Guitar amps

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Permalink Reply by Stevo on February 16, 2012 at 4:26am

I love all good amps, preferably those with tubes in them. But I personally own two Fender circuits - a 6G2 Brown Deluxe and a Black Face Vibrolux Reverb. Both are Allen amps.

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Permalink Reply by David Loeffler on February 16, 2012 at 7:14am

Personally I useually go through the system with a Fishman aura Spectrum most of the time with my accoustic and I have a Line 6 Spider IV that I put through the system for my electric. I just bought my son a Carvin V3212 with Celestion V30's, an awesome tube amp that I would get myself if I played electric more.

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Permalink Reply by Stevo on February 16, 2012 at 9:39pm

Carvin all over again - I think you should become a rep. I have wanted to play through one of their amps but no one ever seems to own one. I've played the guitars and liked them a lot. The amps have to be nice too.

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Permalink Reply by David Loeffler on February 16, 2012 at 10:07pm

Yes, they are great, I was curious myself but when I got the power amp and subwoofer for the church and heard how good they were I thought I'd give the amp a chance seeing they have a 10 day trial so if for some reson my son didn't like it we could send it back but it didn't disapoint at all, my son loves it and of course I think it is great also but I do so much with Accoustic electric, that is what I focus on.

And yes, it would be great to be paid for all the free advertising I do for them. 

Almost forgot, if you are serius about trying one go to the Carvin forum and ask if there is someone in your area that has one, most guys are willing to show off their stuff and alot of them are Christians.

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Permalink Reply by Greg Newhouse on February 16, 2012 at 11:28am

Ok, you asked...

Stevo's heard all this, so he can stop here if he likes. I started with the Marshall JTM45 preamp circuit, raised the filtering, connected to a 2x6550EH power section with diodes and a dropping resistor instead of a tube rectifier. I moved the bias supply to pre standby switch so it comes up when the heaters do, like the Hiwatt circuits. I used transformers from Mojotone which I assume are made by Heyboer. It's all in a 2x12 combo with Eminence PJ speakers. The caps are from Mojotone and the resistors are plain old 2W NTE metal oxide, since I tried carbon comps and I can't hear anything more pleasant or tuneful out of them, but I do hear more noise. Currently for preamp tubes I have a set of old Matsushita 12ax7's (made in Japan on the Mullard machinery). Wire is 18ga solid which I saved from changing old ballasts in the lighting at church. It's dead quiet when I'm not playing, Extremely Loud and Extremely Clean when I am, and I'll probably never buy another amp, especially an underpowered one that distorts on purpose. (That's why I modified the Rat. Speaking of which, I'll also never spend $200 plus on an overdrive box which is a Tubescreamer after maybe half an hour of soldering and in most cases no more than half a dozen parts. That covers most of them, except the Zvex BOR. And that's another discussion.)

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Permalink Reply by Stevo on February 16, 2012 at 9:41pm

I'm 99% sure Mojotone are Heyboer.

What's in your NOS tube collection beside the Matsushitas?

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Permalink Reply by Greg Newhouse on February 17, 2012 at 12:59am

Just those right now. I have used the current production Tung-sol which are brighter than the Matsushitas, but the Matsushitas just sound huge in comparison. Long, long ago (1988-1992ish) I acquired from a coworker a very early 100W JCM800 head which was basically a 2-hole 4x6550 master volume JMP with the JCM logo, which I played thru a 2x12 cab with Altec-Lansing speakers. Loud doesn't begin to describe it, as four 6550s put out closer to 140-150 watts cranked up. Around that time a relative found an old non functional console organ and a bag of about 3 dozen various 12ax7's including some RCA and Sylvanias at a garage sale, and I got the tubes! Imagine the bemused reaction when I got that excited about a wrinkled grocery bag full of cruddy old tubes! None were Mullards, though, and, regrettably, I sold the amp with the tubes shortly after I got married. I still miss that amp. Priorities...

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Permalink Reply by Stevo on February 17, 2012 at 1:51am

I have used some of the modern Tung Sols and they were the best sounding 12AX7s I've ever heard. Right now I have old Sylvanias and original Tung Sols in my amps mainly because they outlast anything modern. 

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Permalink Reply by Toni on February 16, 2012 at 1:41pm

I like all kinds of stuff, but for church prefer something based on valves, around 20W or less and 1X12 or 1X10 to reduce the beaminess compared to multiple speakers. I'm grateful to have a bunch of stuff, much of which is home made, based on Fender or Marshall and a Vox AC30. I also have a Tech 21 Trademark 60, but TBH it's just like a well-made Marshall MG series, and certainly not a 'great' amp.

Speakers are a very important part of the signal chain too, often overlooked, and for me it's vital to match the speaker to the amp. So in my 18 watter I have a '70s 20W G12M (lacks the treble harshness of the 25W version) in the Madamp A15 an Eminence Red Fang alnico and in the pignose G40V a Ragin Cajun. There's various other speakers & cabs laying around but these are what I prefer.

I've tried modellers from Line 6 and Behringer (older behringer stuff definitely sounds better than older Line 6), but they really are a desperate last resort to me.

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Permalink Reply by Stevo on February 16, 2012 at 9:45pm

Here is what I like:

http://mojaveampworks.com/amplifiers/plexi-45/

They're built like tanks and sound very toneful. Somehow, Guitar Center has one or two come into their used inventory from time to time and I get a chance to play through them.

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Permalink Reply by David Loeffler on February 16, 2012 at 10:13pm

I don't know anything about those but seems kind of pricey, but I know you get what you pay for mostly. Do you get those factory direct or are they avalible in stores?

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Permalink Reply by Stevo on February 17, 2012 at 1:52am

I think they have some dealers carrying them, but it's few and far between. And yes, they are indeed pricey.

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