Beer of the Bass

Ah, like my idea of putting an SMPS and Class D power amp in a 3U rack case with a couple of house bricks to see if anyone could hear the heft!

They're in the guitar pickups section of the website, but Guitarfetish have hotter-output lipstick pickups with the Danelectro style mounting brackets.

Most preamp valves do glow visibly, but the filament and plate structure varies even within the same valve type, so you can see more of the heater filament on some than others. It's not usually a strong enough glow to light up the whole inside of the amp and shine out through the vents, as seems to be the fashion with a lot of recent gear!

I'd say that non-rolled fingerboard edges might be a conscious design choice on narrow spaced 5 strings. It can be easy to pull the G string off the edge with low tension strings, so they may have wanted to preserve all the playing area they could.

This thread is an annual Basschat tradition, every December!

I saw pics of Jon Button, the current touring Who bassist, using his PF50T with them at the Hollywood Bowl. I'm enjoying mine for much more humble gigs, but it's cool to see that it can do the job in that kind of setting.

I haven't heard the newest version, but I quite like the Blues Juniors at low volume. They get sort of boxy if you're pushing them for volume (maybe the tiny cab?), but otherwise they seem like useful amps.

I think Robert Smith has been using Line 6 Spider amps lately for some big gigs, admittedly a bit higher up the range than the model in the video. Though he is both a bit of a contrary sort, and a "clean amp with loads of effects" type player, so I could imagine him taking to them more than most would.

It's a while since I've had one, but I remember the bass channel being very bassy, and the guitar channel being very bright. So running the two together and varying the mix to to taste gets you a broader, more balanced bass sound than either alone.

You can definitely use the two channels on these together, so it ought to work just fine. There are numerous old multiple channel valve PA heads that would also get you there. I wouldn't describe it as stereo though, as the two channels are being mixed into a single power amp and speakers.

I think it can happen with any string manufacturer - I don't know of any who have never had a faulty string. The important thing is how they deal with it.

Ah, glad it's working and sounding good! I wonder if the preamp differences between this and the Eminent make it a bit nicer sounding for electric bass (the Eminent being more geared towards being a PA mixer amp. I'd use the 4 ohm output when using both drivers, as the two 8 ohm outputs will be connected to the 8 ohm tap, so a 4 ohm load will be a mismatch. That probably won't kill anything, but does run your output valves a little harder than they need to and may lose some power too.

I'd like to change my user name, if possible. My current one is based on ny real name, and I've recently had someone locally paying an uncomfortable amount of attention to my online activities, so I'd like to move away from that.

If you did want to get the 2x12" up and running for use with that head, there may not be much benefit in choosing the Kappalites over certain cheaper 12"s, given that they'd only have to handle 50 watts per driver. A pair of something like Eminence Betas or some of the Celestion bass drivers would cost less than one Kappalite and can be got in 4 or 16 ohms to make an 8 ohm cab. Of course, mixing it with your 1x15 could still be hit-and-miss though.

IIRC they waited until I'd dispatched it, but not until it reached them.

Are they guitar humbucker sized? There may be some blade polepiece guitar humbuckers that would do the job if so.

I had much the same with the G on a set of new Spirocores a couple of years ago, also bought from Thomann. They sent a replacement which was fine, and I had to return just the G.

I'm wondering if "surprises" are a good idea when working on instruments for others. It seems like one to discuss with the owner. If you do go for a smaller radius, the fingerboard thickness may be an issue, since most electric bass fingerboards are quite thin already, and a smaller radius would thin it further at the edges. Of course, if you're replacing the board rather than just defretting and filling the slots, you could address that.

Only one half of the ECC81 is acting as a gain stage in these (the other half is a cathodyne phase inverter which has no gain whichever valve is used), and the power amp uses a lot of negative feedback to keep it clean and linear. So I'd say there's not a lot of potential to get dirt out of these with valve swaps alone. My own Eminent II that I built a new preamp into will get just a little grit, but it's all from the preamp. Though it's a pretty fun sound and it's only really the mid control and DI outs that cause me to favour my Ampeg PF50T over the modded Dynacord.

I think I used that name in one or two places, yeah! I used to wear hats a lot...

I'd say re-working the Peavey wouldn't be the most sensible route - it's a hybrid preamp which will have its own power supply requirements and is likely to be built around one large PCB, making it difficult to rehouse. With my own Dynacord, I started by making sure the amp was fully checked over and working in stock form, before building a new valve preamp from scratch to a relatively simple design.

I found that my end pin does the same with rubber walking stick ends, but the ones I use are just big enough to slip a 5 pence coin inside the bottom of, and that helps them last longer.

Hard to say from a photo alone, but it's likely that one valve may have been running hotter than the other. With an amp like this that's been out of use for years I'd really want to do more than visual checks before powering it up, like checking that the bias supply is present and correct on both EL34 sockets. But it might be wise to find someone who's familiar with doing this safely.

OTOH, the ability to correct the neck angle without major woodworking could be seen as a positive!

I have an Eminent 2, which is the same power amp with a four channel preamp. They're well built amps intended to run very clean. I found the original preamp a bit uninspiring on mine, so took out two of the channels and built a valve preamp in there. The power ratings can be confusing as this era of Dynacord amps had models with 2x EL34 valves at two different power ratings. The Bass King T and Eminent I were 40 watts, with the Imperator and Eminent 2 at 80 watts. The 80 watt models used a dual-rail power supply which puts around 750V on the EL34 plates. Because of the high voltages and unusual layout these might not be the ideal platform to learn on if you're not familiar with working on valve amps, so you may want to have it checked over.