Quicksilver audio silver 88 mono amps

Just received the amps today hooked them up, biased the power tubes to the recommended 40a.  It came with kt88 and kt90 tubes, installed the kt90's.   What tubes are you running in your amps, is there anything else to know? 

The electrolytics that are problematic are not the coupling caps. They are both 600v 50 uf rated. I would speak first with Mike Sanders if or when there is an issue. The + leads on both fried manifesting in a howling sound from the amp. I performed the replacement of these caps until my friend who has regular contact with Mike Sanders performed the final fix which involved some minor mods to acommodate a beefier power supply and better caps. 

I went through 5 different pre-amps before settling on a Bill Thalmann upgraded CJ PV9a which complements the QS amps in my set-up very nicely. I am using the Tung Sol KT 150 tubes which I prefer over the KT 88s, ymmv. A matter of trying both. I am unfamiliar with the KT 90 and KT 120 tubes in these amps.

Fsonicsmith you are spot on in recognizing the importance of the power and output transformer in tube amp designs. I am  certain this is the primary reason why all QS amps are all so consistently excellent across the board. The mid monos are a great value at the price as is the 20 watt integrated. I have had zero problems other than the cap issue noted over the past 5 years. Yeah, Mike doesn't seem too keen or that it is necessary to "upgrade" but it must be noted, these products are still built to a price point and better performance can be gotten using better components. I'm with you on that deconney.

Enjoy your Zardozmike, you made a great choice!   

 

@zardomike
IMO, good KT88s paired with nice small signal/driver tubes for those amps. Not a big fan of the KT90s or KT120 tubes in a few different QS amps, could just be me. Others may hear differently.

I'm going to experiment with the kt88's also, they've been my go to power tubes forever.  A really solid performer. 

@zardozmike
Recently helped a friend with an older Jolida integrated who was enamored with the sound of the upgraded QS monos. After some pushing and prodding by a few us and a local dealer buddy -  removed his over-provisioned KT150 tubes (he mistakenly tried in that amp) to go back to different KT88s in his Jolida that was originally designed to run KT88s at lower plate voltage, bias, etc. KT150s were a waste and not running in their optimized state in THAT older Jolida. And of course, newer Jolida avail for KT150s though, different topic of course. Back to KT88s....  

Popped in New Plate Current Matched Quad of Psvane KT88-T Classic MKII Series tubes. Viva sells them too.. Wallah, kinda got lucky, and his older Jolida sounded like a completely different amplifier, was a nice surprise. Not sure if your QS would respond the same but it was worth trying different KT88s in this other amp, fwiw. He loves the amp now...