chickenoregg, Regarding the E80CC, Jim Hagerman probably would not approve on the same grounds by which he did not approve of the FQ7, the excess heater current requirement. And the FQ7 is more like a 12AU7 than is the E80CC. The fact that you got away with subbing the E80CC with a 12AU7, and I got away with subbing the FQ7 for the 12AU7 in my Quicksilver preamp (with audibly positive results) have no bearing on the question of the Trumpet.
You asked about my statement, "Honestly, I think tube rolling is way over-rated and prone to expectation bias on the part of the listener." To which you responded, "I am genuinely curious to know what gear you rolled what tubes in to no or little effect?"
First, I did not and would not say there is NO effect, but I would say it has little effect, and here is what I mean when I say that: (1) Tubes age; any beneficial effect you hear at first is probably not going to last forever for that reason. (2) There is a lot of fraud these days in vacuum tube sales in that vendors know what audiophiles want and the market is replete with fake copies of TFK, Mullard, Amperex, etc, branded tubes. That would deter me from making new purchases of rare NOS tubes for fear that they are copies. I do have a stash of all the named brands that I purchased NOS back in the 1970ss in their original boxes, mostly 12AX7, AT7, and AU7. As well as 5687 and its congeners, and yadayada. I trust my stash but not some other guy’s recently purchased samples. (3) My prior experience tube rolling suggested to me that the expensive rare brands, even authentic ones, do not always sound as good as some of the modern tubes made in the far East or in Eastern Europe, let alone do they sound any better. I will not make any generalizations, but when I compared a slew of different NOS 12AT7s at the input of my Atma-sphere amplifiers, probably about 20 years ago, the best sounding without any doubt were tubes made in China and purchased from Billington in the UK. Problem with them was a short lifespan. (4) Tubes depend upon the contact points between the pins and the tube socket. Tube sockets do not always age well or maintain a tight fit on the pins. This alone can cause the sensation that performance is fading. Few of us pay attention to that and even fewer of us clean tube pins and tube sockets periodically to assure good contact. (I do pins with Q tips and sockets with tiny wire brushes made for the job,) When you pull one tube and replace it with another, you are per se cleaning the tube socket by friction and by the fact that some dirt comes out with the pins of the old tube. That is one cause of a false positive sense of achievement. (5) Expectation bias is a real thing and every one of us is susceptible to it.