Splawn Owners?

ErikH

ErikH

Well-known member
How many Splawn owners do we have here? I think I want one. Last night I laid down my tracks for our demo and I used the studio engineer / owner's Quick Rod through a Vintage 30 loaded 4x12. The experience was amazing. The tone was perfect. I played my new Frankenstrat with the Purpetual Burn pickup for all of it. It was set to the Plexi setting. Killer crunch with amazing sustain. He had it set up in one of the isolation rooms and dual mic'd. Sounded killer not only in the big room with the door to the ISO room open but even in the control room through the monitors, which is where I played thanks to his killer wireless. I was there for 2 hours but I could've played through the thing for hours. So yeah, killer sounding amp. I played through one several years back but I didn't like it as much. It was too tight, maybe from the cabinet? IDK. This one though, wow. The only thing stopping me is the weight and the cost. They seem totally worth it though.
 
Re: Splawn Owners?

I’ve got one...
7e8452d24ded7396a96a491681566dfd.jpg

Anything you need to know about them?
 
Re: Splawn Owners?

I see you mentioned that the previous one was too tight...
One of the options on the current models is a Drop B+ switch which lowers plate current/voltage and gives the amp a ton of sag.
I would NOT order one without that feature. And also, there is a new/old option which changes the voicing from his older style to the newer style. Both sound good but the old setting is just mean as f*ck sounding...again, that’s a must have option as well, IMO.
The other option is a mid cut switch, I personally never use it. It sounds too muffled to me. But the idea was to give the amp a voicing closer to the Nitro model Scott also offers.
 
Re: Splawn Owners?

There wasn't a ton of sag on this one, but it definitely was not Boogie tight. It still had some looseness to it that made it much more pleasing to me. Think Wicked Sensation or Tooth and Nail. It's tight but not so tight that it sounds sterile. I hadn't looked at the control panel on what he had set because the back was facing the door of the ISO room but he sure has it dialed in great. Like I mentioned, it might've been the cabinet that the other one was running through.

Now, something confuses me a little is the different modes and gears. I know there's Plexi, 800 and Hot-Rodded 800. Are those the 3 gears or are there 3 gears within each of those modes?

What's the difference between the old and new voicing?

I won't be getting one any time soon and if I was in the hunt, I'd be looking at used. The tone I had on this one immediately floored me so much that I just had to ask about them to learn more about them.
 
Splawn Owners?

Each mode is a gear. Plexi is gear 1, 800 is gear 2 and super 800 is gear 3.
Gear 1 is very harmonically rich with a strong midrange. Obviously modeled after the plexi.
Gear 2/3 add more low end thump and gain staging. I seldom use gear 3...it just has more gain than I could ever need.
However, the clarity in the amp is ridiculously good at all gain/gear settings. It’s truly amazing how Scott can get so much saturation and not have the amp turn to mud. Hats off to that feat of engineering.

The older amps don’t have the loop volume built in. So if you decide to go used you want to make sure you get one with that feature. Without it the amp is just too loud for just about any application.
You could use an attenuators as well I suppose.

The old/ new is just a small variation in the voicing of the circuit.
Iirc, the old is the voicing used in 2006 and earlier models. For some reason Scott decided to change it post 2006 and people began asking him to make the amp like the older models, hence the switchable option. I feel the old setting has a meaner growl to it. It is subtle but I can definitely hear the difference. I keep it on the old setting
 
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Re: Splawn Owners?

Thanks for the info.

Is the Loop Volume a PPIMV or is it like putting a volume box in the effects loop?
 
Splawn Owners?

ErikH said:
Thanks for the info.

Is the Loop Volume a PPIMV or is it like putting a volume box in the effects loop?
Click to expand...

Like a volume box. Except to my ears I don’t hear any tone loss.
It’s a standard feature on the more recent builds.
 
Re: Splawn Owners?

Gtrjunior said:
Like a volume box. Except to my ears I don’t hear any tone loss.
It’s a standard feature on the more recent builds.
Click to expand...

I figured it was the same by the wording but had to be sure. I have a volume box that I used with my Marshall when I had it. It sure made it easier to get the master volume past that sensitive spot. I would set the master at 5 and choke it back with the volume box. That's cool that he made it a standard feature.
 
Re: Splawn Owners?

I'm an accidental Splawn nut... I ended up with a Streetrod as part of a trade and I thought it was a metal amp so I thought I would sell it.

But the first time I plugged in I immediately had 2 awesome sounds...

A tight clean tone that I've never been able to get with a tube amp and a heavily saturated, singing lead tone.

It only took me a couple of days to figure out how to use the gears to get good classic crunch for chords and this turned into my number one amp.

And I don't play metal ever!)

Only one minor gripe... 3 of the foot switches are illuminated as I up the gain - gear switch, vol boost, and one more who's name I can't remember.

However, the channel selection switch is illuminated when clean and not illuminated for crunch...

Fine for the studio, but I gaurantee that I will get the channels mixed up when performing.

Sent from my SM-G960U1 using Tapatalk
 
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Re: Splawn Owners?

Ive got a pair of Splawns - a QR and a Nitro - and I cannot say enough good things about them. Both are 50 watt / fully loaded versions with the mid cut and old/new switch. The Nitro is a bit overkill because 3rd Gear in the QR with the ‘new’ voicing and the mid-cut switch engaged will get you about 99% of the way into Nitro territory. To me, the Nitro is like a QR with the drive channel set permanently to 3rd gear. My ‘desert island’ amp would be a fully loaded QR. There just isn’t a sound you cannot find with it. People say they are not known for their clean channel, but I find the clean to be absolutely ‘functional’ - particularly if you do add some chorus and verb through the loop. I love how the amp is so articulate and maintains such great string separation even at really high gain settings. If your chops are ‘so-so’ the QR won’t do you any favors. Bit if your chops are dialed in, you will sound like a God through a Splawn.
 
Re: Splawn Owners?

Ever since Friedman is doing his own thing, Splawn seems to be dropping off the map?
 
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