4P1L Pentode Driver (Test 2)

Improving the driver with a gyrator load

After the early experiments with the 4P1L driver in pentode mode, I decided to look at improving it somehow given advice given. The gyrator load is not a good match for a pentode unless the reflected impedance is low enough to control the gain of the stage. Gary Pimm recommends:

“In the driver experiments the plate resistor was increased to a value larger than in traditional Pentode driver stages to get more gain.A CCS was placed in parallel with the plate resistor to add plate current to compensate for the high value plate resistor. This allows you to have independent controls of the gain and operating current. The resistor is chosen to set the gain and the CCS is used to set the Pentode operating current.
To maximize the circuit performance the resistance in the screen circuit is adjusted for minimum distortion. There are draw backs to this- The circuit has to be tweaked for each tube. As adjusting the screen voltage and resistance also effects the gain of the stage you have to compromise some to have the gain match between 2 channels. This is not a circuit where you can swap tubes around without “calibrating” the stage on the test bench.
Another interesting way of applying the circuit is to place the plate resistor in parallel with the Pentode and have the CCS supply all the current needed by the stage. This allows the Pentode driver stage to have PSRR similar to CCS loaded triode stages. It also makes the signal current loop very small including only the Pentode, cathode, and plate resistors. The noise and capacitor colorations of the power supply are quite effectively removed.”

So I opted for adding a resistor in parallel (RL) to adjust gain, minimise distortion and improve PSRR:

4P1L Pentode Driver TestThe load resistor is 68K. I optimised the operating point to reduce distortion at maximum swing (i.e. 200V peak to peak). The input impedance of the soundcard interface which is 100K didn’t produce a significant impact on the distortion when measuring from the anode output or in the mu output:

4P1L pentode filament bias RL=68K

Interesting to see that distortion is now nearly half of previous operating point and 0.27% for 200Vpp is very good.

The screen current is approximately 1.8mA at 81V bias.

 

 

C3g and D3a triode SPICE models

Using my C3g and D3a triode curves, I developed the following SPICE models:

D3a triode SPICE

 

** D3A TRIODE ************************************************************
* Created on Sat Jan 12 09:17:53 GMT 2013 using tube.model.finder.PaintKIT
* model URL: http://www.bartola.co.uk/valves/valve-curves/d3a-triode/
* Created by Ale Moglia [email protected]
*--------------------------------------------------
.SUBCKT TRIODE_D3A 1 2 3 ; P G K ; 
+ PARAMS: CCG=6.7P CGP=3.3P CCP=1P RGI=2000
+ MU=72.1 EX=1.456 KG1=65.625 KP=534.0 KVB=300.0 VCT=0.0557 ; Vp_MAX=500.0 Ip_MAX=0.07 Vg_step=0.5
*--------------------------------------------------
E1 7 0 VALUE={V(1,3)/KP*LOG(1+EXP(KP*(1/MU+(VCT+V(2,3))/SQRT(KVB+V(1,3)*V(1,3)))))} 
RE1 7 0 1G 
G1 1 3 VALUE={(PWR(V(7),EX)+PWRS(V(7),EX))/KG1} 
RCP 1 3 1G ; TO AVOID FLOATING NODES
C1 2 3 {CCG} ; CATHODE-GRID 
C2 2 1 {CGP} ; GRID=PLATE 
C3 1 3 {CCP} ; CATHODE-PLATE 
D3 5 3 DX ; FOR GRID CURRENT 
R1 2 5 {RGI} ; FOR GRID CURRENT 
.MODEL DX D(IS=1N RS=1 CJO=10PF TT=1N) 
.ENDS 
*$

C3G triode SPICE modelC3g triode SPICE

 

** C3G TRIODE ************************************************************
* Created on Sat Jan 12 09:40:08 GMT 2013 using tube.model.finder.PaintKIT
* model URL: http://www.bartola.co.uk/valves/valve-curves/c3g-pentodetriode/
* Created by Ale Moglia [email protected]
*--------------------------------------------------
.SUBCKT TRIODE_C3G 1 2 3 ; P G K ; 
+ PARAMS: CCG=7P CGP=2.7P CCP=6P RGI=2000
+ MU=50.4 EX=1.428 KG1=199.6875 KP=426.0 KVB=204.0 VCT=0.5760 ; Vp_MAX=500.0 Ip_MAX=0.07 Vg_step=1.0
*--------------------------------------------------
E1 7 0 VALUE={V(1,3)/KP*LOG(1+EXP(KP*(1/MU+(VCT+V(2,3))/SQRT(KVB+V(1,3)*V(1,3)))))} 
RE1 7 0 1G 
G1 1 3 VALUE={(PWR(V(7),EX)+PWRS(V(7),EX))/KG1} 
RCP 1 3 1G ; TO AVOID FLOATING NODES
C1 2 3 {CCG} ; CATHODE-GRID 
C2 2 1 {CGP} ; GRID=PLATE 
C3 1 3 {CCP} ; CATHODE-PLATE 
D3 5 3 DX ; FOR GRID CURRENT 
R1 2 5 {RGI} ; FOR GRID CURRENT 
.MODEL DX D(IS=1N RS=1 CJO=10PF TT=1N) 
.ENDS

4P1L SPICE model updated

Dmitry Nizh kindly worked out the 4P1L triode SPICE model using his great tool:

4P1L_triode_match

 

Here is Dimtry’s model:

** 4P1L_TRIODE ************************************************************

* Created on Mon Jan 07 07:31:48 PST 2013 using tube.model.finder.PaintKIT
* URL: http://www.bartola.co.uk/valves/valve-curves/4p1l/
*————————————————–
.SUBCKT TRIODE_4P1L_TRIODE 1 2 3 ; P G K ;
+ PARAMS: CCG=8P CGP=7P CCP=9P RGI=2000
+ MU=8.232 EX=1.3719 KG1=851.25 KP=108.0 KVB=528.0 VCT=-1.0 ; Vp_MAX=450.0 Ip_MAX=0.08 Vg_step=5.0
*————————————————–
E1 7 0 VALUE={V(1,3)/KP*LOG(1+EXP(KP*(1/MU+(VCT+V(2,3))/SQRT(KVB+V(1,3)*V(1,3)))))}
RE1 7 0 1G
G1 1 3 VALUE={(PWR(V(7),EX)+PWRS(V(7),EX))/KG1}
RCP 1 3 1G ; TO AVOID FLOATING NODES
C1 2 3 {CCG} ; CATHODE-GRID
C2 2 1 {CGP} ; GRID=PLATE
C3 1 3 {CCP} ; CATHODE-PLATE
D3 5 3 DX ; FOR GRID CURRENT
R1 2 5 {RGI} ; FOR GRID CURRENT
.MODEL DX D(IS=1N RS=1 CJO=10PF TT=1N)
.ENDS
*$

4P1L Pentode Spice Model

Inspired by Rajko’s model, I tried creating my own Spice model of the 4P1L pentode:

4P1L Pentode SPICE take 1Dmitry’s tool for pentode is difficult to fit to the pentode curves, not as the triode tool which is very accurate. Here’s Dmitry’s explanation:

“The pentode model equations, as defined by Koren, have one very, very important property: they reduce to a pretty accurate triode model of the same device if the screen moves together with the plate (I have a parameter UL for that and for ultra-linear arrangement, UL=1 is triode – try it! – then ul=0.4 or so is for UL connection, UL>1 is so called supertriode connection). That’s the good news, a really good one but that is the end of the good news. The bad news is that pentode and tetrode fitting can be at best very approximate – that is, the knee region and the slopes are not right for most tetrodes and pentodes, with the exception for some small-signal pentodes.”

Here is my model. Hopefully someone can try it and report some results:

** 4P1L PENTODE ************************************************************
* Created on Sun Jan 06 18:21:28 GMT 2013 using tube.model.finder.PaintKIP
* model URL:
*————————————————–
.SUBCKT PENT_4P1L PENTODE 1 2 3 4 ; P G K G2
+ PARAMS: CCG=9P CGP=0.1P CCP=9.5P RGI=2000
+ MU=9.27 EX=1.4139 KG1=1658.84 KG2=3528.0 KP=469.2 KVB=40.504 ; Vp_MAX=450.0 Ip_MAX=0.07 Vg_step=1.0
*————————————————–
RE1 7 0 1MEG ; DUMMY SO NODE 7 HAS 2 CONNECTIONS
E1 7 0 VALUE= ; E1 BREAKS UP LONG EQUATION FOR G1.
+{V(4,3)/KP*LOG(1+EXP((1/MU+V(2,3)/V(4,3))*KP))}
G1 1 3 VALUE={(PWR(V(7),EX)+PWRS(V(7),EX))/KG1*ATAN(V(1,3)/KVB)}
G2 4 3 VALUE={(EXP(EX*(LOG((V(4,3)/MU)+V(2,3)))))/KG2}
RCP 1 3 1G ; FOR CONVERGENCE
C1 2 3 {CCG} ; CATHODE-GRID 1
C2 1 2 {CPG1} ; GRID 1-PLATE
C3 1 3 {CCP} ; CATHODE-PLATE
R1 2 5 {RGI} ; FOR GRID CURRENT
D3 5 3 DX ; FOR GRID CURRENT
.MODEL DX D(IS=1N RS=1 CJO=10PF TT=1N)
.ENDS

46 DHT driver final tests

20130105-125459.jpg

Having built the 4P1L filament bias driver stage in a breadboard, I now have the sufficient voltage swing to drive the 46 to maximum sweep. In my 4-65a SE amp, a maximum of 200Vpp is required to drive the amp into class A2.

The following tests conditions were used:

  • 4P1L first stage:
    • DN2540 gyrator in mu follower output
    • 220nF/450V Capacitor coupled into 46 driver
    • Filament bias: 15 ohms, Vgk=-10V
    • Vsupply=355V and Va0=210V
    • Output set to about 30-32Vpp to drive 46 at 200Vpp
  • 46 driver stage:
    • IXYS 01N100 gyrator in mu follower output
    • Load impedance is 100K (Pete Millett’s interface)
    • Filament bias: 10 ohm / 100W Vgk=-17V
    • Vsupply=355V and Va0=204-208V
    • Output set to 200Vpp

I tested 28 valves. Just a few of my lot are NOS. The average THD was about 0.4-0.5% but a good selection of 8 valves (mainly Sylvania NOS) provided a consistent 0.18% THD:

4P1L into 46 driver test2Happy now with the initial tests and selection of 46 pairs for the amplifier, I can now continue with the build…

4P1L Driver Tests

4P1L is a sublime DHT. As shown before it’s one of the most linear valves in triode mode. I built a breadboard in filament bias to test 4P1L as a driver using a MOSFET gyrator in mu-follower mode:

4P1L triode driver filament bias 1

20130104-205239.jpgMy test set can only drive the 4P1L output to 30Vrms and the distortion is only 0.027%!

I was intrigued by the performance of this driver in pentode so did a quick modification to provide a screen fixed voltage instead via a source follower and adjusted the bias voltage to minimise distortion. I found that a bias of about 120V was the best. This setup wasn’t the ideal one as in filament bias the frequency response is really poor as there is no cathode resistor bypass. The gain is about 200 with the gyrator used:

4P1L pentode driver filament bias 1A distortion of 0.58% @ 200V peak-to-peak is really good. The filament bias is forcing the pentode to operate with low anode current so I guess that with a lower bias point performance will improve. I will have to test this.

The measured THD was:

  • 0.125% @ Vo=100Vpp
  • 0.34% @ Vo=150Vpp
  • 0.58% @ Vo=200Vpp

Interesting to see the increase of H3 and H5 as a result of the pentode operation.

The breadboard for pentode can be improved for sure. I will look next at reducing the bias voltage as a first step. Interesting results which show that 4P1L is a great driver both in triode and in pentode modes.