I'm looking to get myself a small tube amp. Something like the Valve Jr. So far my considerations are the Valve Jr, Gretsch Electromatic and Fender Champion 600. What else is there in the $100-$200 price range? Thanks!
;D
Just having fun!
I've played the Tiny Terror. They really sound great ... but are made very poorly in my opinion. They are selling rather cheaply on Craigslist now. If I owned one, I'd have to get the orange sleeve cover for it to make it look like an actual orange head.
I like the Tiny Terror combo, but that price tag is the killer. I just want something for around the house. I currently have an Orange Crush which has been a great little amp, but I'd like to try a small tube since there's so many around at a reasonable price.
Jet City Picovalve. Basically a 2.5/5 Watt THD univalve. 300 bucks new at GC, or less used. Any octal based power tube can be used in it. Sounds damn good.
I've got a Valve Jr. head just sitting here - no mods, but I did put a new Mullard power tube and a new EH preamp tube in there—those tubes have maybe 20-30 hours on 'em. Now that I've got my Blackstar, this head is just gathering dust.
It begins to develop an AC/DCish tone at about 1:00, but of course sounds best dimed. Put a good overdrive, distortion or fuzz in front, and you can get some seriously heavy sounds. You'll need a cabinet; I've run this through 1x12, 2x12, and 4x12 cabinets with success.
I'll let it go for $75 plus shipping (I have no idea of what shipping will cost, but I'm in New Mexico).
If yer interested, lemme know.
I've got a Fender Champion 600 and it sounds great! much warmer than the older silver face champs. It breaks up really good when you crank it. I love it!
I modified my Champ 600 with the Mercury Magnetics kit and it really sounds great. The Vox AC4 is also a cool amp and I think sounds better than the Champ when comparing two stock models. For around $300 and some patience you can often find a Silvertone 1482...sometimes referred to as a poor man's Tweed Deluxe.
Quote from: RacerX on December 28, 2010, 07:10:33 PM
I've got a Valve Jr. head just sitting here - no mods, but I did put a new Mullard power tube and a new EH preamp tube in there—those tubes have maybe 20-30 hours on 'em. Now that I've got my Blackstar, this head is just gathering dust.
It begins to develop an AC/DCish tone at about 1:00, but of course sounds best dimed. Put a good overdrive, distortion or fuzz in front, and you can get some seriously heavy sounds. You'll need a cabinet; I've run this through 1x12, 2x12, and 4x12 cabinets with success.
I'll let it go for $75 plus shipping (I have no idea of what shipping will cost, but I'm in New Mexico).
If yer interested, lemme know.
I'll keep that in mind while I'm weighing my options. Thanks : )
RACERX IN THE HOUSEEEE. Glad to have ya back, Alan. ;D
The Vox AC4 is a great little amp, excellent if you live in an apartment.
I use a Blackheart Little Giant half stack at the house. It's cheapish. Sounds good but looks a little cheesy.
QuoteRACERX IN THE HOUSEEEE. Glad to have ya back, Alan.
Thanks! Good to see all y'all refugees from the ol' Jam Room!
I tried the champ 600 and didnt like it. I own two silverface vibrochamps and they are excellent. They were each $200, a '68 and a '73.
Craigslist on christams eve a coue years agao for the 68 drip edge ;D
I have the valve jr, unmodded and its a nice little head for the bedroom, you can get a great early marshall sound from it with a tubescreamer in front of it and the volume at about half way up.. but i never use it with the stereo vibrochamps and a marshall 18 watt sitting there.
If you can go up to $300 you might find something vintage and being an amp geek, that is the way I'd go. They sound better, have excellent resale value, they can be repaired unlike printed circuit board amps, made in america, you can use em i the studio to great effect , they are an amp you can keep and use for the rest of your life.
Those old gibson and epiphone combos , the falcon and shit like that are just killer. They have the swampiest tremolos too.
The silvertone mentioned above is an excellent suggestion also, love those.
heres a sleeper few know about. fender silverface musicmaster bass amp. they are killer guitar amps and when i see them for sale they are in the $150-300 range cause everyone thinks they are just underpowered bass amps. They put out more power than a princeton tho so they are giggable guitar amps, in fact my guitar lpayer currently gigs this amp so he doesnt have to bring his 64 princeton. amazing tone he gets from the thing and his was free for fixing another amp for some guy.
another favorite, the gibson falcon
What about Alamo stuff? I just got one for free through an ad I run on Craigslist. I offer to haul peoples junk equipment off for free. ;D I get a little bit out of it. Anywhos, this amp is missing the tubes are missing so I'm gonna replace the tubes and see what happens. Just wondering if anybody has any comments on the Alamo stuff.
You could have a nice little score there, providing it works with new tubes. Which model is it? Alamo was in business for a long time, but their small tube amps are well regarded.
The dirt on that tremolo is fucking GODLY.
Every Alamo I've ever played has been kind of balls in terms of clean, but the raunch makes up for it...
Chovie, it's a Montclair Reverb 2565. And that Musicmaster Bass amp? I missed one at a pawn shop a few months ago for $80. I had no idea what it was, but I figured Made In The USA Fender for $80 I couldn't go wrong. Unfortunately I didn't have the cash in my pocket. Went back a week later on payday and it was gone.
Thats a score. Supposed to be similar to a fender deluxe(the best guitar amp ever made). Get some new tubes in there, it may need a cap job too. Tubes and caps and labor can be expensive so even tho free, you'll still be sinking a little dough into this one. Im guessing it would be worth it tho. It appears to have an SS preamp which is unfortunate. i bet the trem and reverb are great tho.
Quote from: Chovie D on December 31, 2010, 11:46:07 AM
Thats a score. Supposed to be similar to a fender deluxe(the best guitar amp ever made). Get some new tubes in there, it may need a cap job too. Tubes and caps and labor can be expensive so even tho free, you'll still be sinking a little dough into this one. Im guessing it would be worth it tho. It appears to have an SS preamp which is unfortunate. i bet the trem and reverb are great tho.
Musicman HD212, HD130... etc.
I have to admit that I am a solid state fan. Which is probably because all my first amps (Kustom, Randall, Peavey) were solid state, so they sound more natural to me. So, a solid state preamp is no big deal. I'll really only have to lay out cash for parts since I have a friend that can help me out with the labor side. Even if I really end up upside down on the cash side to what it's really worth, I think it's worth saving if they are well regarded amps.
Quote from: SunnO))) on December 31, 2010, 12:10:22 PM
Quote from: Chovie D on December 31, 2010, 11:46:07 AM
Thats a score. Supposed to be similar to a fender deluxe(the best guitar amp ever made). Get some new tubes in there, it may need a cap job too. Tubes and caps and labor can be expensive so even tho free, you'll still be sinking a little dough into this one. Im guessing it would be worth it tho. It appears to have an SS preamp which is unfortunate. i bet the trem and reverb are great tho.
Musicman HD212, HD130... etc.
Yes I own a 70's musicman with the SS pre, it is unfortunate in that amp as well. Leo Fender was an old school electrical engineer and his primary goals in designing amplifiers were more volume with less distortion. Hi-Fi. He never really understood that guitar players LIKED that slight harmonic distortion. Switching over to the SS pre at Musicman was a mistake for him and, those amps , tho still good, suffered for it. Its one reason the HD130 makes a better bass amp than guitar amp. Im sure its still a good little amp, it does appear to have one tube for the trem and reverb which is a great thing. For me part of the charm of these little combo tube amps is that tube pre tho.
Its definetly worth saving and will rock. I saw a lesser model alamo today for $350 at the store, didnt have time to try it out.
I think you definetly scored.
I found a guy that's building me a narrow panel tweed box for my Champ so I can rehouse it as a 1x12...I'm excited to be able to switch between the two cabs and speaker sizes.
That's a really cool idea. Hope it works out well for you!
I've got a '65 gibson falcon, and I swear it's an amazing little amp. ugly, but hey. I can't remember what I paid for it, but it was either 60 something or maybe about $100. People know about them now, so they go for quite a bit more. I wish it had more power, but as it is it's totally useable with the addition of a speaker jack, then going into a bigger cabinet. Parker from radio moscow uses an old gibson titan head, which is similar to my falcon (I a/b'ed them), but his doesn't have that godly reverb or tremolo that really makes the amp what it is.
Vox AC4 or AC4TV. I'm probably gonna pick one up very soon. Supposed to be pretty sweet and not too expensive.
I vote for Vox!
Reviving this old thread based on the magic of search. Just at work now on lunch, so only took a skim through the already posted suggestions. Anything new anyone wants to add? Seems a lot of the original suggestions were very small, though I'm open to anything up to about 20 watts. I'd like to find something that sounds good for home practice that isn't too loud, records well, and possibly workable in a small gig situation - though I have other amps of course for gigs if need be. Still - getting lazier in my old age and something I can carry with one hand is appealing.
Thanks all!
Aha.
Check this out, then:
one day imma get me a orange or15 or a hovercraft dwarvenaut
Always been a fan of the Bassman. 50W isn't exactly "small" but they're pretty rad. MusicMaster is also a good find. I have a single-knob Epi Blues Jr. It's OK for practice at home, but pretty much a one trick pony and not that awesome.
I've got a pretty big boner to try this thing out, but so far the guy hasn't got back to me:
http://vancouver.craigslist.ca/pml/msg/5335707690.html (http://vancouver.craigslist.ca/pml/msg/5335707690.html)
i scored one off the floor in GC for $249: Egnator Tweaker 15
it has 3 tone stacks and a bunch of other "tweaks"
so for playing around you can really change the sound of the amp.
I like the AC3 tone stack and sort of a deeper, less tight settings
however, the marshall tone stack and modern input settings is the one to impress guests. it screams.
anyway, I've had it for a year and still haven't explored it fully
http://www.egnateramps.com/EgnaterProducts/Tweaker/TweakerHead/TweakerHead.html
(http://www.egnateramps.com/EgnaterProducts/Tweaker/TweakerHead/assets/TweakerHead.jpg)
here is a demo by this Swedish guy. he really works it out nicely. I like the 4min sound and the 6min sound a lot
he is using the egantor 1x12 which has a 30watt greenback in it, which is why I didn't buy it because it was as much as the amp
here is a real tweak demo, flip a switch, play, flip another switch, play, etc. also a great demo. check out the 3min mark
Yeah, there is one of the Egnater's on the local craigslist so I might have to check it out. They want $450 CND for it though, which seems a bit steep. I also was kinda hoping for a combo. I like the idea of a grab and go amp. Not ruling out a head mind you, but I don't own a single combo either.
i use the egnator as a pre-amp too. it stays quiet with master down and the gain is the pre-out level to drive w/e other amp.
it is richer than my 1-tube Greta pre-out.
some day i would like to build a rockerverb50 pre-amp section, then use it to drive other power amp sections.
then you could have a whole selection of different power outputs still using that nice pre-amp. it really nice. that's what makes that amp IMO.
Plus it should be wai-cheap(relatively speaking), since there is no output iron to deal with.