,46,2A3,300B,PX4,PX25,AD1,6A3,VT62 etc.
    - dual input tube with mix and match. Usually it's one tube per channel resulting in mismatched sections after a while. With one tube doing the first stage and the second one the 2nd stage one can tailor to the wildest dreams.
    - speaker output because why not
    - low and high gain/impedance outputs
    - fancy components inside, PIO caps, stepped pot, Japanese iron, dutch cables
    - adjustable everything with check points
    - built to last by a pro

    A good year a half ago I came across this blog post:
    http://easytubeamp.com/woo-audio-wa5-vzglyad-snaruzhi-i-iznutri/

    Having re-bought my old Woo WA5 I yearned for an upgrade. Next to the Stellaris it was slow, thick and rolled off. Had it's moments yet it was clear a 300B should sound better. Reach out to the builder and over a year ago, he was crazy to accept my request and I sent my woo for a long journey to literally the other side of the world in Vladivostok, east Russia.

    Several days ago, got it back, meet my crazy do it all one of a kind amp:
    [​IMG]
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    There's nothing really from the original apart from the chassis, new tango ISO FC20S OTP, even the power transformers has been re-wound just for HT with three more for heater duties.

    Hot 8W Sophia Royal princess 300B with a mix of TS RPBG 6F8G and Visseaux 6J5
    [​IMG]

    Cool 4W Elrog 300B with two of my favourite tubes, now complementing each other, tube fusion:
    [​IMG]

    I'd really like to try this against a WA33, perfect British combo, BL63 and ECC32, 2A3 running with DNA spec:
    [​IMG]

    I'll let it run in for a while, savour tube rolling at its finest, then use it and the Stellaris as benchmarks for my own build.
     
    Last edited: May 21, 2020
  2. msommers

    msommers High on Epipens

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    This is such a cool project, wow it was amazing all those caps actually fit. Tango transformers too....I hate to ask the total price on this sucker
     
  3. m17xr2b

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    A stock WA5-LE(speaker posts were added with the build) and around $3.5K. Just shipping was insane at around 800$.
     
  4. m17xr2b

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