I Got Robbed By The Swedish/danish Government.... |
|
I Got Robbed By The Swedish/danish Government.... |
|
|
|
|
Oct 30 2009, 12:01 PM |
... by taking my car to visit our brothers in Denmark and their lovely Copenhagen, not to mention a meeting with one of the vintage amp guru's around here. (if not the only) I learned that I had to pay 80€ in highway-drive fee for driving on the bridge between Swden and Denmark...
-------- The following is just intended for vintage amp nerds/geeks like myself.... ------------- Otherwise, the meeting went out very good and there were some points of interest that I like to share. The guy (Lars Reinau) is a very skilled craftsman and builds hand-crafted copies of Fender Tweed Deluxe's (mostly) and other Fender vintage amps, though he's not "commercial" and sells just through the word of mouth. Up til now he have built bout 50-60 amps, most of them sold to studio players/studios in Denmark/Sweden/Germany. I was bringing two of my amps, the Fender Hot Rod Deluxe and my Marshall, which is still over there, waiting to get a new heart. What I learned about my Fender amp was the following: - Fender has in my opinion been ripping off the customers since the 50's and still do. In my amp that is U.S.A built (nowadays they make this serie in Mexico,except for some small serie that is even more expensive) they put chinese components, not to mention the tubes that are also chinese and "are not suitable to any musical amplifier", to qoute Lars. - The output transformer is mass-produced, eg. the wiring is no good. - The construction, however, is good - but are pretty much the same as in the old day's, built on the famous 5E3-type circuit, which actually is the base circuit for all tube-preamps.... - It can sound A LOT better than in stock configuration.... So while we were chit-chatting, he was measuring my current tubes, adjusting the bias for the output tubes. (which is really not so sound essential as the most of the colour of the sound comes from the first preamp tube) Then we started to test with different pre-amp tubes and this really blew me off..... by changing the pre-amp tubes (mostly the first) the amp was suddenly able to produce both sweet, warm tones and even to be overdriven at low volumes, without using the "drive"-channel. I finally decided to go for a NOS-tube that produced a little "compressed" warm sound without beeing distorted so easily, since I want to be able to play "clean" at a higher level. An other scary thing he did was to switch the speaker-cable. (this sounds VERY silly, I also thought so until I heard the difference...) So he switched to some of his that are not manufactured anymore, he still got some meters left though... It lifted the clarity of the sound and made it even more responsive, sounds like mumbo-jumbo, but it's true!! Another thing we tested was to switch the speaker itself, we tested some vintage celestion greenbacks, other eminences that he had and finally the one I like the most: the Weber 12A, which sounds a lot more "brown" than the original Eminence. This had to be ordered though, so I haven't switched it yet.... I also order myself a birthday/christmas present in form of one of his amps with some custom features built in. I compared his amps to some Victoria's he had there, my own Hot Rod Deluxe and an original Fender Tweed. And I must say that I'm simply so impressed! Amazing sound... If one has seen Victorias reissues or heard them, You know what Im talking bout here. (http://www.victoriaamp.com/) What he's actually is doing when building an amp, is to take the Victoria concept (which is actually a hand-crafted copy of the original Fender amps, piece by piece) and then using even better parts, some tweaks by his own as well as making it a dual-input amp where the two channels have different characteristics rather than high/low. It's also possible to change the character of the amp (like I stated above) by just change the first pre-amp tube. You can see how they look below.... Specs: Weber & MojoTone chromed steel chassis. Power- and output transformers, Mercury Magnetics USA. Original USA Sprague and Mallory condenser and New Old Stock Allen Bradley and Stackpole Carbon Composition (coal fiber) resistors. Everything is point-to-point soldered on fiber-boards as the originals. CTS pots, Carling switches and Swichcraft jacks. All connections with solid-core cloth wire "Just Like The Originals". Cabinets are Finger-jointed Tweed covered cabinets in massive pine, laquered with shellak og nitrcellulousa for an "aged look". And of course NOS-tubes of highest quality.... The prize will be somewhere at 1000-1200€, which is anyway cheaper than ordering one from the U.S, it seems a little high for an amp just to be used in the studio (since the overall level may be to low to perform any other things that small club gigs), but on the other hand, we just live once.... //Staffay Edit: Btw. Im going to do a investigation on the history on these amps, to be published in the WIKI.
Attached image(s)
-------------------- Guitars: Ibanez AM-200, Ibanez GB-10, Fender Stratocaster Classic Player, Warmouth Custom Built, Suhr Classic Strat, Gibson Les Paul Standard 2003, Ibanez steel-string Amps: Fender Hot Rod Deluxe, Marshall JMP 2103, AER 60 Effects: BOSS DD-20, Danelectro Trans. Overdrive, TC-Electronics G-Major, Dunlop Wah-wah, Original SansAmp, BOSS DD-2 Music by Staffy can be found at: Staffay at MySpace |
|
|
||
|
|
|
Oct 30 2009, 12:07 PM |
Sorry to hear about that fee, quite high fee!!
But you had some great experience with Lars so it was worthy after all. -------------------- Youtube
MySpace Website Album "Let It Out" on iTunes and CD Baby Check out my video lessons and instructor board! The Pianist tune is progress,check it out! "ok.. it is great.. :P have you myspace? Can i to personalize this for you guy?" |
|
|
||
|
|
|
Oct 30 2009, 12:28 PM |
Isn't that because young people were crossing that bridge to go have a drink or two in Danemark where alcohol isn't forbidden for minors ? Can't exactly remember the whole story... The Young people take's the train.... it's just about 7€, single fair. Surely it's easier for young people to get liquers in Denmark, since they do not have a monopoly like in Sweden... but it's not in the old day's when they had no regulations at all.... Sorry to hear about that fee, quite high fee!! But you had some great experience with Lars so it was worthy after all. Yeah, that was the really most important ! -------------------- Guitars: Ibanez AM-200, Ibanez GB-10, Fender Stratocaster Classic Player, Warmouth Custom Built, Suhr Classic Strat, Gibson Les Paul Standard 2003, Ibanez steel-string Amps: Fender Hot Rod Deluxe, Marshall JMP 2103, AER 60 Effects: BOSS DD-20, Danelectro Trans. Overdrive, TC-Electronics G-Major, Dunlop Wah-wah, Original SansAmp, BOSS DD-2 Music by Staffy can be found at: Staffay at MySpace |
|
|
||
|
|
|
Oct 30 2009, 12:33 PM |
Well, at least you have a great experience with the tone guru, I guess it's worth it!
-------------------- - Ivan's Video Chat Lesson Notes HERE
- Check out my GMC Profile and Lessons - (Please subscribe to my) YouTube Official Channel - Let's be connected through ! Facebook! :) |
|
|
||
|
|
|
Oct 30 2009, 12:36 PM |
Not a complete waste of 80E then!!!
-------------------- I'd rather have a full Bottle in front of me than a full Frontal Lobotomy!!
|
|
|
||
|
|
|
Oct 30 2009, 03:06 PM |
ah you had a nice adventure after all so its worth it! Looking forward to the wiki article.
-------------------- For GMC support please email support (at) guitarmasterclass.net
Check out my lessons and my instructor board. Check out my beginner guitar lessons course! ; Take a bass course now! |
|
|
||
|
|
|
Oct 30 2009, 06:53 PM |
Sounds awesome. I had one of those american hot rod deluxes. They're pretty nice, but I agree they could use some tweaking. But man, I would kill for one of those (victoria, lars amps, vintage fender, whatever ). How do they take pedals? Oh, they just take them beautiful, thats why I decided to go for a more "clean"/warm amp since the the light overdrive/distorsion is an easy task when You have the right sound from the beginning. I was trying with my Boss-OD20, and it was excellent, though I have ordered a OceanEfx Pearl Drive that sounds just amazing to get that "dumblish" kind of sound... //Staffay -------------------- Guitars: Ibanez AM-200, Ibanez GB-10, Fender Stratocaster Classic Player, Warmouth Custom Built, Suhr Classic Strat, Gibson Les Paul Standard 2003, Ibanez steel-string Amps: Fender Hot Rod Deluxe, Marshall JMP 2103, AER 60 Effects: BOSS DD-20, Danelectro Trans. Overdrive, TC-Electronics G-Major, Dunlop Wah-wah, Original SansAmp, BOSS DD-2 Music by Staffy can be found at: Staffay at MySpace |
|
|
||
|
|
|
Oct 30 2009, 08:28 PM |
Does he make a 2-5 watt amp?
If so, I want one |
|
|
||
|
|
|
Oct 30 2009, 08:31 PM |
Does he make a 2-5 watt amp? If so, I want one I dunno really, You mean a similar to the champ??? But I will ask him ! //Staffay -------------------- Guitars: Ibanez AM-200, Ibanez GB-10, Fender Stratocaster Classic Player, Warmouth Custom Built, Suhr Classic Strat, Gibson Les Paul Standard 2003, Ibanez steel-string Amps: Fender Hot Rod Deluxe, Marshall JMP 2103, AER 60 Effects: BOSS DD-20, Danelectro Trans. Overdrive, TC-Electronics G-Major, Dunlop Wah-wah, Original SansAmp, BOSS DD-2 Music by Staffy can be found at: Staffay at MySpace |
|
|
||
|
|
|
Oct 30 2009, 09:01 PM |
I don't need something similar to anything, hehe.. If he makes an amp in the 5 watt range, I'd be interrested because I'd need a smaller amp than than my Reinhardt sometimes I'd appreciate it if you'd ask him Hmmm, what do You mean by "small" except for the power of 5W, the size? I dont know the specs or size of Your Rheinhardt other than it sounds good! To get a good sound, I think one 12-inch speakers is the smallest to be used, and the Tweed Deluxe I ordered is actually 5-35 Watts.... depending on what tubes You put into it. The smaller version power-wise would be to use one 6L6 instead of two, and then we are talking bout Fender "The Champ" -model. But I think the speaker is too small to produce a good sound.... Anyway, I'll speak to him!!! //Staffay -------------------- Guitars: Ibanez AM-200, Ibanez GB-10, Fender Stratocaster Classic Player, Warmouth Custom Built, Suhr Classic Strat, Gibson Les Paul Standard 2003, Ibanez steel-string Amps: Fender Hot Rod Deluxe, Marshall JMP 2103, AER 60 Effects: BOSS DD-20, Danelectro Trans. Overdrive, TC-Electronics G-Major, Dunlop Wah-wah, Original SansAmp, BOSS DD-2 Music by Staffy can be found at: Staffay at MySpace |
|
|
||
|
|
|
Oct 30 2009, 10:20 PM |
Hmm, if you like the tone from Reinhardt, I think you could get THD Hotplate, this would reaaally give it another dimension + it has Line out so you can record the head tone.
This post has been edited by Ivan Milenkovic: Oct 30 2009, 10:21 PM -------------------- - Ivan's Video Chat Lesson Notes HERE
- Check out my GMC Profile and Lessons - (Please subscribe to my) YouTube Official Channel - Let's be connected through ! Facebook! :) |
|
|
||
|
|
|
Oct 30 2009, 11:36 PM |
I had a Hotplate for one of my earlier amps, good stuff But I'd like another amp instead, to get other tones as well.. I mean, I love the Reinhardt. But It would still be cool to have a small backup amp for recording. Different amp, different tones I usually record many different guitars in my songs, and I think they'd cut more through if I used two different amps. ...and I have constant GAS! There, I said it Two possible ideas here Audio... 1- you do need some minimum level of power to get the speaker to work efficiently. Sometimes with a small amp it may be worth looking at the speakers fitted... 2- and sort of relatedly. You can get a bigger/wider/fuller sound by adding an extension cab rather than another amp. Just a couple of ideas -------------------- Get your music professionally mastered by anl AES registered Mastering Engineer. Contact me for Audio Mastering Services and Advice and visit our website www.miromastering.com
Be friends on facebook with us here. We use professional, mastering grade hardware in our mastering studo. Our hardware includes: Cranesong Avocet II Monitor Controller, Dangerous Music Liasion Insert Hardware Router, ATC SCM Pro Monitors, Lavry Black DA11, Prism Orpheus ADC/DAC, Gyratec Gyraf XIV Parallel Passive Mastering EQ, Great River MAQ 2NV Mastering EQ, Kush Clariphonic Parallel EQ Shelf, Maselec MLA-2 Mastering Compressor, API 2500 Mastering Compressor, Eventide Eclipse Reverb/Echo. |
|
|
||
|
|
|
Oct 31 2009, 12:38 AM |
I had a Hotplate for one of my earlier amps, good stuff But I'd like another amp instead, to get other tones as well.. I mean, I love the Reinhardt. But It would still be cool to have a small backup amp for recording. Different amp, different tones I usually record many different guitars in my songs, and I think they'd cut more through if I used two different amps. ...and I have constant GAS! There, I said it Hey, who admits, half is forgiven -------------------- - Ivan's Video Chat Lesson Notes HERE
- Check out my GMC Profile and Lessons - (Please subscribe to my) YouTube Official Channel - Let's be connected through ! Facebook! :) |
|
|
||
|
|
|
Oct 31 2009, 01:18 AM |
|
|
|
||