Chickenwings
Alnico 6/8
I know a lot of ppl here have fender blackface and silverface type amps and i found a resource (at the bottom of this post) thats invaluable and i wanted to share it with you guys.
After experimenting, and re checking etc i ended up settling on a few small and reversible tube changes:
I changed the PI in my fender twin from an AT7 to an AX7...which reduced the headroom a bit, caused a touch more compression and generally made the amp sweeter and more pleasant to my ears. I took out V1 also. The cool thing about this stuff is that if you pull v1, then you have a spare ax7 to use in your PI!
For any other fender black/silverface style amp owners (im talking deluxe reverbs, twin, supers etc...anything with the two channels on the front). Heres some info i dug up:
1. Removing V1 disables channel 1 (most of us dont use it anyway) and add a little more power to the preamp in channel 2. A slight increase in gain, presence and fatness will be noticeable. The reverse is true of V2 if you prefer the normal channel.
2. V2 is the first preamp tube for the reverb channel..this is the one to experiment with because its the most important tone shaper (that is, unless you use the normal channel)
3. v3 is the reverb send
4. v4 is reverb return/vibrato send
5. v5 is the vibrato return - you can pull this out if you dont use the vibrato and you will get another slight increase in fatness and presence.
6. V6 - usually this kind of amp uses an at7 - remember leo fender did not like distortion - so its geared for headroom. An ax7 will reduce clean headroom a little, which may be good in the case of a twin, or not what you are after in the case of a deluxe reverb.
Current brands that i like for v1/2:
JJs for fatness, headroom, warmth and bass with smooth tops
Tung sols for clarity, presence and rich harmonic content
EH for low noise and mid grunt for high gain.
Best resource ever for fender amp owners who like to tweak:
http://fenderguru.com/amps
After experimenting, and re checking etc i ended up settling on a few small and reversible tube changes:
I changed the PI in my fender twin from an AT7 to an AX7...which reduced the headroom a bit, caused a touch more compression and generally made the amp sweeter and more pleasant to my ears. I took out V1 also. The cool thing about this stuff is that if you pull v1, then you have a spare ax7 to use in your PI!
For any other fender black/silverface style amp owners (im talking deluxe reverbs, twin, supers etc...anything with the two channels on the front). Heres some info i dug up:
1. Removing V1 disables channel 1 (most of us dont use it anyway) and add a little more power to the preamp in channel 2. A slight increase in gain, presence and fatness will be noticeable. The reverse is true of V2 if you prefer the normal channel.
2. V2 is the first preamp tube for the reverb channel..this is the one to experiment with because its the most important tone shaper (that is, unless you use the normal channel)
3. v3 is the reverb send
4. v4 is reverb return/vibrato send
5. v5 is the vibrato return - you can pull this out if you dont use the vibrato and you will get another slight increase in fatness and presence.
6. V6 - usually this kind of amp uses an at7 - remember leo fender did not like distortion - so its geared for headroom. An ax7 will reduce clean headroom a little, which may be good in the case of a twin, or not what you are after in the case of a deluxe reverb.
Current brands that i like for v1/2:
JJs for fatness, headroom, warmth and bass with smooth tops
Tung sols for clarity, presence and rich harmonic content
EH for low noise and mid grunt for high gain.
Best resource ever for fender amp owners who like to tweak:
http://fenderguru.com/amps
