low voltage, low current 6L6GC sound?

[jaywalker512]

With a B+ of 250v, with an inductive load (ie, the transformer), the voltage can actually swing to almost double this amount! The quiescient voltage is also always equal to B+. I suggest you read the 'Single Ended' power section on the Valve Wizard website. Takes a while to comprehend, but explains a lot.

Ah, excellent! That certainly did explain a lot. So just to be clear, biasing the tube and drawing the load lines as the "Single Ended" section describes (for an output tube) is the same regardless of tube type? I suppose I should use a smaller tube as the 6L6 is kind of pointless in my application. Perhaps an EL84 or 12AU7/12BH7 would be better.

[MWJB]

250vdc is even on the low side for 12AU7 or 12BH7 when configured as a power tube, however with the 2 triodes available per tube, you would have the option of running them in push-pull (~4W under drive) as well as parallel SE (~1.5W-ish?).

Plate voltage is more in line for a SE EL84, but that will draw nearly the 50mA that you anticipated for the 6L6...as long as you have some headroom on the heater winding current, it shouldn't be an issue with the EL84.

[Chuck H]

I have a little amp I built from the guts of a VOM record player. A pair of 6V6 tubes at 290Vp cathode bias. They sound great and crunch up really nice too. If you build fixed bias your tubes would "see" about the same plate voltage.