Crate palomino v16

[DPM309]

I have a Crate Palomino V16 on my bench that was dropped out of the back of a truck. The owner said after that, the amp powered up but the sound is now extremely thin. All of the tubes check out OK (I have a B & K 747 tube tester) and the voltages are all in line with the schematic that I have. I pointed out that the reverb tank was removed and asked if this happened before or after the fall and he was unaware that the tank was missing. I am going to plug in a reverb tank that I have laying around to see if it makes any difference. The next step will be pulling the PCB to check for any damage. Has anyone run into this issue with the Crate Palominos? Anything I should be looking at? I am new to this forum and am a member of several others but they do not deal with Crate amps.

Thanks,

Dan

[52 Bill]

The missing reverb tank probably has nothing to do with the thin sound. The first thing that comes to mind is speakers. Have you tried playing the amp through a different set of speakers? Next would be a broken connection or part in the signal path. Does the thin sound change from channel to channel, etc.?

[DPM309]

Good call on the speaker! I never thought to check it but when I plugged an old 8-ohm 12" ceramic into the amp, it sounded great. I know this is an impedance mismatch but I only ran it for a minute or less. What would be a good replacement for the V16?

Thanks,

Dan

[Jazz P Bass]

This post liked the Emminence Wizard.
http://music-electronics-forum.com/t23279/

[negriljerry]

I'm assuming the owner meant the sound was thin compared to before the mishap, of course - so replacing the speaker would only be a solution if the speaker was damaged in a way as to eliminate low end reproduction, a highly unlikely event. @52 Bill - the V16 is a single channel amp with a pre/post volume setup (they refer to the controls respectively as Gain/Level).

The amp comes with a for-Crate designed 16ohm Celestion (which does sound thin) but putting a 8ohm spkr is by no means a mismatch - I did that with mine immediately and it improved the sound tremendously, as it did with the Peavey Classic 30 which also comes stock as a 16ohm rig (WTF is up with that?). Any meaty Eminence 8ohm spkr is recommended - do NOT be deceived into matching your speaker power handling capacity to that of the amp. I have always gained tons of extra gain, and more importantly clean headroom, by using speakers that are rated at a multiple of the amp's rating.