Product Review

A professional grade hand-held vacuum tube pin straightener. Used to straighten and align vacuum tube pins. Great accessory for professional musician's, audiophile's and repair shop's working with tube-based audio components. Compatible with US/European and Russian/Chinese miniature 7-pin and 9-pin tubes with B7G bases (e.g., 6AK5, 5654, 6AU6, 6AQ5A tubes) and B9A bases (e.g., 12AX7, 12AU7, 5670, 6BQ5, EL84 tubes). Bent tube pins can permanently deform and loosen the contact between tube pins and socket contacts, which could negatively affect sound quality. Inserting tubes with bent pins into a socket can also damage the glass-metal interface along tube pins, resulting in reduced tube life or glass breakage. Modeled after vintage hand-held pin straighteners - but with significant improvements in machining accuracy and material. The straightener is CNC machined from a premium-grade martensitic stainless steel and hardened to RC50 (Rockwell C50). In addition to providing long life (as well as corrosion resistance) we chose a premium grade stainless for good reason; if a softer material is used for a pin straightener, for example aluminum alloys, pin contamination can occur (aluminum transferred to tube pins can form Al2O3). This pin straightener was designed for many years of trouble-free use - you will not wear this one out! A small, pocket size, foam-lined tin storage box is included to store the pin straightener when not in use. Dimensions of pin straightener: 36 mm length x 22 mm maximum dia. ***PLEASE NOTE*** Do not use for severely bent pins - tube damage and glass breakage may occur. Not recommended for gold-coated (or other coated pins) as damage/scraping of pin coatings can occur. May not be as suitable for some of the very old vintage Chinese tubes, which can have a slight variation in pin spacing and pin diameter (however, no problem using the straightener with newer Russian and Chinese tubes with 9-pin B9A or 7-pin B7G bases).