Tone Stack

[Faraday]

Is a tone stack just essentially an EQ? If it is, then would it be possible to have a tone stack that was controlled by a parametric eq to adjust which frequencies were boosted for more control over tone shaping rather than just a static bass, mid, and treble knob adjustment...or am I way off here. Please educate me.

OOPS, Moderator Please move this thread to the Amp Section. Sorry.

 

[ES350]

Re: Tone Stack

Most of the common tone stacks you see are variations on the 5F6A/JTM45 etc. Besides having common values of components, they are all passive in design and subject to various levels of insertion loss. There is no gain in these tone stacks---only cut. While you could fashion a sort of narrow Q filter with a passive design, no gain is available. Most EQ designs are active and have both cut and boost with either fixed ('graphic') or variable (parametric) Q...

 

[Lewguitar]

Re: Tone Stack

Virtually all guitar amps use a tone stack that can lose treble, mids and bass but not boost them. Lew

 

[Faraday]

Re: Tone Stack

Virtually all guitar amps use a tone stack that can lose treble, mids and bass but not boost them. Lew

Thanks for the responses. So if you can only cut in a tone stack circuit, is there a way that you could adjust the Q or select the frequencies to cut like a parametric eq does?

 

[kmcguitars]

Re: Tone Stack

Thanks for the responses. So if you can only cut in a tone stack circuit, is there a way that you could adjust the Q or select the frequencies to cut like a parametric eq does?

I believe www.Duncanamps.com has a tone stack calculator that can help you talyor your tone stack to your liking.

 

[Lewguitar]

Re: Tone Stack

Thanks for the responses. So if you can only cut in a tone stack circuit, is there a way that you could adjust the Q or select the frequencies to cut like a parametric eq does?

You just need to experiment a little and see what works for you. There's normally three caps in a tone stack.

The blackface Fender tone comes from a 250 pf treble cap and a .1 and .047 cap.

The Marshall tone (and Fender tweed Bassman tone) comes from a pair of .02 caps foo the bass and mids.

Just experiment.

lew

 

[Gearjoneser]

Re: Tone Stack

The amps that always fascinated me were Eden World Tour bass amps, because they have bass, low mid, high mid, highs, and then have frequency knobs above those. That way, each bandwidth could be tweaked. I think that's what you're getting at, and I'm curious about why guitar amps can't do that too.

 

[Faraday]

Re: Tone Stack

The amps that always fascinated me were Eden World Tour bass amps, because they have bass, low mid, high mid, highs, and then have frequency knobs above those. That way, each bandwidth could be tweaked. I think that's what you're getting at, and I'm curious about why guitar amps can't do that too.

GearJoneser, you hit the nail on the head with my question. That's exactly what I'm talking about. I was just wondering if we could vary the freq that we are adjusting exactly like having a peq on the front of an amp instead of the traditional static freq setting like treble, mid, and bass. Maybe an amp tech could chime in hear and tell us if it is possible or not.:banana: