DO NOT use any type of contact treatment on power tube pins or tube sockets!
17 responses Add your response
Water is not a good conductor of electricity. Stabilant 22 on the other hand is. That’s why Deoxit for example is safe to use on tube pins. That’s also why commercial aircraft use it on communications electronics. One must obviously ensure not to allow Stabilant 22 to get onto the surface of the tube sockets where it could migrate to another pin. Wipe off any excess before inserting treated tube. |
How much heat are you talking about? What's the voltage? Here is the typical statement found in an ARC owners manual for tube audio equipment. // Quote: "3. Note: In general, contact enhancers are not
recommend for use on vacuum tube contact
pins. With continual exposure to heat and air,
many of these substances can form gummy, dustcollecting
residues which actually reduce
contact and degrade sonic performance. Proper
external use of these preparations – on
interconnect plugs, speaker connections, etc.– is
subject to the discretion of the owner. Contact
Audio Research for specific recommendations." End of quote. // I bet other tube equipment manufactures have the same statement in their manuals. You can clean contact enhancers off of tube pins fairly easily. Not so easy out of the female contacts of tube sockets. I'll just stick with using Isopropyl alcohol for cleaning tube pins and tube sockets. |
Tom wrote, "30 years ago this same product then known as Tweek was used and sold in a store I ran. Great stuff for sure . Went away and came back in the same form. Glad it did." i remember Tweek very well. That's the stuff that gave contact enhancers a bad name, namely by turning a greenish black over time. cheers |
right from the mouth of the goat mouth..look on their site..geoff http://www.stabilant.com/Company.html D. W. Electrochemicals Ltd.D.W.E. was established in 1986. Our product originated in 1976, from Wright Electroacoustics, where it was based on the R&D work of Wm. M. D. Wright. After several years of field trials, the final product, Stabilant 22™ was introduced by Sumiko Audio, under the trade name TWEEK©. Tom |
| Post removed |
Tom, here’s the results of a quick Google search. You figure it out. Google is your friend. "Nasty stuff, I can’t tell you the number of RCA jacks that I have seen that once had Tweek on them and the chemical damaged....looking at the jacks under magnification looked like the gold plating had been "blasted" off the substrate...." "The name was "Tweek", a contact enhancer distributed by Sumiko. I still have a sealed sample in the original syringe packaging. Be very careful using this stuff as tended to gum things up and/or caramelize when dumped in places like tube sockets." What exactly is the relationship between Stabilant 22 and Tweek? I have read a lot about poor results using the old Tweek product, such as the Soundstage! review from 2003 where Bill Cowan says (about Tweek), "When it was used between dissimilar metals, a thick layer of black gook built up on the metal surfaces, and this could happen within a very short time frame. This gook was very difficult and sometimes even impossible to remove completely -- I managed to destroy the RCA plugs on a fairly pricey pair of interconnects trying to get it off. Since then, I�ve stayed away from contact enhancers, although I have made use of the Caig Pro Gold. But Pro Gold is billed as a preservative rather than an enhancer, and I�ve never had a problem with it causing any kind of chemical reaction on metal surfaces. For straight cleaning, I use either isopropyl alcohol, or when confronted with badly oxidized connections, Caig�s DeOxit. In both instances, the cleaner is applied and then completely removed, rather than left in place like Pro Gold or the H2L solutions." "The information I found on Stabilant 22 states, it is a, amorphous-semiconductive polyoxyethylene-polyoxypropyline block polymer with a molecular weight of about 2,800" "What the heck is that? In liquid form, it appears to be primarily Isopropoal alcohol and is then called Stabilant 22A. If you guys are having success with it, then Stabilant 22 or 22A themselves must not cause a detrimental effect when left in-place over long periods of time like Tweek did, and it must not degrade as some believe the SST and Quicksilver do. Is this because it is polymer based vs. the organic oils (I believe are) used in SST and Quicksilver? Do you use it in its concentrated form or diluted with Isopropol alcohol? Any performance comparisions with ProGold?" |
I have a can of Cramolin lotion with tiny copper power in it. I got this from a radio station that dipped their tubes in it before inserting them. I did discover that with time and heat that I had to use emory cloth to remove the build up. I guess in radio stations with tubes in reserve that this may have been useful. I have a product called Audiotop that is a three step cleaner. Step one is an acid cleaner that you apply and wipe off. Step two is an alkyl cleaner that is applied and wiped off. Step three is a magic oil that preserves the cleaning and helps the sound. It used to be distributed by A audio imports, but isn't on their webpage any longer. |
Hello I first clean all tube pins including the tips, as well as All power cord surfaces . Tweek I recently did all power cords as IEC connections let all tube pins and applications dry for a hr then put in ,without question everything sounds better .as long as the area isnot super hot where it will fry such as a super hot outputtube you are fine . The stuff called tweek was the old Stabilant that was cut 8-1 it gave not much protection . Stabilant 22A. Is cut with a 4-1 alcohol. Used to drop in plugs to break any oxidation it evaporates fast . i use on new gear put a thin coat pure 22 and plug in and wait an hr no problem. the tubes sound for sure better detailed once clean and 22 applied. The $100 bottle comes with several applicators .and will last a Loong time. i did my whole system best product I have found. Great for batteries in flashlights even digital contacts. |