Fender Blues Deluxe; distortion-capable or build to roll clean?

[Walgraeve]

'llo

Little Question to any of you guys (or girls) who have experience with or own a Fender blues Deluxe; Is this thing capable of giving a nice tube-overdrive without raping both speakers and ear-drums? Because I simply love the deep warm cleans this amp gives, especially with a humbuckers equipped guitar (don't shoot me), and I'm hesitating about buying one, but I like some hair on my sound, and in the shop they simply weren't allowed to crank it up high enough to get even a slightly distorted sound because the walls were about to come down..So is is possible to get some ZZ-top sounds out of it without getting a concussion, or is this thing born to be clean? And if so, do you think a Lovepedal Les Lius can change this, as I love this pedal and I guess the combo of these two might be absolutely mind-blowing

 

[ken361]

Re: Fender Blues Deluxe; distortion-capable or build to roll clean?

I just bought one the OD isnt too bad, I re tubed the preamp tubes. Im using the Bogner Red XTC pedal for more higher gain stuff. At least at low volumes is sounds freaking great. I have to test it loud this week

 

[Walgraeve]

Re: Fender Blues Deluxe; distortion-capable or build to roll clean?

Changing the power-amp tubes to the kind of EL34's that have less headroom than the regular ones already occured to me, but at the same time I consider it blasphemie But it's worth the shot I guess, but I'd like to see what a Les Lius and a maxon OD808 do to the sound first rather than swapping the tubes

 

[zzmoore]

Re: Fender Blues Deluxe; distortion-capable or build to roll clean?

My experience was that the BD has quite a bit less headroom than the HRDlx. That is on the "clean" channel BTW.
Good Luck

 

[ken361]

Re: Fender Blues Deluxe; distortion-capable or build to roll clean?

HRDLx has a harsher/brighter top end with more gain if your going to use the drive channel though

 

[Chickenwings]

Re: Fender Blues Deluxe; distortion-capable or build to roll clean?

Changing the power-amp tubes to the kind of EL34's that have less headroom than the regular ones already occured to me, but at the same time I consider it blasphemie But it's worth the shot I guess, but I'd like to see what a Les Lius and a maxon OD808 do to the sound first rather than swapping the tubes

ON the power tube front...blues deluxes run on 6L6 tubes so dont get them confused with EL34's.

i reckon itd sound superb with a les lius. The les definitely sounded good in my twin and princeton II and i think it would blend even better in a blues deluxe.
Having said that... the dirty channel on the amp is pretty nice.

What speaker have fender put in the blues deluxe you are looking at? IS it the gold/brown special design eminence/fender thing?Youll get a much bigger timbral change with a speaker swap rather than a tube swap. the possibilities are endless once you ditch the crapola fender speaker.

 

[Laughing Kookaburra]

Re: Fender Blues Deluxe; distortion-capable or build to roll clean?

I owned one. IMHO, the amp is fantastic on its own for clean. I did not care for the drive channel except as a slight boost. I would throw your favorite overdrive or distortion pedal on for hair.

 

[zzmoore]

Re: Fender Blues Deluxe; distortion-capable or build to roll clean?

In my BD I changed:
Speaker to a GB12
V1 to 5751
V3 to AT7
good luck

 

[IM4Tone]

Re: Fender Blues Deluxe; distortion-capable or build to roll clean?

It's a Blues amp, so the amount of distortion is modest. This little device ( http://www.ebay.com/itm/METAL-VOLUM...221?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item2ebf2f1425 ) will help you get the amp's most pre-amp distortion at reasonable volume. It is not a speaker attenuator as some think, but I like it's effect.

For higher levels of distortion, the amp takes pedals very well. I also use the matching tweed extension cab. with mine. It increases the bottom end and makes for a "bigger" sound.

Great Amp!

 

[Walgraeve]

Re: Fender Blues Deluxe; distortion-capable or build to roll clean?

ON the power tube front...blues deluxes run on 6L6 tubes so dont get them confused with EL34's.

i reckon itd sound superb with a les lius. The les definitely sounded good in my twin and princeton II and i think it would blend even better in a blues deluxe.
Having said that... the dirty channel on the amp is pretty nice.

What speaker have fender put in the blues deluxe you are looking at? IS it the gold/brown special design eminence/fender thing?Youll get a much bigger timbral change with a speaker swap rather than a tube swap. the possibilities are endless once you ditch the crapola fender speaker.

I have to say the Celestion greenbacks have a special place in my heart

 

[Chickenwings]

Re: Fender Blues Deluxe; distortion-capable or build to roll clean?

greenbacks are nice, except greenbacks are only 25watt speakers and the blues deluxe can pump out 40 watts. I would not recommend that as a combination.
Something in the 50 watt category or more would suit better. Something not super efficient and dark is a good choice too, so you wont get as much volume per knotch on your master (which is your case is a good thing) and it wont cut and make your ears bleed when you crank the amp up a little.

 

[Walgraeve]

Re: Fender Blues Deluxe; distortion-capable or build to roll clean?

greenbacks are nice, except greenbacks are only 25watt speakers and the blues deluxe can pump out 40 watts. I would not recommend that as a combination.
Something in the 50 watt category or more would suit better. Something not super efficient and dark is a good choice too, so you wont get as much volume per knotch on your master (which is your case is a good thing) and it wont cut and make your ears bleed when you crank the amp up a little.

What do you think about the Celestion Creamback handeling the Blues Deluxe, 'cause I always thought of them like Greenbacks on crystal meth, but with the same deep grown, like kicking a sleepy lion in the kidneys

 

[Chickenwings]

Re: Fender Blues Deluxe; distortion-capable or build to roll clean?

dunno. sorry, ive never tried a creamback. The specs say it would be the right tool for the job tho.
I have had good success using a 75watt greenback clone with a couple of fender amps. Sounds cool, but i think personally i prefer some of the eminence patriot series speakers better for fenders.

 

[ken361]

Re: Fender Blues Deluxe; distortion-capable or build to roll clean?

Eminence makes a green back type speaker also 50 watts, the stock USA might be the same thing im not sure.

 

[Chickenwings]

Re: Fender Blues Deluxe; distortion-capable or build to roll clean?

the stocker (shocker) is different to the private jack.

 

[chadd]

Re: Fender Blues Deluxe; distortion-capable or build to roll clean?

I had one of the original BD's and I loved it. Great clean and the dirt channel works for most stuff short of hard rock or metal. They do tend to take pedals well, so that should open up some options if you want a higher gain than the amp offers. I usually paired mine with a Mesa V-Twin and could cover just about any tone I wanted. There is a mod out there to make the volume knob more usable, I would strongly suggest looking into that for any of the newer fender Deluxe amps.

 

[ken361]

Re: Fender Blues Deluxe; distortion-capable or build to roll clean?

they rock good with the Bogner red pedals

 

[Walgraeve]

Re: Fender Blues Deluxe; distortion-capable or build to roll clean?

they rock good with the Bogner red pedals

As much as I respect the brand Bogner and adore their tone, they simply overprice their things, which ofcourse adds to the legend, but can be frustrating for someone who has a rather small budget (I'm still studying)

 

[ken361]

Re: Fender Blues Deluxe; distortion-capable or build to roll clean?

Had my GF buy most of it for xmas present I usually never a pedal guy, I always buy amps for there OD but the bogners got me interested.I like the high end clearness of the pedal and the gain. I had mini rectifer which was a real good but I wanted something more modern and I dont play metal all the time and I find the v30 a little bit too edgy at times. retubing the pre's on the fender helps some for the stock OD its actually pretty good and will get better when the speaker breaks in. I may change it down the line and im sure a warmer bias would help.

 

[ken361]

Re: Fender Blues Deluxe; distortion-capable or build to roll clean?

That love pedal would be nice, get ya the stones sound. I had a Kalamazoo its a nice smooth pedal also