Laney cub 8

Hootsmon

Decent enough wee practice amp for a LP and some ODs around the bedroom?

i have the Fender frontman  10G and it's a bit shit TBH

Jimbro66

I had one but passed it on. Good value as a genuine valve amp but the small (8") speaker and a tendency to be very bright meant I never really bonded with it. If you back the tone right off on a HB guitar the amp will really sing but overall I'd say bypass the Cub 8 and go for the slightly bigger Cub 10 if you can.

Hootsmon

Thanks Jim 

Does something like a cub 10 use much electricity i wonder? i play every night at home and it can last anything from 1 to 4 hours......at the mo running a Laney vc15 with ODs and a wonderin' if downsizing the amp would be a savin' at all?

Hootsmon

maybees icbm will pop in and sort me straight with this...

JamieWakeham

Utterly insignificant in terms of cost. At most it'll be drawing around 50W of electrical power.  If you pay a typical rate of 15p/kWh then you're using less than a penny an hour.

Compared to other forms of energy, sound energy is incredibly cheap. Compare your 100W Marshall to a 100W kettle..!

Jimbro66

hootsmon said:

Thanks Jim 

Does something like a cub 10 use much electricity i wonder? i play every night at home and it can last anything from 1 to 4 hours......at the mo running a Laney vc15 with ODs and a wonderin' if downsizing the amp would be a savin' at all?

The power consumption of the Cub 10 is 50w. I’m not sure about the VC15 but it should be noted on a rear plate if you take a look. As one amp is 10w output and the other is 15w output the power consumption isn’t likely to be so different that it would really notice in your electricity bills IMO. Bear in mind that 50w is less than one traditional 60w light bulb.

Hootsmon

Wow...thanks guys 

JezWynd

I've had a Cub 10 for a couple of years and think very highly of it. Sounds and feels exactly like a simple, small valve amp should. The gain control is very nice, dials in a bit of grit very smoothly (but can be a bit too loud for home play, so it's a bonus that it likes pedals). If you feed it out to an external speaker it can get surprisingly loud (it runs 2 x 6V6's).

Voxman

Laney amps are massively under rated, and the Cubs particularly so. Mines a 12R in which I've upgraded the speaker to a Vintage 30 and dumped the stock tubes for hand selected JJ tubes.  I liked the 8 and 10 too but the 12R had the classic rock sound I like and more features.

Grumpyrocker

I have a 12R too. Classic sound. The preamp is a copy of the 2203 JCM 800 circuit. So you've got classic British crunch right there. 

Voxman

Grumpyrocker said:

I have a 12R too. Classic sound. The preamp is a copy of the 2203 JCM 800 circuit. So you've got classic British crunch right there. 

Interesting, didn't know that. 

ICBM

Voxman said:

Laney amps are massively under rated

They're more highly rated by people who don't have to work on them than people who do, in my experience...

Voxman

ICBM said:

Voxman said:

Laney amps are massively under rated

They're more highly rated by people who don't have to work on them than people who do, in my experience...

Possibly true, but they are still a lot of amp for the money and if you buy new and register online you get a 5 yr warranty.

ICBM

Voxman said:

Possibly true, but they are still a lot of amp for the money and if you buy new and register online you get a 5 yr warranty.

Yes, I agree. They're not *that* badly built either, but I do find that they're more highly regarded for "quality" - often mentioning things like chassis-mounted valve sockets, but without realising that the quality of the sockets is more important - by people who don't have to fix them when they break down.

They're definitely not terrible, but they do cut quite a lot of corners, some of which can cause trouble. I'd still mention one if I thought it was the right amp to do the job for someone though.

Voxman

ICBM said:

Voxman said:

Possibly true, but they are still a lot of amp for the money and if you buy new and register online you get a 5 yr warranty.

Yes, I agree. They're not *that* badly built either, but I do find that they're more highly regarded for "quality" - often mentioning things like chassis-mounted valve sockets, but without realising that the quality of the sockets is more important - by people who don't have to fix them when they break down.

They're definitely not terrible, but they do cut quite a lot of corners, some of which can cause trouble. I'd still mention one if I thought it was the right amp to do the job for someone though.

To be fair the same can be said for most manufacturers range of amps at the non-boutique non hand wired price point, including Marshall, Vox and Fender.  Both my Laneys and both my Marshall's have required some repair since acquired but only once each.  Amps like the Vox AC30CC2 were supposed to have been a nightmare to work on and from what I've read you had to drop the chassis to change the tubes. 

ICBM

Voxman said:

To be fair the same can be said for most manufacturers range of amps at the non-boutique non hand wired price point, including Marshall, Vox and Fender.

Those, yes - but I disagree about having to go to boutique or hand-wired to get proper quality. For example Orange are pretty bombproof, at different price points largely caused by where they're made. They don't have the sort of corner-cutting you'll find in Laney, Marshall and to some extent Vox amps. Fender are - one or two models aside - not quite as bad either.

I'm not really picking on Laney as such, just that I read a lot of praise for them as being "under rated", "very well built" etc, as if they're a real hidden gem that are somehow far better than their price point, whereas the truth isn't quite as rosy. They're cheap for a reason.

Voxman

ICBM said:

Voxman said:

To be fair the same can be said for most manufacturers range of amps at the non-boutique non hand wired price point, including Marshall, Vox and Fender.

Those, yes - but I disagree about having to go to boutique or hand-wired to get proper quality. For example Orange are pretty bombproof, at different price points largely caused by where they're made. They don't have the sort of corner-cutting you'll find in Laney, Marshall and to some extent Vox amps. Fender are - one or two models aside - not quite as bad either.

I'm not really picking on Laney as such, just that I read a lot of praise for them as being "under rated", "very well built" etc, as if they're a real hidden gem that are somehow far better than their price point, whereas the truth isn't quite as rosy. They're cheap for a reason.

Sure, and I specifically didn't include Orange as they are pretty robustly made. 

midlifecrisis

ive had three laney cub 12r at various time, loved the sound and simplicity of them but all developed faults at some time, had a vc30 which was also great, only problem i had with that was a dirty switch. 

ICBM

@Voxman - to be fair to Laney, although I'm working on a Hardcore series solid-state amp at the moment which is a bit crap, it is a very cheap amp. I've also got two Marshall JCM2000 combos and a JTM60 here, and what utter landfill they are! They make the Laney look well-made. And they were not that cheap either.. so I'll give Laney that at least - better than a modern Marshall.

WiresDreamDisasters