Another question about tube amps

[guitarwhisperer]

I've got a marshall JTM-60, 2 epiphone valve jr. heads, the new Fender Supersonic combo amp with two clean channels (instead of 2 distortion channels), a Fender 5E3 tweed deluxe amp kit from Torres engineering that I wired up myself, and a Fender silverface Champ. If you're handy with a soldering iron, I'd reccomend a tweed champ kit from Torres or someone. Those things wail, at a low volume! My champ barks like a dog and you can still talk over it. I'm surprised no one else has mentioned the Champs! (unless I overlooked someone, sorry!). For more volume I use my tweed deluxe from Torres. It has that creamy Santana overdrive, with my little Fender 65 reverb reissue box. For distortion, nothing beats an overdriven power tube or two.

Vox makes a pedal board that uses a 12AX7 tube to actually physically model the power section of whatever amp your emulating, and in my opinion does a better job than any modeler out there. Most manufacturers use a tube preamp and solid state power amp, but Vox actually does the opposite and models the POWER section instead.
12AX7's are actually 2 miniature triode tubes in one housing, and can be used to model class A, Class A push/pull, or class AB push pull power sections, and they also make a 1 watt power tube if desired. Most amp manufacturers overlook this application, but Vox has taken advantage of it, with quite some success in my opinion.

[ChuckE99]

I went to GC today, and brought my 2619 along. Since I was looking to spend less than $500, it severely limited my choices, and I started with some Fender tube amps (two different Blues Jr.'s, one NOS) and while both sounded good, they had that Fender bite and I really wanted a Marshall growl. Next they brought me a Crate floor model, because they don't carry Crate's in the store anymore, and it sounded fantastic. But then it started crackling and making very odd noises, so that one was out. I tried a Vox but it had a scratchy tone I didn't care for. I tried some solid-state modelling amps then, but didn't like all the options. I just wanted a tube amp, dang it.

The sales guy I was working with came back and I asked if maybe one of the new Marshall SS amps might do the trick, and we went over to look at them, but he said if I was thinking of one of those that, again, Vox was a better choice. We went around the display to the Vox SS amps, and there, sitting alone with them, was an Epiphone "Valve Junior". This little amp (and I stress that it's little) pushes all of 5 watts, but is a pure tube amp. It has a matching 16 ohm cabinet (though the head has jacks for both 8 and 4 ohm speakers also). It has but one knob: Volume. That's it. Well, I plugged it in and it sounded great. Yeah, it surprised me too. The only downside: no reverb. Then I asked the guy how much. Head and cabinet together? $230. Yes, $230. Well, for that amount of money I'm willing to take a chance. After all, if it doesn't sound good after I try it Wednesday night, I can always return it. But I've got it plugged into my gear at home and it is both loud and sounding great, so far.

Here's a picture of the setup. That's my "Chuckburst" 2618 next to it.

[guitarwhisperer]

Yup, I've got two of those.

There's a whole cottage industry of people who make mods specifically for that amp. The circuitry is incredibly simple, but effective.

They're great little amps, very reliable. With one knob, what can go wrong?

I'm going to put a tube rectifier into one of mine some day soon.

[ChuckE99]

Do you have any links for the mods to the Valve Jr.? That's something I'd be interested in, I think. Also, do you have a link for the Tweed kit from Torres? That sounds like fun. (When I was a teen, my dad and I built my first stereo amplifier from a Heathkit kit. It took days [if not weeks] but in the end it was very satisfying when I plugged it in and it worked.)

[guitarwhisperer]

As far as valve junior mods go, you'll have to do a google search for "valve junior mods". There's also some on ebay.

The Torres amp kits are at www.torresengineering.com  You can call the store and talk directly to Dan, he's really cool and friendly, and he loves amps.

He has a few amp kit options available. My favorites besides the tweed deluxe are an amp called the PrinceTone Junior, with a great sparkling clean tone, as well as a really nice creamy distortion, and reverb as well, and the British Invasion,  which is very much like a vox, and sounds very Marshally, but in a good way.

His amps are very sensitive to how you set the controls. They get most of their distortion from the power tubes, and if you have the bass up too high, it sounds flubby, but dial the bass down and the treble up a little and they're perfect. This makes them very tweakable. The clean channels are very full and almost acoustic sounding, I turn the treble down on it, and the bass up.

This is due to the vintage styling of the circuitry. Most modern amps limit the responsiveness of the controls, so that no matter how you set them , they still sound fairly reasonable. Some of them it seems to me like they don't respond at all on some amps (ahem, Marshall). Torres doesn't limit the tones you can get out of the amps, so as a result, you can get some ABSOLUTELY AMAZING sounds out of them, but also some real stinkers if you're not careful! I love his amps. I sold my Princetone Jr. and my British Invasion amps a while back, before I got my current gig, and I haven't had time to rebuild them.

If you get a kit, let me know, there's some conventions that need to be followed for quiet operation, I found out the hard way, my very first kit came out HORRIBLE, but I sent it to Dan and he fixed it up for me for about $300.00. My next three came out awesome.

When I have more time I plan on getting a few more kits and building them. Gotta pay for my new motorcycle first...
Well, I broke my foot falling off my new motorcycle. Maybe I'll build an amp kit now, since I have time!

[holmis63]

Well, i decided to go for a qousine to the Epi valve junior head, the harley benton GA5H, it´s the same head as the epi but with an eq control added. I think there might be to many controls to handle!?

I´m really excited and can´t wait for it to arrive, i bought it from Thomann, including the 12 inch epi cab. I´ve strugled with my super twin reverb enough, 49 kg is to much for my back. It´s going to be interesting to see if it can live up to the many good reviews i´ve read about it! I was at a blues gig this saturday in the neighbourhods and the Guitarplayer giged on that Epi stack Chucke presented in a post earlier! Sounded real good but he had the hole flor full of effectboxes so it was hard to tell what was the amp and what was the boxes.

[sunil]

I have a Dr. Z. Mini Z which follows the same concept of single knob, 5-watt, tube amps.

It does scream, but I had never though of gigging with it.  It has an 8" weber speaker that I'm sure I would blow out with any humbucker style pick-ups.

My excuse was to buy it to keep in my office to jam during lunch.  Never took it to work.

[Mongo]

I would love to have one of these, if just for the fact that it's very cool!

http://zvexamps.com/amp_view.html

[ChuckE99]

There's something about these minimal amps that really gets my interest up. I'm hoping everything works well Wednesday night. If so, I'll be a devote forever. I also have the option of trying out the EVJr. head with my Mesa Boogie/Black Widow 12" cab (8 ohm).

On the reverb front, GC had a Boss Digital Reverb pedal for about $150, new. I just scored one off eBay for a bid of $76 (+$10 shipping). So I have my reverb (or I will, when it gets here).

[guitarwhisperer]

A friend of mine has one of those z-vex nano amps. Actually, it's pretty cool, I forgot all about those! Those things rock, and only half a watt.

[acetan]

I've had a Zvex for three years now.  I run it through 4x12's.  Great, no, GREAT amp.

[jazzzbo]

I think a great amp for someone in your situation is the PEAVEY CLASSIC 30, this is an all tube amp with reverb, clean and semi cruch channel, 1x12 inch speaker, nice amp, doesnt weigh a ton, sounds vry good to me, ive used one on quite a few gigs, it will not cut it with a loud band or a keyboardist like mine playing thru a 300 watt peavey pa, but GO PLAY ONE, at let me know what you think,   the el84 tubes have a nice compressed sound when cranked, but this amp sounds good for clean jazz as well, now the best part, you should be able to get a nice used one for around $400 or less, jazzzzz

[ChuckE99]

I'm smitten with my Epi Valve Jr. at the moment. I had it cranked all the way up to about 3 today, running my 2629 through my TS-9 and the amp and was blasting out the neighborhood. Dang, what a sweet, growly sound! I played rhythm with the guitar volume dialed to about 5, then cranked it up to 10 for some leads. Wooo hooh! When my Boss digital reverb gets here, I'm all set.

[emckenrick]

When my Boss digital reverb gets here, I'm all set.

We'll see

[guitarwhisperer]

With these small tube amps, you can roll you volume down on your guitar an clean it up pretty good, although it works better with single coils. I used to have a strat that had a gain knob where the last tone knob was, and I'd turn the volume down for clean, up for rythm, then I'd turn the gain up for leads, and it would overdrive the input more and produce a really singing distortion. I was playing my tweed deluxe amp most of the time back then.