Champ 12

[what_wires]

I have recently acquired a Champ 12 amp. So far I have gutted the pathetic reverb, swapped the OT with a Hammond 125ESE, and swapped the speaker with a nice old 50's Jensen Alnico. The clean channel is much better, but the distortion channel is still "all or nothing". Can anybody help me tame this beast??

[Marc]

mods to try

I have recently acquired a Champ 12 amp. So far I have gutted the pathetic reverb, swapped the OT with a Hammond 125ESE, and swapped the speaker with a nice old 50's Jensen Alnico. The clean channel is much better, but the distortion channel is still "all or nothing". Can anybody help me tame this beast??

Try the attached schematic mods. I believe these came from Ray Ivers via another amp buddy of mine. They are simple and make a big difference in the sound of the champ 12.

Marc

[vmazz]

Torres mod + this one? OK?

I am a newbie to electronics, I have done a couple of the easy Torres mods to my Fender Champ 12 and had read on here about another simple mod to help with the tone on this amp ( starting to get some nice sound though with the Torres mods and new c12r Jensen). This simple mod was attributed to Ray Ivers who I messaged about and I dont know if he'll have the time to answer. In any case I was wondering if anybody had any opinions whether doing these changes (33k for R10, 330k for R16, .002 uF Cap for R18, C8 remove and C26 jumper) would enhance or conflict with the Torres tone mod.

[strickland4218]

The volume and gain pots in the "distortion" section of the Champ 12 are both 1 meg pots. Replace the "Gain" pot with a 500K and the "Volume" with a 250K and you will have much better control of that section of the amp. Kit can be purchased from Torres Engineering.

[vmazz]

correction to my post

I seem to have misread the schematic with the mods written. I guess I change c26 not c 7. Also if marc is around, It seems like the notes on the schematic cross out r 21 but there arent any notes describing what to do, Im gonna leave it alone unless someone tells me otherwise. Anyways Im really enjoying reading all the stuff on amps. There are some very intelligent folk round here.

[vmazz]

corection to the correction?

Im not so smart sometimes I posted a correction to something I had not posted duh...However I did the above mod attributed to Ray, yet I made a stupid mistake I misread the schematic ..I thought it read c8 instead of c9 ..so I got it all done and fired it up and it sounded ok ...but at about 1/20th of the output, of course I thought this was a conflict with the Torres Mod so I redid everything back to pretty much original specs. Then yesterday I looked at the schematic closely and realized my mistake. Now I am tempted do go back and do the mod as it is supposed to be, but I am still not sure if it will conflict with the Torres Mod(which puts a set of resisitors and caps between a couple pins of the preamp tubes). I have also read some folks opinions against doing any Torres Mods, unfortunately I dont have any idea of what to do to improve a circuit so I am open to any one telling me "this will make it really sound great!" If anyone can offer a suggestion before I go ahead and start tearing things apart again, I could use the input. Thanks.

[Satamax]

This will make it sound better

[coolestmaster]

Ray Ivers Champ 12 mod

I did the Ray Ivers mod and I noticed it improved the dirt section. The drive is more modern. Both channels had less compression as well. But in turn (my case) increased the clean channel's volume.

At stock the clean channel opens up at 1 o'clock. After the mod the clean channel opens up at 9 o'clock. Anything after 10 o'clock distorts the speaker already.

I didn't keep the mod though. But thank you for sharing this anyways.

[heikkijv]

This will make it sound better

Hi! What will make it sound better? Any other hints or tricks to make Champ 12 better ? IŽd be grateful.