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New amp: orange rocker 15

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  • New amp: orange rocker 15

    Recently got a used Rocker 15 combo amp by Orange.
    15/7/1/0.5W power switching
    el84 power tubes
    The idea behind the amp is a natural channel that has no tone stack, minimal voicing components and one half of a 12ax7 then the power section. The dirty channel is based on the topology of the Rockerverb but with 3 gain stages as opposed to four. It has a FMV tone stack and a dual gang gain pot so it has a huge range from hairy cleans to black Sabbath. Reminds me of the tiny terror but with a cleaner channel, tone controls and a more "open" sound but still plenty of gain on tap.

    The stock speaker right away sounded very bright and upper mids voiced with not a lot of bass. Early ratty breakup. Not bad but not what I wanted so I threw in a Celestion g10 vintage. Much darker speaker but still some good high end. Louder too. It was a good choice. Even brand new this Celestion has more balls and punch, and holds bass together at higher volumes for sure. Very good 10" and not expensive.

    The 1w/0.5w modes are ok but sound congested compared to full power, but it's not bad. It's still loud on bedroom mode!

    Natural channel sounds good but I bought it for a mid-rangey dirty channel. I will play with this more later when I get the chance but it's very natural sounding on the natural channel and breaks up early with buckers.

    Dirty channel has lots of mids, decent bass but not like a 40w amp. Still good though.
    Plenty of gain for Black Sabbath. The treble control I like to leave very low, it can add a lot of sizzle. There's plenty of chime going on with the treble on minimum still.
    The mids on or near full gives the most vintagey orange tones to be found in this box, but it has wide sweep of mids control if you don't want it so in your face, and to tailor your sound to different pickups and cabs.

    Sounds good with the dirty channel set cleanish then use your dirt pedals to push it over the edge. This is how I've spent the most time with it but still getting to know it. Too much gain and it splattts out. But it can get a good big muff fuzz going at a decent volume. Nice thick fuzzy sound without getting the cops called. I like it. I use a blues driver a lot and it works well to take it from hairy cleans to big crunch with picking and the guitar volume and I like the blues driver flavor with this very much.

    It is capable of a 8ohm load so you can run it with the internal 16 ohm speaker and add a 16 ohm extension cab or run one 8 ohms can and disconnect the stock 16 ohm. I would like to try this with a big cab some day!

    I used to have an or15 and this amp is every bit as good for my purposes but in a conveniently sized package.
    All in all, not a metal amp or clean machine but a good rock amp for jamming in the garage.

    It sounds way bigger than it looks!
    Click image for larger version

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    Last edited by FuseG4; 07-08-2020, 01:52 PM.

  • #2
    Re: New amp: orange rocker 15

    Hell yeah man. I have an older Rocker 30 combo with the EL34s and a V30 12" and it's one of my favorite amps -- and amongst my 69 Bassman, 90s Matamps and 73 model T, that's saying something.

    It's interesting to me that you use yours with your pedalboard. I specifically bought mine to be the amp I can noodle on without pedals. I run it with the stock V30 and a 90s Sunn extension cab with a G12T75 and like to crank the Natural channel to where it breaks up on my bridge pickup on 10 but cleans up on the neck, then I match the volume on the gain channel and set it as heavy as possible without maxing the gain. I actually like the way it sounds with all 3 EQ knobs cranked hahaha. Then I just use the foot switch and it covers most of my bases. I need something louder and cleaner if I'm using delays and reverbs anyway.

    I wonder how much would change if you added a 1x12 to that rig. It sounds like the 10" speaker is having a hard time dealing with the gain on the Rocker preamp even with the Terror power section.
    green globe burned black by sunn

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    • #3
      Re: New amp: orange rocker 15

      I'm so used to playing through a blues driver that it is like part of my guitar now
      And the muff is a muff and just sounds really big to me

      What's great about the pedals is that I can get a pretty similar sound at low volumes, just turn the volumes on the pedals down and gain up a little and turn the amp down and boom I can practice at night when i actually have time

      The natural channel I will play with more when I get time to crank it

      And yeah some time I might get a 1x12 cab, I have a an Eminence reignmaker FDM speaker sitting on a shelf with no box to put it in
      But the g10 vintage is twice the speaker that the stock voice of the world was and holds it's crap together rather well I'd say!

      The controls sound good dimed when the amp is very loud but at medium volume I like the treble off as it just let's through way more "glassiness" than I need, I think the el84s add some very bright harmonics when they get going or something
      We'll see what I think about the range of the treble control when I've got the speaker broken in more!

      But yeah overall I really like it and look forward to messing with it more

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      • #4
        I put a tung sol 5751 in v2 (both sections are for the drive channel) and also SOVTEK LPS in v1 and phase inverter. Also replaced JJ el84 which was little microphonic with fresh new production Mullard ones.

        Obliterated a lot of fizzy harmonics that were there previously with a the stock setup which was all jj except a Ruby Chinese tube for phase inverter.

        The amp has deeper bass and it's punchier now too. The mids are more even but there's a little less low mids now. But these really dramatically improved the amp again

        Between the new speaker and new tubes it's great
        The breakup is much smoother and more controlled and the amount of bass seems as good as a 10" combo should give!
        Saving for a 2x12 with g12h30s

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