Upgrade Pas 3 or not?

Hello all,

I was able to grab a Pas 3 on the Bay. It's completely stock except the 12AX7 tubes. Sovteks. (yeah, I know) Anyway, the original owner says it works perfectly. I know if any mods would decrease the value, but what is the failure rate on the selenium rec? Leave it or play it safe and change?

Thanks

A failed selenium rectifier will result in slow warmup and poorly defined sound. Most
properly functioning PAS I see nowadays have silicon rectifier diodes soldered onto the
existing selenium rectifier, effectively using the selenium device as a terminal strip.
Practically all selenium rectifiers fail high-resistance or open-circuit, so paralleling
silicon rectifiers across them should work just fine.

GP49 wrote:A failed selenium rectifier will result in slow warmup and poorly defined sound. Most
properly functioning PAS I see nowadays have silicon rectifier diodes soldered onto the
existing selenium rectifier, effectively using the selenium device as a terminal strip.
Practically all selenium rectifiers fail high-resistance or open-circuit, so paralleling
silicon rectifiers across them should work just fine.

Thanks for the reply!

Where exactly do I solder the diode? Any pics, diagrams?