Has anyone tried the George Benson Fender Hot Rod Deluxe ?

Telejester

According to the blurb the solid pine construction adds a softness to the tone and reduces the stock hot rod harshness. The 100w speaker would contribute to it being a superb clean machine. To hell with the crappy gain channel, the non master one is the one im interested in. Any feedback or comments appreciated.

Funkfingers

Telejester said:

a superb clean machine. 

The reduced gain factor of the ECC82/12AY7 in V1 is the single biggest contributor to that cleanness.

The only time that I have been able to directly compare otherwise identical Fender amplifiers with regular and pine cabinets is the Blues Junior III.  For my tastes, the "woody" edition seemed slightly nicer. Blindfold testing would have been the proper way to compare.

Telejester

they say the gb uses a 12at7, i think a 12ay7 could sound a bit gutless

Funkfingers

Oops. Typo. ECC82/12AU7.

p90fool

Pine cabs make no difference to me, the speaker is close mic'ed for both gigging and recording. 

It's an expensive tonal red herring IMO, you may as well get a pine reverb tank.

You just need a cab which doesn't rattle. 

Kebabkid

I've tried these amps a couple of times at Andertons and have posted my thoughts on them before.

I don't think that Fender marketed them very well. Forget the George Benson moniker/is it a jazzer's amp as it has more versatile applications with its strong point being the excellent clean channel. I found the cleans to be bigger, bolder and softer in sound to a regular HRD (I don't actually like HRDs). It also took *pedals really well and the reverb's ok. The first time I tried it in the shop and plugged my board in, the guys there gathered round and were very impressed by the sounds and hadn't realised it could handle things so well.

It's a shame they didn't upgrade the overdrive channel as per the new HRDs as that would've really turned the amp into something even more special and self-contained but some people like that channel anyway, but my interest is in the clean channel and as a good pedal platform.

If it's your thing, you've got extremely high, clean headroom and 40 watts whilst being the weight of a DRRI.

The livery is different and may divide opinion but if you can bag one of these used for £400 or less, you'll be laughing.

I play a Divided by 13 and also like amps like Carrs, Morgans and the Deluxe Reverb Reissue (most are boutique and expensive). However, I'd be perfectly happy with one of these and they're not a million miles away from some of those cleans.

exocet

I bought one S/H from here. If you play a clean amp with pedals for dirt it's a very nice amp.
I also bought the closed back extension cab to add some more weight / thump to the bottom end.
To be honest I can't fault it as an amp..although I do plan to mod the OD to make it more useable. 

crunchman

I suspect that some of the improvement is the Jensen C12K rather than the Eminence that used to come stock with the normal Hot Rod Deluxe.

I don't know what the Celestion in the latest version of the HRD sounds like, but a Jensen is likely to be better for Fender style sounds.

I put a Weber 12F150 (their take on the original Jensen C12N) in my old Hot Rod Deluxe and it made a huge difference.  For me it put the tone up there with some of the "boutique" amps I have played.  I only got rid of it because it was far too loud for my current needs.

Niallseroreilly

Had one for a few years, loved it. I would say it wasnt veru versatile... and it was quite bass heavy... it is perfect for jazz in my opinion, but if you want quintessential fender clean tone i would go for a deluxe reverb or a princeton.