Re: [Harp-L] My New Amp!




----- Original Message ----- From: "samblancato" <samblancato@xxxxxxxxxxx>
To: "Harp-L" <harp-l@xxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Thursday, October 07, 2004 5:44 PM
Subject: [Harp-L] My New Amp!



Here's my issue with the Holland. While it is indeed a lot louder than the
Fender and with way less feed-back, it really has a much cleaner tone. One
of the things I like so much about the Fender is that the added dirt came
with just a littlest bit of sustain and this little bit of sustain tends to
smooth out the edges on my playing. I don't want all you guys to think I'm a
crappy player or what ever; I'm a respectable player. But one thing about
the Holland that I'm finding hard to get used to is this: When I start a
note or phrase and then finish a note or phrase both the start and finish
are rather abrupt. I don't know what you call this quality but I don't like
it. I understand that this has to do with the fact that more power is
getting to the speakers and I also understand that I'm going to have to
tighten up my timing a bit. A buddy of mine who is local has a Holland 4x10
and I've played it a lot with the same problem. I still like the amp a lot
though.


What I want to do is to explore the tonal range of the Holland via the tubes
and see if I can't get a more dirty voice like I like. I have 12AT7s and
12AY7s I can swap around with on the preamp side but this amp also has a
tube rectifier and I know that I can swap Rectifier tubes without rebiasing
the amp. I don't really know anything about tube rectifiers or the kind of
tubes that I can use. The guy who sold me the amp said changing with
rectifier can have a profound impact on the sound of the amp but I don't
know much about this end of the amp other than that tube rectifiers have
something called "sag". I sort of know what this is but not how to
manipulate it. But I do have an idea that this sag is what is causing the
abruptness I described above. Then there are the two power tubes. These
are both Sovtek 5881 tubes. I don't know what this means - I'm used to 6L6
and 6V6 tubes. I do know that you can get different power tubes that have
the same power ratings but sound different- kind of like the Groove tubes
with the red, blue and black color ratings.

Hi Sam,
Swapping rectifier tubes without rebiasing doesn't make sense because it's a necessity to get optimum performance, and the only tubes that DON'T need to be rebiased are the preamp tubes, which are self biasing. Which rectifier tube is in the amp?? Also, how are your tone controls set? The Holland amps, like the Victoria Bassmans (tho a bit different) are based on the '59 Bassman setup, and that setup usually uses a 5AR4/GZ34 rectifier tube. You may also want to totally roll off the treble to get more bite to the sound and mess with the bass, middle and presence settings. Back in the late 50's, 5881's were considered a higher grade version of 6L6's, having more mids than 6L6's. I personally don't care for the Sovtek 5881's and a better choice would be either NOS Tung Sol or NOS Phillips 5881's, NOS GE 6L6GC's, or for newer production tubes SED 6L6's or JJ's of the same type. I'm not sure about this, but I think that much like the Victoria Bassmans, and the new Fender '59 Bassman LTD reissues, they have a bias adjustment pot and the bias could be set either too hot or too cool for the rectifier tube that's in there, and if the bias is not set correctly for the power tube and rectifier tube combination that's in the amp, you risk blowing power tubes out at a faster rate than normal.


Sincerely,
Barbeque Bob Maglinte
Boston, MA
http://www.barbequebob.com
MP3's: http://music.mp3lizard.com/barbequebob/






This archive was generated by a fusion of Pipermail 0.09 (Mailman edition) and MHonArc 2.6.8.