Bell labs tubes

[Jakel]

Can anyone tell me something about Bell Labs tubes?
Thanks.
Jake

[jockman]

As far as I know, they are Indian made Mullards, I have 4, they are a great sounding valve, nice and smooth with that Mullard chime.

[Bloozcat]

From what I have been able to gather, the Indian BEL plant was owned by Philips and produced tubes that were very close in tone to an equivalent Mullard.

Apparently, there was a time in the early 60's when the Mullard Blackburn plant supplied the BEL plant with the internal plate assemblies. BEL made everything else in the tube
I have several of the BEL 12AX7's and they are very nice tubes. They definitely have that Mullard Blackburn ECC83 vibe to them, although I wouldn't say that they sound like an exact clone.

Another interesting story about the BEL tubes. In the 1980's, Carvin was supplying their amps with BEL tubes in them as stock. They were labeled with the Carvin script logo and said "Made In India" on them. It seems that many people, not being very impressed with Indian made tubes, opted to change them out. For a time, the "Carvin" BEL tubes could be found on e-bay for cheap.

I picked mine up from Terry Kilgore (sgt overdrive here) about a year ago when he found a small stash of them.

[rjgtr]

Are we sure he isn't talking about AT&T's Bell Labs?

If so, they are probably GE, RCA or Sylvania tubes that have been relabelled and are probably very good tubes. Since Bell Labs was at the forefront of transistorization, the tubes are probably from the mid 60's and before.

[Jakel]

Thanks for the info! I picked up a couple Tesla Hexplates from Terry and wasn't sure they were what I was looking for. Turns out I needed some other tweeks to the amp. Anyway, Terry suggested some Bell Labs and I didn't know anything about them. How would they compare to the Hexplates?

[rjgtr]

The Teslas are nice tubes. I used to use them all the time. The only problem is that they can get dark when they break in. The Bell Labs are likely to stay brighter.

[Jakel]

Thanks guys!