I have an AL-811 that needs a little tweaking.  I know some of the Ameritron 811A amps can send HV to the input connector (BAD!) if a grid-plate short occurs. I have a friend who melted down 3 out of 4 tubes on an 811H - not good.  I've never come close to anything like that and probably won't.

 I see a lot of info on mods for the AL-811 and AL-811H and sometimes it is difficult to know which they are talking about.  There are definitely some differences in the circuits.  Some disassembly is needed to get to the bottom of the tube sockets, where the problems and fixes are.  W8JI has mod kits to sell and tries hard to answer inquiries but he is overwhelmed with work on Ameritron amps due to factory problems.  I've looked at the articles and YouTube videos, but I'm still confused on a few points. 

This amp has a non-functional grid current metering circuit, no meter lights, etc, and I figured I'd bring it up to date while I had it opened up.  I may also change to 572B's but that will be for when everything else is up to date.  

If anyone is familiar with these amps and wouldn't mind discussing them with me, I'd appreciate it. 

It gives me a solid 500-600 watts on CW and SSB and that's enough.  I don't really need to buy anything else, but I have two of these and lots of spare tubes so I figured I'd at least get them running as well as possible before even thinking about anything else. 

(They would also be good drivers for some amps I see, but we won't think about that now...HI).

73,

Dennis/W5RZ