Mr. Foxen

[quote name='simon1964' post='1035385' date='Nov 24 2010, 06:05 PM']But as I said several posts ago, I'm not defending Rics as a design. I love them, but I readily accept the bridge, pickups, and lack of countours are as old fashioned and flawed as a Morgan Roadster.[/quote] Do you say that because you know Dad makes parts for Morgans? I think the updated Morgan is doing ok though.

That is a nice rig. Worth making an offer to part out. Wish I had the cashes to do that.

[quote name='simon1964' post='1035361' date='Nov 24 2010, 05:50 PM']I agree. I was just responding to someone's suggestion that not making enough was a design flaw [/quote] Not being able to make enough is a design flaw. Choosing not to make enough is marketing.

[quote name='simon1964' post='1035219' date='Nov 24 2010, 04:04 PM']Even if you end up being able to sell them at a massive premium?![/quote] Marketing isn't good design. In fact, they are often directly at odds with each other.

[quote name='simon1964' post='1034119' date='Nov 23 2010, 05:21 PM']Quirk or not, they have a waiting list, so they must be doing something right![/quote] Not being able to make enough to keep up with demand is another design flaw I didn't think of.

[quote name='Mandril' post='1033885' date='Nov 23 2010, 01:56 PM']And what about power amps with the VT Bass? Which one would be ok? I know nothing about power amps...[/quote] On spec they are much of a muchness, a good name is nice for reliability, but aim for 1000w into 4ohm and that is all you'll ever need, can score Peaveys that will do for unde £150 or fancy lightweight jobs for more, fan noise will be your biggest issue with those.

[quote name='simon1964' post='1033780' date='Nov 23 2010, 12:34 PM']Thing is with Rickenbacker that they have updated their designs to take out the quirks (eg the 4004 bass which has a modern bridge, pickups etc) but then nobody buys them![/quote] They forgot to take out the 'massively overpriced' quirk, and the 'no-one started off playing a lookalike and saved up for the real thing' quirk. As for Fenders non-angled headstocks, changing it is a fairly major thing, you either end up not with a 1 piece neck and corresponding, cutting and glueing time, or using loads of wood wastage. Fenders are Fords, the fact that some of them are Cadillac prices does change that.

Boss LS2 and you can mix away to your hearts content. But if you want a simple rig for stage, bring the dirty one, and a DI for the clean one.

[quote name='LawrenceH' post='1033689' date='Nov 23 2010, 11:14 AM']I know. That's doesn't negate what I was saying in any way. I was just pointing out that small crap speakers are often sold by virtue of being bassy, and at the low volumes of such systems it matters, if anything, more than with bigger (partly because of the requirement for equal loudness contouring). Plus, on plenty of cheap stereos it doesn't disappear as you turn the volume up at all, you can switch it in and out and clearly hear it. There're also 'hyper bass boost' buttons and a hundred other similarly-named things which EQ small stereos around the porting frequency. But you know this, I really can't understand what you're arguing against if anything.[/quote] Point is, you are constantly referencing cheap crappy ported systems, and those are crap because of the cheap crapness, not the being ported. What I have noticed in studios is that whilst they are equipped with NS10s, they also have other speakers in the room, and they are ported. The NS10s being there as representative of home stereo speakers (since that is what they were designed for) and the other speakers used for the actual production.

[quote name='icastle' post='1032357' date='Nov 22 2010, 10:49 AM']Sound City were the budget answer to the HiWatt kit. There's a whole pile of info about them here: [url="http://www.soundcitysite.com/sc_webpages/sc_home.htm"]http://www.soundcitysite.com/sc_webpages/sc_home.htm[/url][/quote] More Hiwatt were expensive answer to sound city since SC were first and the guy moved on from them to form Hiwatt. The MKIVs are pretty noisy as they have an active preamp, I'm fighting with one at the moment, there are things to do to clean them up, but they are pretty damn powerful. Should be a lot of grunt into a Vintage.

Availability. Since tuners are considered much of a muchness, they are easy to pick up anywhere. I think they predate most of the contenders, meaning they are more available second hand, and how often do you have tuner GAS once you have a functional stomp box? I bought three froma band liquidation early on and homed them all easily with people I knew, no reason to have anything else since.

Rickenbackers. So many improvements can be made and they have stubbornly stuck to a design that has never known an engineer. I think that is where Fender has it, Leo was an engineer and not a musician.

I bought some lemon oil in a guitar shop when I started playing. It wasn't full when I got it, and I've still got a little over a quarter left, I've gone through a lot of basses and done a lot of setups for other people using it.

[url="http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/VINTAGE-KAY-BASS-RICK-COPY-RARE-AND-COOL-/320620972719?pt=UK_Musical_Instruments_Guitars_CV&hash=item4aa67fcaaf"]Kay[/url]

Using terms like 'time smearing' = BS. Fairly sure your ear ear/brain doesn't perceive much relevant to that in the port tuning sort of frequency band. The term 'transients' also makes me suspicious, but that might be to do with Ampeg's marketing BS. I don't think I've encountered any decent sealed bass cabs.

[quote name='Paul S' post='1032840' date='Nov 22 2010, 04:32 PM']BIN has been removed now! Must be reading Basschat.[/quote] A bid removes the BIN, no idea why some idiots bid on BIN auctions.

[quote name='DanOwens' post='1032888' date='Nov 22 2010, 05:03 PM']How about the Ashdown Lomenzo Hyperdrive? It gets some good reviews. [[url="http://www.bassguitarmagazine.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=223:ashdown-james-lomenzo-hyper-drive-pedal-issue-36&catid=39:pedals"]CLICK[/url]][/quote] These are great, but the tru path is running two rigs, clean and dirty, just cut the lows from the dirty to avoid comb filtering issues.

[url="http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/marshall-plastic-amp-badge-/320620305236?pt=UK_MusicalInstr_Amplifiers_RL&hash=item4aa6759b54"]This will give your amp all the benefits of a Marshall.[/url]

If the power amps are anything like the guitar amps, they'll have wee tiny underspecced output transformers, so will be rubbish for bass, as the ability to pass low frequencies is proportional to the size. No point in having power valves if you don't want a bit of drive going on. Plus those are stereo, so you need a couple of cabs to run them, or a stereo cab.

If you already have a VT bass, you can just get a power amp and use the VT as a preamp, that will give you cheap power, and VT bass tone. What is your budget like? You can get valve amps that aren't Orange or SVT for not insane money. I think I can sort a working SC120 for around £350, given notice, will have more balls than a blackface clone.

Curious about doing finishing before pickup routing.

[quote name='borisbrain' post='1030990' date='Nov 20 2010, 11:16 PM']Hi folks, I've recently discovered this forum, and think it's just great. This is my first post though, so be gentle... I've read through all the posts in this highly useful thread, and have certainly learned a great deal. However, here's my situation: I currently run a Trace Elliot AH200 (Series 6 GP12) into two 300W 8 ohm TE cabs (a 1153 and 2103x). I take one output from the back of the head, then daisy chain the two cabs together by XLR. So, from what I've learned from this thread, this is a parallel 4 ohm cab set-up, delivering 200W. However, the AH200 is on its way out. I've also got two loud guitarists to cut through in the band, so I'm thinking of getting of getting an AH500 head that I've spotted on Flea Bay. The idea is to use the same speakers, so the cabs would theoretically receive a max of 500 W. However, they're 300W cabs. My question - is this a no-no because the output power of the amp would exceed the wattage of the cabs? Or do two cabs at 300W each effectively give me 600W? Alternatively, anyone got a TE 250 or 300W SMX??? Many thanks, BB[/quote] Problem is, with the same speakers, you probably won't get much louder even if you have more power on tap.