For days now I've been building and rebuilding power supplies for my various valve amps. First it was rectifier shootouts, then capacitors, and now it's 1200V SIC diodes, which are about the cleanest diodes you can get. All these power supplies feed my standard circuit which is a 2 stage SE 2a3/6C4C amp running at "book" value, i.e. 250v, 60mA, -45v. The last 2 days have been choosing between a 5u4 hybrid rectifier power supply and a SIC diode bridge. Mains transformers are the same, though with added voltage in the case of the 5u4 to give the same output voltage of around 310v. Same large 8H, 210mA choke and same Kemet DC Link caps.
So I've come to the finding that I slightly prefer the SIC diode power supply. This is good news because it's a lot simpler and cheaper. There's not much in it though, so I'll continue experimenting. I bought the SIC diodes from Farnell. I'll be buying some more now, in case the price goes up. The DC Link capacitors are smoother than Kemet electrolytics I tried, but may not be the last word. I'll be looking at all the many PSU capacitor threads.
Please post all your power supply experiments here and let's start a debate which may be useful for ongoing experiments.
So I've come to the finding that I slightly prefer the SIC diode power supply. This is good news because it's a lot simpler and cheaper. There's not much in it though, so I'll continue experimenting. I bought the SIC diodes from Farnell. I'll be buying some more now, in case the price goes up. The DC Link capacitors are smoother than Kemet electrolytics I tried, but may not be the last word. I'll be looking at all the many PSU capacitor threads.
Please post all your power supply experiments here and let's start a debate which may be useful for ongoing experiments.
