Suggestions for the most simple and direct amp design you know of

[Dolmetscher007]

Since I stumbled across this website a month or so ago, I have learned a metric mega-ton about pickups, guitars, amps, and electronics in general. I have just scratched the surface, and have a lot of time, work, and projects between me and accomplishing some of my more lofty goals. Even though, over the net couple of months, I would like to start much smaller than diving into trying to build a high-voltage tube amp any time soon, I would still like to do some research on an amp design that I can use down the line.

My main goal, in the long term, is to build dozens and dozens of guitar pickups, every shape, style, and model I can find, as well as all the experimental pickups and ideas that I'd like to try. In so doing, the idea is to finally get a good solid foundation of what all the different pickups sound like. I also plan to try out different woods, nut materials, bridges, etc.

So finally getting to the point of this post... I would like to know if you guys might know of an all-tube amplifier that is considered to be the gold-standard of good tone. I want it to have no reverb, no tremolo, and no complexities of any kind. I see amps that have a normal and a "high-impedance" input. Some have a "presence" knob. I don't care about any of that. I don't even want the amp to have a built in speaker, because... yup... you guessed it... I'd like to be able to swap in and out different speakers, different speaker box designs... I'd basically like to find an amp design that can function as the highest quality "blank slate' I can find. Any distortion, reverb, tremolo, vibrato, chorus, phaser, flanger... will come from the aforementioned pedals I'd like to build.

Yeah... this is a very long post to ask a very quick question. I think I'm subconsciously trying to pre-address some of the "Why do you want to do that?!" responses I anticipate. Hopefully I've made myself clear.

Thanks guys!

[Chuck H]

At face value I would qualify your desire as both simple and confounded. One problem is that modern ideologies in "tone" have morphed with the newer uber gain trends. This should be considered if this is part of your goal. Otherwise I would say you need to build two amps. One "Marshall" plexi type clone and one "Fender" blackface type clone. They are of such different topology that it's cumbersome to make one amp that does both. But both are relevant to the goal.

One problem is that we are in a tweener sort of position right now. The very best guitar tones are still attached to these coveted classics, but those tones are not achievable without a consequence of volume for the distortion tones. In other words... Those amps cranked up loud. There are many mediocre compromises to replicate a similar effect, but I don't get the idea that your post is about compromise. So how do we reconcile this? Do you have an environment in which you can clone these amps and play loud? I mean ACTUALLY loud?

[The Dude]

There's really not a "gold-standard of good tone". Tone is a matter of taste and everyone has different tastes. Aside from a learning project, what do you intend to do with the amp? Are you looking for a low power bedroom amp, something you can gig with, other? You could build a little 5F1 Champ if you're just looking for something simple to get your feet wet. It's a pretty stripped down simple amp with no bells and whistles and they do sound good, IMO. It's not going to be big enough to gig with, though. I guess we need to know a bit more about what you intend to do with it after its built. It'd also help if you said what kind of tone you're looking for. What's your bag musically? Do you like a British sound, more traditional American sound, other? Do you want it to break up? Do you want lots of clean volume?

[J M Fahey]

All 3 examples by same player, similar guitars and same recording setup, so only real variable is amplifier.

Simplest with very good tone is Fender Champ.
Good enough for Eric Clapton

Requires a good guitar to start with a good sound source, and deserves a good speaker. Just 1 control: Volume

[J M Fahey]

Next higher in complexity might be very simple Marshall 20W and *killer* Rock sound . 2 controls, volume and tone.

No, I´m not cheating: you´ll see 4 knobs on most, that´s because they have 2 channels, some also have tremolo effect, you can just build the "Lite" version: single channel and 2 knobs, period.

[J M Fahey]

Had to switch player for my third suggestion: Orange Tiny Terror and its glorious 3 knobs: gain/tone/volume

of course there are TONS of killer amps out there, no doubt everyone favors one or another, and for good reason

[mikepukmel]

Next higher in complexity might be very simple Marshall 20W and *killer* Rock sound . 2 controls, volume and tone.

No, I´m not cheating: you´ll see 4 knobs on most, that´s because they have 2 channels, some also have tremolo effect, you can just build the "Lite" version: single channel and 2 knobs, period.

Some Holy Grail tones!

[Dolmetscher007]

The Fender Champ looks like the clear winner to me.

It has an on/off, and a volume knob. Sold!

Brand new, a Fender Champ re-issue is $999. Wow! I've done a little investigation, and it looks to me like you could build this little guy for <$99, assuming you really went DIY and made your own chassis and everything. I may be wrong about that. I often massively UNDERestimate the cost of building something myself.

In fact, (not to get off-topic, but... ) the idea of saving money through DIY is probably one of the biggest myths of the century, in my estimation. Whether it's homebrewing beer, making your own furniture, hell... even cooking your own meals... by the time you buy a couple of new tools, pay shipping on this or that, not to mention the cost of starting over when you destroy whatever it is you're making, because you are not good at it yet... DIY seems to offer very little cost-savings, across the board. Yet, the sweet song of "DIY and save money" seems to always come back. Ha ha ha.

No one is safe. Go to a store like Pier 1 Imports. You WILL see an entire store full of overpriced stuff that you will routinely think... I could build something like this that looks better and is 1/2 the price! Then you go to Home Depot, buy some of those black pipes, all the couplers and connectors, a wooden board, some stain, some polyurethane... and at checkout when you see the total, your internal DIY glow immediately fades. $200?!?!? Then, you get home and realize that... wow... now you actually do have to build this thing. So you set out to do it. And it's fun! at first. Then... You don't have a big enough drill bit... the only brushes you have are your nice $20 Purdy brushes, and you didn't think to buy any solvent to clean them, because you usually just use Late paint... so you can either ruin a brush or go back to the store. Oh well... you need a new drill bit, so... back to the store. $38 later, you're back in your garage.

14 YouTube videos and 3 more trips to Home Depot later... you are finished!!! The grand total comes to $324. You drilled the hole slightly off-center by accident and now that is all you can see. You did not know that pine looks like blotchy shit when you try to stain it, and you are only mostly sure that you wired the thing correctly. The thing you saw back in Pier 1 Imports was $129. Your wife OF COURSE really just wanted that thing. So you sit down on the couch, slightly proud that you DID IT... but mostly just shocked and disappointed at how expensive that all was. You decide to put it out of your mind and just get lost in some senseless TV, so you flip on the Food Network.

Bobby Flay on Iron Chef is making Wagyu beef sliders with a Romesco sauce and they look delicious AF! Alton Brown points out that Wagyu beef costs $205 per pound! You look to your wife and say... "Jesus... over $200 a pound?!? I could make those for 1/10 the price! and they'd be just as..." she interrupts, "Honey!!!" <shakes her head, no!>
You pout.

She's right.


You sulk off to play guitar. As you plug in your guitar to your amp, you look at the amp and think... Hmmm... I wonder...?

[eschertron]

Hmmm... I wonder...?

Haha! You're right, of course!

FWIW I got a Fender "Champion 600" (reissue, but never have seen an original) at GC for about $99. Not an 5F1, but can easily be modded into one.
There are kits for the 5F1 from the usual suspects, a little looking should reveal the options and prices.

[alexradium]

that's a good amp,i would include a tone control of some sort to adapt to different guitars and speakers.
I had good experience with the Epiphone valve junior, EL84 power tube and no feedback,nice pure valve tone and no noise.

[eschertron]

The tone/volume controls from the 5E3 (and related designs) works well as a 1-knob control, and can be dialed mostly out to provide the gain advantage that you get with a 5F1. That is the circuit in my Champion 600 now.

[pdf64]

The 5F2a Princeton is a Champ with about the best 1 knob tone control https://el34world.com/charts/Schemat...ceton_5f2a.pdf
Guitars sound so different that I think the 5F1 Champ is just too basic, an amp NEEDS a decent tone control.