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Discontinued Valve Amplifier Models
Abrahamsson Audio
Manufactured a line of single ended class A power amplifiers that have a good reputation, but are seldom seen in the flesh.
Antique Sound USA
Had a line of high end amps including the PA-4 preamplifier and the PA-2 line preamplifier, the A-8 80 watt mono block, but the one amp that got the most kudos in its day was the A-4 stereo power amplifier, it used EL-34 and was often likened to the old Dynaco D70. Earlier the company also had a range of cheaper models that included an integrated amp called 103 one owner has more info on that model here the 102 and 108 were apparently similar. Their best remembered amp is the K-2003 a single ended triode amp with only a 2x4 watt output, got great reviews but obviously will only work with very sensitive speakers, an old review of it can be found here. Note that the company supplied their products both as kits and fully built and while the build quality of the assembled models was excellent the quality of the kits will obviously vary upon the skills of the assembler, keep that in mind when you are investigating a second hand buy of one of those amplifier, Also this company should not be confused with Antique Sound Laboratory.
Amalgamated Wireless Australasia Ltd. (AWA)
Made a series of amplifiers intended for PA use in the 50's, these often found their way into the home hi-fi market especially on the second hand market. One of their models was the PA 826, a 30 Watt mono model based around the KT-66.
Audio Innovations
Made the Series 1000 preamplifier in the early 90's , a well regarded mid end preamplifier that featured a MM stage.
Audio Research
You can find an user review of the D-76 power amp from the early 80's here, that is I believe a design with symmetrical outputs at 2x75w.
Beam-Echo Ltd.
Made a small range of amplifiers in the late fifties and early sixties, these were designed by G. Lawson (of Lawson & Parsons) and were considered to be some of the best designs of their day. Amongst the amps the company made were the DL-735 30w monoblocks, the SP-21 preamp, the SPA-21, an early stereo integrated amp that featured EL-84 output valves and pumped out around 12 watts. Has a switchable power supply so it can be used in any part of the world. A budget version of the 21 was also available as the SPA-11 that turned out around 6w.
Braun
Had quite a range of amps, the most commonly seen unit is probably the CSV-13 integrated unit from the early 60's. Output tubes were EL-84's, and there are separate speaker outputs for 4/8 or 15 ohms and a specialised output for Braun or Quad electrostatic loudspeakers.
Cyrus Brenneman Audio
Made "Cathode follower" amplifiers in and around the turn of the century, in fact apparently right up to 2003, both pre and power amps, and the power amps were available as push pull or single ended, you can find a review of their Cavalier integrated here.
Golden Tube Audio
This company had a reputation for making fairly inexpensive but well designed amplifiers, at the least compared the norm. In 1997/98 they introduced the SE-845 direct heated triode monoblock capable of pumping out 20w of Pure class A, it uses a 6SL7 in input stage, 300b as a driver and an 845 in the output stage, the SE-85 and SE-200 push-pull amps, both used EL 34, the SE-200 is a monoblock and uses 6 of them to deliver 200w but the stereo SE-85 uses for of them to deliver 2x85w. At around the same time they also bought out a couple of preamps, the SEP-2 and SEP-3, both were single ended triode pure class A affairs and were basically the same unit but the more expensive SEP-3 had an external power supply with valve based rectification, slightly improved circuit and the DC phono preamp built in as standard. Older models included the SI-50 and the SI-50 MkII integrated amps that gave you 2x50w, they are push pull class AB units that use 4x EL34's but have a true class A preamp, the MkII was introduced in 99 to fix reliability and usability problems and it retailed for around USD 1000 to 1300 when new, while it had only three inputs you could add the optional DC phono stage to it as well, note that the original model had a fan but the MkII did not and they shared one innovative feature an auto biasing circuit that used fuzzy logic, here is an old PR blurb for this amp and the scematic for the power modul can be seen here. The SEP-1 preamp that features balanced outputs in addition to the norm, could be bought with an optional battery powered DC phonostage that retailed for USD 100 when new and was considered to be something of a bargain,the SEP-1 was reviewed in issue 30, 1996 of Audio.
The SE-40 power amp is one of the best loved valve based amp from the 90's, it was introduced in 1993 or so and is a 2x40w class A parallel single ended unit that could be bridged in to a 80w monoblock, it offers excellent sonics especially in the midrange although it suffers a little in the bass like so many valve based amps. It also suffers from some reliability problems resulting from the use of lower spec parts than are really needed for the task, which is surprising considering the overall build quality of the amp, there is nothing wrong with the basic design of it, it's just a matter of replacing some of the parts with better spec units in particular the power resistors and is not an expensive or a difficult upgrade, you could also get a version called SE-40SE that had better valves, transformer and other parts and contained minimal circuit modifications in order to accommodate those parts, the original retail price of this model was around USD 1400 while the standard was around 1100, note that SE versions after 1997 had an improved output transformer as well. The USA based company Soniccraft sells scematics and offers upgrade kits for this model, those upgrades are mostly reliability related, the Australian company Trevor Lees Audio however offers an upgrade kit that is designed to improve the sound by reverting it to revision 1 of the amp and replace some of the same under powered parts (rev. 1 is very rare), and finally it was reviewed in issue 30, 1996 of Audio. The SE-100 was a follow up to the SE-40 introduced in the latter half of the 90's, it's basically an 2x 100 w version of the 40 (200w if bridged) and has the same basic topology with class AB attained with 10x EL34 pentodes, the power supply is a 600w thorodial and the list price was basically 2x se40's (£ 1780 in the UK). The SE-300B was a single ended amp from the company that was introduced at around the same time as the SE40 but for some reason never got the press or users that the push-pull variant had, it's a single ended pure class A 300B, no feedback based unit that delivered 2x7w and had a valve rectified power supply and balanced inputs, an improved SE-300B MkII and SE-300 MkIISE versions were introduced in 1996 that had 2x9w with list prices of UK £ 1495 and 1730, the SE version features oil filled capacitors. Unusually for valve based amps all their pre and integrated amps that we have seen came with remote controls.
Greenwave Audio
Had a small line of very good looking valve amps, but we lost our info on them, if anyone out there has that info or has saved the pages from the company's (now defunct) homepage we would welcome if you would send us a line.
Jefferson Electric
This company made a 60 and 120 watt amps in the 30's, more information on this page.
Marvox
A line of valve amplifiers from the Mexican company Margules in the fifties and 60, these were intended as much for home audio as for PA usage.
PYE
The PF 91 monoblock is something of a classic in the UK.
YS Audio
The company holds out an informative page on some of their older models, apart from the models lited there other notables are the The Music that was available in Mk1 and Mk2 variations.
Z-Man
Made a valve based "signal enhancer, you can find a couple of old reviews here and here.