Been tinkering around with a little project over Christmas. Not sure if this has been done before? It's a pretty simple one - loosely based on a Champ, but with the preamp going to two separate single-ended power valves - one El84, one 6v6. Each valve has it's own volume control so you can mix and match.
Works better than I expected too - each power valve has it's own flavour. Brightness and harsh breakup from the EL84, smoother breakup, fatter tone and more bottom end from the 6v6. I deliberately didn't add a tone control to let the valves speak for themselves a bit. Loads of fun to mix them together, and pretty raucous when they're both on full whack.
The speaker is an old Elac 10" Alnico which works very well and gives it a more vintage flavour too. Cabinet is pine with a thin baffle so it's lively and resonant, in a good way.
Have to say this is one of my favourite amps to date.
Amp covering is a new one ... might not be everyone's cup of tea but I like it
Please excuse the messy workbench ...
Comments
very nice though, come a long way since the Champ I got from you.
IIRC it's pretty common in the DIY HiFi community, and Rat Valve Amps offers it on some of his SE rebuilds
Rift Amplification
Brackley, Northamptonshire
www.riftamps.co.uk
"Take these three items, some WD-40, a vise grip, and a roll of duct tape. Any man worth his salt can fix almost any problem with this stuff alone." - Walt Kowalski
"Only two things are infinite - the universe, and human stupidity. And I'm not sure about the universe." - Albert Einstein
Cool looking amp BTW
"Take these three items, some WD-40, a vise grip, and a roll of duct tape. Any man worth his salt can fix almost any problem with this stuff alone." - Walt Kowalski
"Only two things are infinite - the universe, and human stupidity. And I'm not sure about the universe." - Albert Einstein
In reality most great sounding guitar amps are based on old Fenders and Marshalls, which in turn were badly copied from radio handbooks and built using whatever random parts they could get hold of.
The Blackface amps were in many ways intended to be 'hi-fi' - or at least as close as possible given the limitations of the technology - that's why the tone stack is so scooped, to compensate for the midrange-only speaker cabs.
There are still some interesting anomalies though, like the Deluxe Reverb OT ratio being so badly mismatched... my guess being that it was originally intended to use 6L6s or perhaps something like 7591As, but they found it could be done more cheaply with 6V6s and forgot to change the ratio, or just liked the sound of it anyway. That's what is actually most responsible for the characteristic flubby overdriven sound of them, rather than the 6V6s themselves.
"Take these three items, some WD-40, a vise grip, and a roll of duct tape. Any man worth his salt can fix almost any problem with this stuff alone." - Walt Kowalski
"Only two things are infinite - the universe, and human stupidity. And I'm not sure about the universe." - Albert Einstein