Bought this through the forum a couple of weeks ago. I finally got it down to our practice room last night after a little repair (fell out of the back of a 747, or something, thanks UPS!). It sounds fantastic! The first and second channels are voiced quite differently, the first being a fair bit darker and more midrangey than the second; which is really spanky and bright. Reverb and tremolo also sound good. The first takes my OD and fuzz pedals (boss hyper fuzz, box of rock) very nicely, the pedals sounds a bit klangy through the second channel. It's also pretty loud! I highly recommend this amp, and it looks great!
It's really new, so I'm curious to see how the tone changes once the speakers get broken in.
Side note: comparing my Strymon Flint to the Fender's spring real reverb, the Flint's spring reverb emulation is scarily close. You You actually can't tell the difference. Impressive!
Here's a pic:
Comments
Yup, I don't like spring reverb much but frankly even the boss spring emulations are extraordinarily close to the real thing. I've had a couple of amps with real springs (big tanks, little tanks) and I've always preferred plate or hall sounds except when I'm going for a wild west twang reverb as a special effect.
Nice amp! I've always found the bright channels on fender amps to be a bit clangy with heavier distortion pedals, blackface amps being the most extreme. The best bit of these is they have that more vintage voiced channel that loves pedals and sounds lovely clean anyway.
You can also link the channels if you want to blend the warmer sound with the spanky sound - just connect a patch cable from the second input on the first channel to the first one on the second.
What did UPS do to it?
"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
Hyper Fuzz is my favourite fuzz! More people should own one.
A friend who owns the same amp told me about linking the channels. I'm gonna go down and play it this afternoon. Can't wait.
I bought it from a bloke on this forum and had it shipped to me in Berlin. When it arrived the reverb wasn't working, and there was a low oscillating noise coming from the amp when played loud. The output tubes were f'ed, and various components were loose from the board. The RCA jack in the reverb tank had also snapped. Now I have to try and get some money back from UPS. Luckily, the repair costs were cheap.
I'd also nominate vintage Hiwatt heads.
I'll get some video together later!
A friend of mine had a little Mesa combo shipped to him from France, and when it arrived the valves were all broken… oddly there was glass from them in front of the speaker cone and behind the grille cloth, which is a closed space. It's absolutely impossible that could have happened unless the speaker was deliberately taken out.
Good luck getting money out of UPS. Another friend had a vintage Rickenbacker shipped to her - in the proper Rick moulded case, and very well-packed - and UPS had clearly jumped up and down on it from the bootprints on the box… or at best used it as a 'walkway' in the van or something. The case, neck and pickguard were all cracked - the neck was repairable, but expensive. She got £100 from UPS after a fight.
I really don't like couriers as you know...
"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
We surmised that the output tubes were oscillating when the amp was played at volume. If you held them, the noise stopped.
Even with microphonic power valves self-oscillating you won't get a transformer loosening off, let alone a broken RCA jack in the reverb tank. Fender aren't fools and these amps are built to withstand normal vibration and handling.
"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
Ups are to amps what pete townsend was to SG specials in the 60s.
My band, Red For Dissent
UPS managed to literally smash my DRRi on it's way back from being serviced by Fender in Paris. However it was so badly packed with just odd bits of cardboard around a random box it was never going to survive any vaguely rough handling.
I would counter this with the fact that the replacement new amp arrived in perfect nick, along with the new Bassbreaker 18/30 I bought and my new Rivera Pubster that came from Italy. That was the only thing that UPS have ever damaged (including other valve amps, Gibson LPs, PRSs and lots of Fenders). It's all about the packaging. Or whether someone has been in the packaging rummaging around.
Any issues in that regard?