Reversed trannies, stuffed?

[Toney]

Just "debugged" my orange squeezer. Ahem, cough.... well flipped the Jfets around. Man , I've done that too many times. Guess eagerness to fire it up at the end . Still I've often wondered, is a Jfet thats just copped a dose of 9v at the gate likely to be stuffed?
  I've searched and read that although they may still be operational, internal damage may have occured altering their performance.
Is it also true for bipolars?
Its so easy to do and in the cases where I have no replacement, I have wondered how if it may have sounded different non-flipped.
In peoples experience do you go ahead and use misoriented tranny thats received power or replace it as a matter of course?

[Ge_Whiz]

I would normally expect most silicon devices to survive 9V. Germanium, probably not; MOSFETs, less certain. Bipolars are pretty tough these days, and JFETs can have their source and drain reversed without any problems; in fact, most will work normally that way.

[Toney]

 Thanks.
How 'bout a fet's gate?  It's more sensitive, right?
It was the gate that copped it.