What Amp Did You Expect To Be Rubbish But Surprised You?

gubble

Following the recent 'I spent all my money on the amp I really wanted and it was pants' thread, i thought this could be interesting and I'll get the ball rollowing.

I give you the hidden gem in my collection, The Epiphone Firefly 30 DSP

Firstly I have to say the Overdrive channel is utterly horrible. Really It's not good. The clean channel for a solid state 30 watt 1x10 combo is however flippin' brilliant.

I genuinley cannot remember why I bought this amp but I do love the clean sound it produces. It's quite loud too and looks great !

ICBM

The mighty LEEM KA-1210 Pro Multiple Amplifier.

These come as either Leem or Meridian, and in two cabinet styles - this is the earlier one which looks a bit like a cheap Marshall copy, and a later slightly better carpet-covered angled-back one. I acquired it for £40 from a shop that was closing down and becoming an online-only retailer - it wasn't quite in good enough cosmetic condition for them to sell as new, and I thought I would just move it on for £50 or £60 to anyone who wanted a karaoke amp.

But it's much better than that. It's very versatile with all those different channels, powerful at 100W and sounds genuinely quite good - not brilliant, but far from poor, partly helped by having a really decent heavy-magnet 12" speaker. The acoustic/electric instrument channel can a bit scratchy-sounding if you turn it up too much and the EQ is a little odd, and there's a bit more background noise than you might ideally want, but at normal volume you don't notice it. I fitted it with a switch to turn the piezo horn off, which helps if you're not putting anything with much high-end through it.

I've used it for everything from small-room acoustic-duo gigs to playing bass on a radio show (I had taken it as a 'universal backup', which it's very handy for) and being the PA for a children's Hallowe'en party - the reverb is cheap-sounding and cartoonish when turned up to more than just 'ambience' levels, but great for that! So far it has seen off Marshall, Carlsbro, Peavey, Trace Elliot and even AER acoustic amps as possible replacements - not because it's actually better-sounding (although I would say it might be compared to a couple of those!), but because it's not really *that* much worse, and it's more flexible.

So "Professional" Multiple Amplifier is probably stretching things, but two out of three ain't bad .

hobbio

Can you use multiple channels at once and does it take pedals well? lol

midlifecrisis

old peavey bandit 112 teal stripe with scorpion speaker. bought it when I was running open mics and jams , as a knockabout anyone welcome to play it amp, but liked it and kept it in my rehearsal studio and have done a couple of open air gigs with it.

ICBM

hobbio said:

Can you use multiple channels at once and does it take pedals well? lol

Yes and yes... up to a point . I've never actually tried more than two channels at once but as long as you don't overload the output section it will be fine. Being essentially a mini PA in a box it needs "amp preamp type" pedals rather than outright distortion, and you do need to turn the tweeter off if you're going to, but it works well enough to get by.

Gassage

Roland Cube 40XL

Dave_Mc

fender vibro champ (or whatever that modelling amp with tubes was called)

Adam_MD

Yamaha thr10c. Despite the amount of people saying how great they are I was highly sceptical.
I think I had an inbuilt distrust for anything classed as modelling due to the ridiculously shit Flextone II xl I paid an embarrassingly large amount of money for.
I played a 10c a few months ago in guitar center and loved it, even though the speakers are tiny it sounds great. I hardly use my mesa at home anymore.

Cacofonix

+1 on Peavey.  VT Deuce - cost £50 and needed a new switching input plug.

The plug cost me about £1.63 and was a breeze to fit.  The valves were on a pcb which used solder for the traces.  I kid you not!

I had to rebuild a couple of them with wire (for my own peace of mind, really, rather than any real danger) and it sounded brilliant.  I've never heard a bad word said about them, except by oldsters with bad backs and no forklifts.

I moved it on for more than I paid for it, and although the pedal cost me some to make, I still came out about even, so I rented it for nothing for a couple of years.  Only sold it because I couldn't easily lug it about any more.

samzadgan

Peavey Studio 112, 60w from late 80's. Used it when i was in my teens in a thrash band, then stopped playing guitar and it collected dust in the garage. A few years ago i went to oz for a holiday, and found it in my parents garage...plugged in, worked perfectly and decided to never sell it.

ICBM

Cacofonix said:

The valves were on a pcb which used solder for the traces.  I kid you not!

No, the traces are standard copper, but they are *also* coated in solder to thicken them and increase their current-carrying ability - by the simple process of not masking them between the component connections as normally done, so the wave soldering process is applied to the whole board. It's a crude but fairly effective method.

Unfortunately they forgot to make the boards heat-resistant enough so they eventually fall apart anyway...

Cacofonix

ICBM said:

Cacofonix said:

The valves were on a pcb which used solder for the traces.  I kid you not!

No, the traces are standard copper, but they are *also* coated in solder to thicken them and increase their current-carrying ability - by the simple process of not masking them between the component connections as normally done, so the wave soldering process is applied to the whole board. It's a crude but fairly effective method.

Unfortunately they forgot to make the boards heat-resistant enough so they eventually fall apart anyway...

They were solder.  The way I found out was by adding to a trace which had partially melted.  Imagine my surprise when the whole trace turned into a molten blob, and that blob started retreating down the board, leaving nothing underneath.

They were solder.  Fact.

ICBM

Cacofonix said:

They were solder.  The way I found out was by adding to a trace which had partially melted.  Imagine my surprise when the whole trace turned into a molten blob, and that blob started retreating down the board, leaving nothing underneath.

They were solder.  Fact.

Wow! Not like the ones I've worked on, but I trust you. Do you think it had been repaired before, or always like that?

I'm actually puzzled how they could have built it unless there was some sort of trace which could have the solder added to it.

Cacofonix

ICBM said:

Cacofonix said:

They were solder.  The way I found out was by adding to a trace which had partially melted.  Imagine my surprise when the whole trace turned into a molten blob, and that blob started retreating down the board, leaving nothing underneath.

They were solder.  Fact.

Wow! Not like the ones I've worked on, but I trust you. Do you think it had been repaired before, or always like that?

I'm actually puzzled how they could have built it unless there was some sort of trace which could have the solder added to it.

It looked like it had been made that way, from the shape of the traces - more stencilled than laid piecemeal, if you take my meaning.

It was curious because I had to rebuild the trace and the solder seemed to be happy holding onto the board, which was more fibreglassy than a modern board.  No green board paint either.  It wouldn't take though unless connected to an existing trace, so it was fun getting the heating just so.

I added wires to the traces as I thought it would be more durable long term.

randomhandclaps

This is a bit harsh as I didn't expect it to be completely rubbish, just 'meh', but the Jet City 22 head. I saw one for sale locally for £130 a few weeks back and thought what the hell, and grabbed it with the intention of modding it. Fuck me though for a low budget valve amp there are so many great rock tones to be had as standard. It an epic little amp that in my opinion kills everything else in it's price category even purchased new.

Voxman

The Vox Mini-3.  Digital/modelling, weighs next to nothing, battery compartment velcro'ed on, and with only a 5" speaker it looks & feels like a toy.  But it sounds surprisingly good & loud for its size, & it's effortless to take round to friends for a little jam in the front lounge. 

midlifecrisis

im quite fond of this little kustom kgx 10 watt solid state amp with a 6 inch speaker. for a home practise amp I couldn't ask for more, has headphone out, line out ext speaker out and a mini jack input for mp3/cd. cost me nowt as it came with a used guitar I bought which I sold on for more. even did a little gig with a singer and plugged my eletro acoustic in.

ICBM

Voxman said:

The Vox Mini-3.  Digital/modelling, weighs next to nothing, battery compartment velcro'ed on, and with only a 5" speaker it looks & feels like a toy.  But it sounds surprisingly good & loud for its size, & it's effortless to take round to friends for a little jam in the front lounge. 

I got the Mini5 Rhythm for my singer to keep at her flat - I also thought it would be a bit of a toy, but it sounds genuinely quite good, and the features are all useful, even the drum machine.

midlifecrisis said:

im quite fond of this little kustom kgx 10 watt solid state amp with a 6 inch speaker. for a home practise amp I couldn't ask for more, has headphone out, line out ext speaker out and a mini jack input for mp3/cd. cost me nowt as it came with a used guitar I bought which I sold on for more. even did a little gig with a singer and plugged my eletro acoustic in.

Those are great too! All the small Kustom amps are, for some reason. A very underrated brand.

Dave_Mc

(^ and Voxman) Yeah I got the mini3 a while back for a laugh, and it sounds pretty good. Some models are better than others (the tweed one is horrible), but enough are at least decent that it's a nice piece of kit for what it is. It's more fun than playing unplugged when I want to learn a song on the laptop, at least. )

dilbert

Marshall Valvestate 8240. I know it is de rigeur to hate these but I loved it.

Fuzzdog

dilbert said:

Marshall Valvestate 8240. I know it is de rigeur to hate these but I loved it.

I had one of those - there really were some surprisingly decent tones in there.  Gigged for several years with no complaints!

I bought an 80's 50w Proamp combo a few years ago as a last minute emergency thing when my existing amp threw a wobbly just before a gig and my backup had been borrowed by a friend - bought it literally on the way to the gig, expected absolute horror, but when cranked up it had some of the nicest gritty bluesy drive tones I've ever got out of anything.  I actually stopped playing at one point that night and just stared at at in shock. )