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In Reply to: Mullard 12AX7WA? posted by pyfite on March 23, 2007 at 12:11:21:
pyfite,The tubes in the craigslist photos show the IEC labelling which suggests these are possibly as late as the mid- 80's, the very end of old Western Euroe production. I think I can see just a hint of the etched date codes around the side in one of the photos and those codes will tell the whole story:
http://www.triodeel.com/images/philipstubecodes.pdf
These codes should be in the Philips format- two groups that tell you the: Tube type> Revision version / Factory> Year, Month, and Week. This will be something like: I65 3B2 -which would mean: 12AX7, Mullard, Blackburn factory, 2nd week February 1973. Ask the seller to quote some of these codes and you can see when and where they were made. If these tubes do not have these codes or the seller won't quote them, or he wants $50 each, I'd avoid them.
The odd banter about the extreme value of these and "selling to a Japanese millionaire" bothers me bit as that and other statements suggests the seller is not terribly knowledgable except he's heard that Mullards are expensive.
I'm not the expert on Mullards, but Mullard did make some premium and ruggedised 12AX7 types. The early 70's 12AX7 Mullards are the same tubes as orange globe Amperex, Valvo ECC82, and Philips, and very good tubes but nothing extraordinary. The Mullard label is not buying something of particularily special quality.
Has the seller quoted a price to you?
Cheers,
Bambi B
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Follow Ups
- Ask for the Philips etched date codes - Bambi B 07:47:11 03/24/07 (0)