Just wanted to say that as someone with essentially no tube amp knowledge, your channel is both helping to amend that on a technical level and simultaneously one of consumer knowledge. Great stuff, and very entertaining.
The more I learn the more i realize that I don’t know! If anything I’ve learned that most new stuff is junk; I’d probably have a different opinion if major manufacturers didn’t charge so much for junk, or maybe I’m just old and out of touch.
These days, with a camera in nearly everyone's pocket, it's simple to simply take a snapshot of the circuitry so you can remember what the polarity of the replacement caps Is supposed to be. Or, stick a piece of painter's tape on the chassis and write on that. I'll admit that I sometimes mark things with a Sharpie on the *foil side* of a circuit board if I'm tracing a convoluted, complex circuit and trying to narrow down a faulty area or a defective component, but that's easily removed afterwards with alcohol and a toothbrush.
Another member of closet queen collective! I bought a 1968 Ampeg Gemini II closet queen at a gun auction. Does the stuff in the back come with the amp? The amp looks brand new, and the auctioneer says, "Yes?" When I got it home, a 1968 Gibson Maestro Fuzztone, a Shin Ei made for Guild Wah, a Jennings Copicat made for Guild tape echo, a Shin Ei Univibe, a Clyde McCoy wah, a Dallas Arbiter Range Master, and a 1st year MXR distortion +. WOOF! $3000+ in old FX. The 12AX7 preamp tubes were all swapped out for Telefunken E803CCs. The previous owner had custom built cabinetry for high end recording studios. All his tools were also for sale. 3 working panel X-Y slide panel saws??! THAT SAYS ENOUGH RIGHT THERE! 8 band saws, including a huge Do All resaw as in a 50" resaw? That is a lumber mill type saw. Spindle sanders, a table saw with a 72 inch table and 6 foot extensions. a custom made hexagonal shaper table & 6 shapers, with over 200 bits? Easily a million dollars just in stationary power tools & accessories, and it was all OCD anal retentive immaculately maintained. His guns were just as babied as everything else, but I stopped bidding on the Walther P7 at $3500. It sold for $6000+. in the original box with 8 or 9 extra box mags all like new. $10K for the whole lot. I got the amp for around $800. I'd have bought all those tools but I didn't have a fleet of semi trucks to get them home.
My first tube amp, got it for $275 at a pawn shop in Oak Cliff Tx ( Stationed at Grand Prairie Naval Air Station) 1985 The grill cloth was puke brown from life in bars!
I picked up the Maxwell House French roast per your recommendation and I can confirm it's pretty good for the money. This is coming from a minor coffee snob haha.
I recently figured out my “ noise “ issue!! When playing, working on and recording my amps, I would have a staticy, putta putta putta sound. It was VERY low level, but annoyed me. I figured it was my phone, nope. Ended up being my Wi-Fi extender…. Unplugged it and the problem was gone 100%. If you have any type of Wi-Fi nearby, that is likely the cause.
One amp I'd love to see you improve is one of the newer Supros, not the real cheap ones but the top line ones. I have a 24w Dual Tone and although I like the amp in some respects I think it could be a lot better with the right tweaks. The high end is harsh and could be softened.
I introduced some odd noise in my research lab which perturbed the amps on the bench enough to warrant chasing down the culprit. I had moved my SONOS wireless speakers nearby to listen to podcasts. No can do ... -BigHammerLabs
@@PsionicAudio Well until there's a positive voltage at the power tube grid end of said caps and PTs are red plating... Also, the blue blob tone caps occasionally pass DC to the tone pots (scratchy noises when turning pots)... Replacing the BB caps solves this. Maybe it's the humidity where I'm at. To each his own...
Not sure about wax, but brown goop will absorb moisture out of the air. Depending on how it's been stored the last few hours will determine if you can duplicate it or not.
You may have ruled it out,but cell phone can cause the noise you mentioned,our amps and mixing board have picked it up when phones are in close proximity.
@Psionic Audio Hi, what have been your experiences with Hiwatt Amps? I own a couple and I like them but I know other people may not like the clean sound. Do you have any opinions about them? Thank, Jacky
I have a challenge for you, figuring out why all of these DL4s from Line 6 just up and die. It's got to be something in the circuit, some sort of terrible wiring or short that slowly develops, consistently in all of them. I'm sure you could find some people to send you dead or broken ones to look at. I'd love to hear and see you go through one of them.
I've brought a few back to life just with isopropyl and q-tips on the board and heating up a few joints I can reach that look shabby. Sometimes I wonder if players even use the wrong jack and don't get sound then toss them.
As far as the "mystery noise" in the air at your shop, I've discovered that WiFi can do that........ You already know about the phone. All these over the air signals are causing chaos.
I’m very confused. I see tons of Fender Amps on your channel and all the shows I go to there are walls of Marshal Amps. Am I going a different type of show? I go to mostly guitar shows, Yngwie, Eric Johnson, Vai, Satriani, ect.
Yes you are. Lower gain, small venue acts are the one's that usually use Fender combo amps. Home players also gravitate to Fender combo's. The rock god's are playing the high gain, high watt stuff. Also a lot of those guys are using something digital like the AXE FX III and the Marshall stuff behind them is just part of the rock image.
I do not see many Marshall amps when I go to shows tbh. Maybe when it's more about the individual vs band? Or good old fashioned motorhead inspired bands I see them, other than that, not really. But especially in the wave of psychedelic 15 years ago, post punk, dark wave etc in the last years, it's all bold cleans and good pedalplatforms.
I love your channel as I was a commercial guitar tech for 20 years and worked hand in hand with amp techs such as yourself. I can't help but notice how when you choose a guitar to test with its almost always an odd combo i.e. tele/hi gain amp or SG/super. Seems to be a bit of amp tech trolling?
Thanks man. A little bit of that, yeah, but don’t tell Derek Trucks an SG into a Super Reverb is odd. ;) I’ve been using the SG a lot lately because Fenders are “home base” so I’m getting to get my right hand used to the Gibson string spacing and height, get the controls on auto pilot, etc. Soon I’ll be spending more time with the LP because it’s slightly different.
My main Strat has been dropped so many times. With a Gibson it would have been calamity. With the Strat, sometimes it knocks the tuning out a tiny bit.
Fender logo doesn't have a tail, so that does say mid-'70s. But, shouldn't a '74 have a Master volume. If it was pre-Master Volume, the logo would have a tail. Is that correct?
Late ‘84 or early ‘85 when the Fullerton plant was shut down? Here’s an example from near the end when Rivera was pushing the limits of PTP ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-3QFWHZmKsLw.html
Hi there i can see the first 2 filter caps are 220mfd 350v , and should be 70 / 100 mfd 350v, a 45w super reverb with a rectifier tube cant handle that much filterng, and this amp is clearly a 45w, not the later ultra linear super reverb 70w with solid state rectification which did use 220mfd caps
It’s not ideal but it’s not the cause of any issues here. Put it this way: you’re absolutely correct but it’s not causing the problems you’ll hear in the second video (Super Day of Super Reverbs).
Mis-guided... I owned a large backline company for decades and have owned and played one of these since 1978. They are their own beast...nothing like a blackface Super or a Bassman. Super sparkley and wonderful clean sounds. Almost no dirt. LOUD! Not gonna break up at any usable volume. Mine has a master volume...think clean PA, not Boogie. Master on 1 and everything else dimed is still pretty clean. I use mine for country and jazz or super clean rock sounds. If you want a blues/rock amp that has great touch dynamics as it breaks up then buy an old Super or Bassman or Blue Angel or... Great content here...none better. Cheers!
Kendrick amplifier house brand of caps so who made them is up for grabs . The puda puda could be security system or some thing the computer or filming doing . Without being there to trace it down just A KEYBOARD WARRIOR rant at best.
