What are some mods to get a little more gain from a Fender?

[Smitty]

AA964 vs AB763

OK. Yeah. You're using the power supply dropping resistors from the Vibrolux AA964. 10K to B+3 and 10K to B+4. You could use the values from the AB568 Vibrolux: 4K7 and 10K, but you may prefer the values from the AB763 (Twin Reverb and Super Reverb) 1K dropping from Screen to PI and 4K7 dropping from PI to gain stages. That'll wake things up a bit. You should notice a big jump in plate voltage and current. Which will give you the gain you're looking for.

Swap those two resistors and report back.

[cgoodson]

OK. Yeah. You're using the power supply dropping resistors from the Vibrolux AA964. 10K to B+3 and 10K to B+4. You could use the values from the AB568 Vibrolux: 4K7 and 10K, but you may prefer the values from the AB763 (Twin Reverb and Super Reverb) 1K dropping from Screen to PI and 4K7 dropping from PI to gain stages. That'll wake things up a bit. You should notice a big jump in plate voltage and current. Which will give you the gain you're looking for.

Swap those two resistors and report back.

Thanks Smitty, that did the trick!!! This was what it was needing the whole time; the preamp was running too cold. Now I'm getting plate voltages around the 240-250 range. The amp has more volume, warmth and presence; basically it sounds more like a Fender should. Also, it breaks up nicely when cranked, before it stayed clean even with everything on ten.

I guess my mistake was assuming that if I followed the schematic exactly, I would automatically have a great sounding amp. Not that it was too bad; it just lacked the balls it now has. I should have done a little more research in this area, which is what I plan to do.

BTW: I should mention I went with 1k/4k7. I think this is what the amp originally had in it...

[Satamax]

Nother good trick i've seen on fenders is using the bright switch to bypass the tonestack. Instead of going brighter. Can't remember, who exactly but i think it was Enzo, who was saying making the two chanels able to use the reverb is nice too, as well it puts the two inputs in phase, so you can jumper the inputs. Or ABY them.