Hi to all,
Just bought a 1974 125 watt All Valve (tube) AC30 top boost! All VOX and made in England. Go Brittania!
What an amp. Paid alot for it but I knew it was a good one!
Questions:
1) Three channels : bright , normal, and Tremolo ? How do you mix them?
2) This has to be the cleanest amp ever made and LOUD! How do you distort it? (without going deaf?)
3) Share any thoughts or practical knowledge, please ...
Thank you in advance! :wink:
... that noise you hear is my Signature Sound ... lovely ain't it?
Man, I'm so envious. A tele player's dream come true.
#2: I think you'll need an attenuator, an overdrive pedal, or earplugs. ...really good earplugs.
Man, I'm so envious. A tele player's dream come true.
... except didn't his Tele turn into a Les Paul?
In any case, enjoy the AC30, luvmytele. I bet Joe forrok_star knows something about it.
-=tension & release=-
I don't think you'll ever get proper distortion without turning it way up. And with 125W, that is insanely loud, so you might want to check into an attenuator to lower the volumes while cranking the amp. A cheaper way would be using a overdrive pedal, but IMHO that would be a waste of this amp (using BOTH together should be possible as well, if you feel like being nasty...)
A cheaper way would be using a overdrive pedal, but IMHO that would be a waste of this amp (using BOTH together should be possible as well, if you feel like being nasty...)
Not sure why an overdrive pedal would be a waste of money -- granted, it causes the amp's input stage(s) to saturate, instead of the output (power) stages. Nevertheless, this is a completely different effect than that provided by a power attenuator, and is useful in its own right, should the player like the result. Having both an attenuator and an overdrive pedal would seem to be the flexible solution -- and it doesn't have to be totally nasty either, there are shades of non-linearity between clean and all-out input/output saturations that are quite useful.
-Greg
-=tension & release=-
Ofcourse it is a 'different' effect, and if the player likes it he is free to use it. But, in my opinion, overdriving the input stage using a normal overdrive pedal will not create that typical overdriven Vox sound, whereas an attenuator will. The difference between, for example a BossDS1+Mesa F30 and a BossDS1+Peavey classic (with both amps set to clean) will be much smaller then when using the overdriven output stages of both amps. Or in other words: if you are willing to pay big bucks for a real Vox AC30, it would be silly (once again: my opinion!) to use a pedal as main source of overdrive.
It is indeed possible to use both attenuators and boosters together, but using boosters is still most often asociated with pushing tubes further then they normally would go.
... and as big bucks have already been invested, I'd recommend both, as price differential of adding even an excellent OD pedal is now trivial and flexibility is maximized.
Boosters push only input tubes/stages -- the output saturation still depends upon volume setting.
Whatever ends up being the main source of saturation and where (pre or power amp) is again a tonal decision. Sometimes a nice brown output saturation can benefit from the additional edge of some input clipping.
Of course, we've both neglected equalizers, which should be recommended by Joe f-star any minute now ...
-=tension & release=-
... and as big bucks have already been invested, I'd recommend both, as price differential of adding even an excellent OD pedal is now trivial and flexibility is maximized.
Pretty hard to argue against this... :lol:
Man, I'm so envious. A tele player's dream come true.
... except didn't his Tele turn into a Les Paul?
In any case, enjoy the AC30, luvmytele. I bet Joe forrok_star knows something about it.
You are correct ... I need to rename. LuvmyLesPaul!
I was reading up on overdrive pedals and getting confused! I really don't know the difference between a tube screamer and all the other crazy named pedals. It appears the better pedals have tubes in them? Though I have plenty of tubes(valves) in my amp???
I like the idea of an attenuator ... cause this beast is ssssssssssooooooooooo LOUD!
I have been playing for hours ... and am just amazed by the sound. I may play like crap ... but I sound good!
Cheers! :lol:
... that noise you hear is my Signature Sound ... lovely ain't it?
Normally, the OD pedal will provide clean gain that simply punches up one's guitar's signal level to saturate the amp's input stage. The tube overdrive pedals are good to have if one's amp is solid state, or has only a SS input stage (pre-amp). The tube OD would then add some harmonic warmness and optionally "overdrive itself" to make up for the "missing" tube preamp in one's SS amp. You should not need a tube OD pedal.
Most OD FX can be used as clean or dirty gain. The dirty gain on something like a Tube Screamer is not considered all that desireable by many -- nevertheless, there is always someone who loves it.
The attenuator is probably key for your Vox. An OD pedal would just be some tonal "icing on the cake" to give you some variety. In the short term, it would also be a way to get some form a saturated sound at lower volume levels, but again, it's up to you to decide how much you like it.
BTW, I use a Voodoo Lab Sparkle Drive because it does both clean gain and dirty gain in parallel paths and allows me to mix them. It's really sort of a super-duper Tube Screamer. I play mostly single-coil guitars, and they get the most benefit from the OD. You may not see as much value from an OD pedal with the LP.
-=tension & release=-
