ma856 diodes

[TNblueshawk]

Anyone have a source for these anywhere? I'm trying but failing to locate thus far.

[midwayfair]

Anyone have a source for these anywhere? I'm trying but failing to locate thus far.

I looked for months and found nothing, not even an ebay listing for a couple pieces. At the moment except for getting them from other DIYers, I'm not sure they can be bought. I think they were very rare to begin with an AnalogMan probably bought all of them.

I got a couple from BRGPollen just for testing. FWIW, they sound absurdly generic. Seriously. Even 4148s have more character. That might be intentional for "transparency," but you could just use 1N4001s or 1N914s instead and I don't know if anyone would notice the difference with their eyes closed (except for slight differences in Fv).

I just realized I never put these in my listening notes ... they were that forgettable.

Here we go, took me a second to find this without bookmarks:
http://user.eduhi.at/aquataur/aquataur/musicstuff/queen.html
"On paper, the BA278 is a perfect replacement for the MA856 as shown in the comparison chart. Their performance in the circuit does leave nothing to be desired, so that was the end of the discussion."

Of course, those are ALSO hard to find.

[TNblueshawk]

Great info, thanks Jon.

Any thoughts on the 1s1588 then?

[GermanCdn]

effectsconnection.com used to have MA856 (I tried ordering from them, but as soon as I added them to the cart they disappeared, so likely an old stock holdover).  I've tried the 1S5188 in a BB type build, and to tell you the truth, I could have saved my money and used 1N914's, as they sound pretty close (and they're 4% of the cost and I have about 200 lying around, but I digress). 

[TNblueshawk]

Yeah, I think I'm getting the picture here. I'll just sub these things and roll on.

Thanks guys.