No love for Fender's Hot Rod series?

[alex1fly]

Re: No love for Fender's Hot Rod series?

I gigged with the Hot Rod Deluxe and my strat for a little over a year in a rock/jazz/ska/punk type band and my experiences were pretty much the same as everyone elses... cleans sounded great, though you need to turn it up to 3 or 4 to make it really sing, and that made me louder than the band. I tried the amp distortion, hated it, tried a couple of pedals (cheap ones though, Boss Mega Distortion and Turbo Distortion), used them for a while, still didn't like it, ended up going back to the amp distortion and just dealing with it. I could still pull off punk typer riffs, but I used a Hot Rails in the bridge so that probably helped. It never seemed to cut through the mix very well though; but again, my single coils were Fender Vintage Noiseless. Shortly thereafter I realized that I was playing with some good gear and a lot of crappy gear, hence my joining of this forum :dance:
That being said, I haven't gigged or even played with the Hot Rod since I got my Mesa, Les Paul, or any other pickups.

 

[Stratcat]

Re: No love for Fender's Hot Rod series?

The Hot Rod Deluxe delivers great Fender tube tone without breaking your bank account. I also don't have to worry if someone spills beer on it at a sports bar gig.:smokin:

 

[75lespaul]

Re: No love for Fender's Hot Rod series?

Yep. I'm a handwired man myself. PCB has no place with me.

Only advice I can give you grasshopper (even though you didn't ask for it, hee hee) is listen with your ears, not your eyes. I thought the same way until I heard my 73 Marshall. I thought it was the greatest sounding Marshall I'd ever heard. Still do. Was I surprised to find a circuit board in it when I got home and took it apart. Didn't learn until then that Marshall started using the PCs in late 73, not 74.

 

[aleclee]

Re: No love for Fender's Hot Rod series?

Aren't Koch amps made in your part of the world? For that kind of $ you should be able to get a Koch and those are a whole lot better than the Hot rod series.

I owned a Koch Multitone for a couple years and frankly I prefer my HRDx. IMO the HRDx has one nice channel which is better than my opinion of the Koch.

Yep. I'm a handwired man myself. PCB has no place with me.

Why's that? IMO, the PCB/PTP argument is often as overstated as the CNC/handmade one. :rocket:

Though reliability can be an issue with some PCB amps, that's more a function of cost cutting rather than PCBs since a number of builders (Soldano, Rivera, Fuchs) make PCB amps that are pretty well bulletproof. I'd bet that 99.9% of guitarists couldn't tell the difference between a PCB amp and an PTP amp built with the same components. That leaves ease of modding as the one particularly compelling argument against PCB...assuming that one is interested in modding an amp that cost what most PTP amps go for.

I don't have any particular gripe against PTP amps (half my amps lack PCBs) but I'm pretty dubious that their method of construction imparts any extra mojo.

I don't care for the overdrive channel, I wouldn't mind if it was a 100% clean amp.. This will be an amp for rehearsals, so I believe a pedal could be good enough for that use.. I use my own amp for concerts..

For those of us in the US, Omega Amps does a cool mod. It smooths out the OD, kind of like Santana in a box. I know that's not everyone's bag but IMO it offers a lot more character than the stock OD.

The HRDx is a wonderful clean platform for pedals even in its stock form.

 

[Tor]

Re: No love for Fender's Hot Rod series?

I owned a HotRod Deluxe and unloaded it after about a year. It has headroom and some dirt to it, but neither sounds were ever really all that desirable to me. I gigged it a few times and always felt like I had to apologize for the sounds it got.

Hm, are you talking about both channels or..? Did you do anything to the amp, or was it left stock..?

I'm lucky to say I might have a possibility on either a stock DeVille or a Deluxe with a Celestion G12H speaker in it. Supposedly it has improved the amp a good bit..

For those of us in the US, Omega Amps does a cool mod. It smooths out the OD, kind of like Santana in a box. I know that's not everyone's bag but IMO it offers a lot more character than the stock OD.

The HRDx is a wonderful clean platform for pedals even in its stock form.

I have come across those mods, and they seem really good. Too bad all things good gearwise are found in the US, more or less, at least for stuff like that..

 

[Hot _Grits]

Re: No love for Fender's Hot Rod series?

I use Hot rods on an occasional basis as provided backline. I put them as first choice on my equipment rider as they have a decent clean tone, take pedals well and seem to be fairly consistent from amp to amp, which is much more than I can say for the most common local backline amps: twins (never know which one you'll get), JCM900s (eww) AC30s (great but also very variable) classic 50s (meh) and rectos (constipated cleans).

Whenever I gig one, I never walk away at the end of the gig thinking I had the tone of doom or anything, but I never feel like the amp hindered me in any way either. I prefer the 1x12 HRD and the 2x12 deville over the 4x10 deville.

If I owned one (did own the pre hot rod deville 2x12 back in the day), I'd swap out the average fender/eminence speakers and probably drop in celestion G12H30s. I'd also do a tube swap.

as far as reliability goes, the only thing I've heard techs complain about is the jack sockets being very difficult to replace without potentially damaging the pcb. But I've never seen one break down.

 

[Tor]

Re: No love for Fender's Hot Rod series?

Thanks a lot for a thorough answer. Might I ask you another question? Exactly why would you want the G12Hs in those? One of the amps I may have a possibility on have exactly those speakers..
I want something allround. Playing mostly clean and funky gospel music, but there are the occassional rock songs in the set list too..

 

[Hot _Grits]

Re: No love for Fender's Hot Rod series?

Thanks a lot for a thorough answer. Might I ask you another question? Exactly why would you want the G12Hs in those? One of the amps I may have a possibility on have exactly those speakers..
I want something allround. Playing mostly clean and funky gospel music, but there are the occassional rock songs in the set list too..

I like the G12H30 with any amp that has pronounced midrange when pushed to overdrive, as the speakers don't tend to overhype the mids. I love older style alnico speakers in fenders, but if I was going for a 6l6 fender amp with good clean headroom and power handling (like a deville), my first choice ceramic speaker would be the G12H30.

 

[Skarekrough]

Re: No love for Fender's Hot Rod series?

Hm, are you talking about both channels or..? Did you do anything to the amp, or was it left stock..?

I'm lucky to say I might have a possibility on either a stock DeVille or a Deluxe with a Celestion G12H speaker in it. Supposedly it has improved the amp a good bit..

The amp was stock, although played in when I got it. The amp had been in one of the practice rooms at Berklee for a few years, but I had A/B'ed it against a new one and a used one in excellent condition. The difference wasn't all that much between the three.

Both channels were decent. The shining star was the clean that had some great reverb to it. But the Drive channel just didn't have anything notably tonally and the More channel had even less.

When I modded and gigged my first Blues Junior it all became clear to me. It had some good sounds. But compared to the other amps I was interested in and was acquiring like my Trace Elliot Velocette (think Plexi) and my Deluxe Reverb Reissue it just didn't have enough going for it. It got loud, but after that it didn't do anything I really felt had it over the other amps I owned.

It did some things adequately, but nothing spectacularly.

 

[Tor]

Re: No love for Fender's Hot Rod series?

Okay, thanks for answers both of you!

 

[Hot _Grits]

Re: No love for Fender's Hot Rod series?

just saw you've got a bead on a HR deluxe with a G12H30. HR Deluxes have a really woolly bottom end that can make them seem murky, so a change to a G12H30 would be a huge improvement in that amp.

 

[Tor]

Re: No love for Fender's Hot Rod series?

Great.

 

[drew_half_empty]

Re: No love for Fender's Hot Rod series?

i dunno about the g12h30, it's only 30 watts

i'd prolly go with an eminence governor

unless you switch to 6v6's or just don't crank the bejesus out of your crap like i do

 

[Hot _Grits]

Re: No love for Fender's Hot Rod series?

i dunno about the g12h30, it's only 30 watts

i'd prolly go with an eminence governor

unless you switch to 6v6's or just don't crank the bejesus out of your crap like i do

True, good point. though a fender running 2x6l6s will generally run at 36w, not 40w. Still, there is a little leap to make there and that's worth considering if you're ramming the snot out of the amp...

 

[drew_half_empty]

Re: No love for Fender's Hot Rod series?

actually the hot rod is 40 watts till it starts to break up, then it's more

that's why the 50 watt speaker in it farts out & sounds terrible about the time the tubes start to break up

 

[Tor]

Re: No love for Fender's Hot Rod series?

Hm, anyhow I got the amp. I am guessing I will be fine with everything, but if I should want another speaker, I'll get a lot more in return for the G12 than the stock speaker.