natural valve distortion

absolutley. having the amp cranked and the guitar volume low you sound loud but clean. then with the pinky you turn the volume knob up thus increasing the guitar's output to the amp and you have overdrive or distortion. it is awesome. the resultant sound becomes a roar full of breath and depth.
unfortunatley for most of us we cannot ever turn opur amps up to Ten.
to achieve that effect I use a stomp box (Tubescreamer). I will set that output at noon (which is pretty loud). then I have my guitar volume knob at half. leaving the tubescreamer on I have some dirt, but mostly clean sound. but when I crank the guitar vol knob I get the roar. if I standin front of my amp I can fdeel the air pressure on my legs.
awesome.

thanks. im still not sure i understand but from your enthusiasm now know i want to!! my volume knobs on the guitar are not senstive, it is loud or silent im afraid, but if i was to get this fixed, with my peavey 212, what do i need to do to achieve this effect??

also, to get this natural overdrive - surely the volume must increase as i increase the guitar volume knobs? using a pedal i can obviously get overdrive without a drastic change in volume, but are pedals as good a source of overdrive as this "natural valve" overdrive??

That's the standard old way of controlling guitar volume and overdrive. Turn your amp's volume and gain up to what you'd want at the very maximum for that playing session (not necessarily with everything turned up to "Patent Pending"), same with tone at the brightest you'll want, and then turn down your guitar's controls as needed. "Drive" it from the guitar. Yes, it'll get louder as you turn the guitar's volume up. Then at some point you'll hit the limit and the tubes start to "clip," which is where your distortion comes from. You can't "overdrive" an amp stage until it's already driven to the max, so the amp will compress the sound and not get louder past that point. (Except that the clipped sound has more harmonics in it, which makes it sound louder.)

Just to piggy back on what the others have said, this does depend on the guitar. I've notice some don't clean up nicely when backed off or are not very well calibrated (LP studio for one). A guitar with decent pots does do what these guys say, and very well at that. If you ever have chance to play a low wattage tube amp and crank it you will see, i think, what they meant about diming it and using your vol knob. It is not really something you can easily do with a 100 watt amp unless you have earplugs or a stadium to fill up. I use a Savage Macht 12 and it is at pretty much full volume but when backing off the volume on the gtr it can sparkle like a twin. Someone will probably correct me but in my experience this works much better with single coils than HBs.

peace,
Jick

thanks - well my amp is a valvekin 212 and that is 100watts - so in practice this is not something i can achieve without causing peoples ears to bleed? guess ill just stick to my pedals :-)

thanks - well my amp is a valveking 212 and that is 100watts - so in practice this is not something i can achieve without causing peoples ears to bleed? guess ill just stick to my pedals :-)

You can to a point. I think you just need to keep messing with the knobs on that thing and bring your GAIN down a bit. If you dime your gain, that's exactly what you'll get...all the time. But dial it in right on that edge and you'll see what they're talking about. However I don't think it'll be at that "LOW" of a volume.

You have 2 12's my friend... Its just a LOUD AMP no matter what. Both of my amps are 1x12 and they're fricken loud... but two of em??? Holy!!! That's twice the amount of air that's being moved from that signal. :) So shhhhhyea!!! Its gonna be loud. (Evil Grin)

your not wrong there mate - i dont think ill ever use that amp in the way it should be used, it is just far too loud - why i didnt listen to everybody and just get a 112 i have no idea - for some reason i didnt think it would be loud enough for big pubs.

my new years resolution - actually LISTEN to advice given to me :-)

In terms of getting tube overdrive without getting evicted, is an epi valve jr going to be enough fun to play with?

Best,
Ande

It'll still get you evicted. Mine's loud enough that I can't hear my wife yelling at me to turn it down. (She manages to get noticed, though.)

If you want output stage distortion at moderate volumes in small spaces, you have two choices: Use an attenuator, or build or buy a tiny amp, like under a watt.

Your other choice is to keep the master volume low and gain up (or use an overdrive pedal) for "preamp" overdrive.

Thanks! A friend of mine just bought an epi valve junior back from the states (a combo), and I WANT one. Little, portable, screams. True, I've only tried it in his garage, while our respective ladies were at the pool together.

Since it sounds like you've got one- a question: If I get a combo, can I only play it with the 8´ speaker that's built in, or could I still use it as a head to drive something larger when there's a need?

(Maybe I could play it in the garden without getting evicted? I just like the feel!)

Best,
Ande

You can still use it as a head. Unplug the speaker and there's a 4 ohm output jack on the back. I've run 8 ohm cabs with mine, cranked. Won't hurt anything. But there's a proper 8 ohm output lead on the output transformer left unconnected inside. It would be very simple to either wire that to a second jack for 8 ohm output (unplugging the internal speaker) or install an impedance selector switch connected to the jack and the 4 and 8 ohm leads.

MIne's an early combo, they may have done something like that already after the head came out with switchable impedance. I don't know.

In terms of getting tube overdrive without getting evicted, is an epi valve jr going to be enough fun to play with?

Oh yeah :)

I bought an attenuator for mine (box goes between the amp and the cab, allows the tube distortion to happen while keeping the output volume low) and I can get a bunch of different sounds out of it. Without the attenuator, it's enough to blow you out of most any room...

https://ssl.eurotubes.com/cart/index.php?page=view_submenu&category_id=112

I've notice some don't clean up nicely when backed off or are not very well calibrated

You can sometimes offset that problem with a "treble bleed" mod using a resistor and a capacitor across the volume pot lugs. Very inexpensive and very effective.

If you want output stage distortion at moderate volumes in small spaces, you have two choices: Use an attenuator, or build or buy a tiny amp, like under a watt.

And even then, a low-watt tube amp with a very efficient speaker can still seem surprisingly loud. I've got a 1/2-watter driving a 12" Weber Blue Dog, which I think is rated at 100db (1w/1m). If my math is right, that's 97db pumping out when the amp is dimed. More than enough to be evicted from a small apartment, that's for sure. Of course, I could have built it with a smaller/less-efficient speaker ... not! ;)

what is an attenator? are they easy to connect to amps and eare they expensive??