Good amps for testing pickups that won't break the bank

[Spence]

Vox AC15? That's a terrible amp for testing pickups. It's one of the darkest sounding amps I've ever heared. They have their place in the world but they will give you a false impression of your pickups unless you use a treble boost.

[Spence]

ted Weber is in the US. He really knows about speakers. Ring or email telling him what your amp is and explain what you're trying to achieve.
In my case I found the Mesa Boogie F50 was very hard sounding. I don't play thrash or metal so I wantes domething that would soften it up a little. I was a little bit anxious about spending $175 plus shipping plus the import duty and VAT but he seemed confident that his 50 Watt AlNiCo speaker, lightly doped would be just the ticket. they don't keep stock and you should allow 1 week for it to be made.

Well the speaker arrived very quickly. Beautiful looking piece of kit. i installed it straight away. I knew it would take a little while to bed in but my instant reaction was one of dismay tinged with a gut-wrenching dose of buyer's remorse.
Two gigs later and I'm telling myself that I'm a stupid money wasting tosser.
Halfway through gig three my guitar snob drummer's got tears in his eyes and I'm thinking ' Fuck this Strat's sounding sweet today...'
No the speaker had suddendly settled in.
When I think of how many mods I could have done to that amp I'm so glad I just changed the speaker. I've had so many valve amps that I've dicked about with and never changed the speaker.
Let's face it, it's the end of the chain just like the pickups on a guitar.

[Brock Little]

Dark sounding????
I've found it quite the opposite. I've used several different types of guitars and pickups into the Vox and can't play a bad note with it. It doesn't matter where the controls are set, this thing sounds sweet.
Ultimately, anyone who wants to be happy with their gear has to test it themselves. It's nice to get a heads up from other users out there but you have to do the test work for yourself. I'm sure I'd be happy to go out and buy a Mesa Boogie anything, but I couldn't justify the $$$.

[Possum]

amps....

I think Spence may be talking about a real AC15, not the reissue which again is probably printed circuit, it would have to be for that price. Vintage Guitar Magazine just did a full page article on the AC15 so you know what that means......the price for a real vintage example just went UP ....

[David Schwab]

Your right........You have us cringing Hardcore!!!

Yeah, but check out some sound clips....

Admittedly not the best recording (I overloaded in a few spots) but the tones are good.

Way easier than mic'ing up a cranked amp in an apartment too!

[soundmasterg]

Pep, the vintage Deluxe Reverbs had the blackface circuit up to 1968 models, which is the first year of the silverface. You can tell these because they have a blue stripe running around the grille cloth. Somewhere around 1969 they changed the circuit and the sound suffers. After '73, they changed it even more and put in the pull boost and stuff like that. If you have the silverface amps up to 73, you can make some changes to get it back to blackface specs, and it sounds very close to the '64 DR's, but not quite exact because of some transformer and rectifier tube changes, but its in the same ballpark and sounds fine. Then you can disconnect the negative feedback loop and tremelo and it sounds great for blues. Listen to many of Dave's sound samples and you'll hear the Princeton or the Deluxe, or a '64 Deluxe with some similar mods to what I mentioned above. Many people say if they were stranded on a desert island the amp they would want is a deluxe reverb, and I'd probably agree, even though I love my Vox AC30.

[Pep]

I have to agree that the Hot Rod Deluxe has a pretty darn good clean tone. It is a little weird though becuase the tone stack isn't quite the same as a classic fender. Because of this it has an over abundance of bass. This is a really easy mod though which I have done to the one I own. All it takes is a pair of wire clippers. What I don't like about it though, just like everyone else, is the OD channel. The sound of the clean channel pushed is a lot better although not in the same category as a tweed, blonde, or blackface.

Possum, I agree with you on the reissue DR. They are pretty bad in their stock form and do not sound like the old ones. There is a simple mod you can do to reduce the brightness by clipping a cap on the input jack on the reverb channel. Makes it sound like the non-reverb channel. Still nothing special. I bought a used one and sold it the same week because of the tone.

Another amp I had high expectations for was the Alessandro Working Dog series. I bought a Rottweiler and tried to get used to the tone but there is just way to much high end in there regardless of where you set the tone controls. They are built exceptionally well, handwired, etc for $1200 but they just don't sound right.

I tried out one of the reissue Traynor 80 watt 2x12 and was pretty impressed with it. The problem is that with a good set of tubes everything sounded really good. Great amp for gigs and recording but not for testing purposes.

I might have to look into one of those univalves. THD makes good stuff for reasonable $. What would be cool is if I could find something that works well for testing that also had enough power to play out with. Too many toys out there for my thin wallet.

[Spence]

Well on reflection it seems like a Mesa Boogie F50 is out of reach for most. But a straight valve amp with a 12" speaker is a must really. So here's the deal. It's made by Epiphone. It's good quality, cheap and you can rest assured that it's made in china.



I have seen and heared a few of these; they're quite good and very cheap.

[mick]

I have a tweed deluxe clone with a weber speaker , sounds bloody good although a bit farty on the low end but that's tweed deluxe's , not much clean either but that's what the controls on your guitar are for , no need for any pedals with it , turn it up and let it rip , FANTASTIC... , want more gain max the tone control , the 2 volume controls are interactive so you can get heaps of different shades , one of the best blues amps ever....

Mick

Forgot to mention that the webers take a fair bit of breaking in , when new they sound a bit funny for a few days but once they open up they are great speakers..

[corduroyew]

Well on reflection it seems like a Mesa Boogie F50 is out of reach for most. But a straight valve amp with a 12" speaker is a must really. So here's the deal. It's made by Epiphone. It's good quality, cheap and you can rest assured that it's made in china.

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I have seen and heared a few of these; they're quite good and very cheap.

If you are making pickups for real people, the the evp valve jr is great. I was just in the market for a pickup testing amp. I almost got one of these but then decided I would try and make something like a boogie mite like torres makes. I didn't actually get the crap torres kit, but I got good parts and I know how to wire them together. I'm goint to hook it to an old Jenson p12Q. I'm keeping my fingers crossed and hoping it will do what I want it to. If it doesn't then I'm going to sell it and get an epi.

[Pep]

Spence, I had an F50 at one point! That was the loudest 50 watts I have ever heard! But yeah, I ended up selling it because it sounded hard and the highs were harsh with single coils. After hearing your success with a speaker replacement I wish I had kept it. One amp I am curious about is the Fender ProSonic. Anyone played one? The epi looks tempting. Better tone than a HR Deluxe you think?

[Spence]

Having lashed out on the Boogie I couldn't justify selling it on because of it's deficiencies. I've never been able to appreciate mind-blowing differences by changing valves so I didn't know what to do. Then a friend of mine who make amps ie ; www.mango-amps.com came over with one of his valve heads rigged up with some alnico celestions. I was astonished at that sound. it promted me to look into alnico speakers, hence the Weber. I'd be the first to accept I'd made a mistake if it was crap but no, it's made an incredible difference.

I don't know much about other amps other than to say a good, cheap alternative to a Fender Twin is the Guyatone Twin reverb which is a good copy. I had one for years and it was really clean. I sold it last year for £150 which broke my heart.

[corduroyew]

Spence, I had an F50 at one point! That was the loudest 50 watts I have ever heard! But yeah, I ended up selling it because it sounded hard and the highs were harsh with single coils. After hearing your success with a speaker replacement I wish I had kept it. One amp I am curious about is the Fender ProSonic. Anyone played one? The epi looks tempting. Better tone than a HR Deluxe you think?

Nope, it doesn't have better tone the the HR Delux but when it is 340 quid cheaper then you can't realy expect it to. The Epi gives you good sound for less than 100 quid. If you know your way around a soldering irion, you can add all sorts of mods to the epi like a gain switch, master volume, put in a switch to take it from pentode to triode. All these thing are great little features and if you have done these things and you are running into the right speaker then you can really give something like the HR Delux a run for it's money. You won't be able to play loud, and you still wount sound like the HR Delux, but you can sound as good. The great the about the epi VJ is the simplicity. When new, it's just a volume knob so it gives you a simple, honest sound. Infortunatly we need to test what our pickups sound like at extreams so you will need to do some mods to really make the amp work for you.

[Possum]

best modern amp....

I don't know the model number but the best damn modern amp I have heard and the only one I've ever heard worth a shit in my opinion, is a Victoria that has two power tube spots in it; you can use a bunch of different power tubes in it 6l6, 6v6 el84, blah blah, use only one power tube or two. I've never heard such a sweet amp in my life, with one 6v6 it just freaking kills, with two 6l6's its loud enough for most gigs. It sounds like an old amp, pricey at $2200 I think. The rest of their amps suck that I've heard, they all sound too new too hard edged. If anyone knows what amp Im talking about let me know.

[Nic the Nerd]

test amp

Your right........You have us cringing Hardcore!!!

Yep, I'm cringing here.