![]() ![]() In this article, I'll mention some things that are trivial updates, and some that might be seen as defiling the temple. This, I found that all Thomas Vox amps all share some similarities in theirÄesigns, particularly in power supply and output power amp sections that can be improved a great deal. Royal Guardsman, a Viscount, a Cambridge, a Pathfinder, a Pacemaker and a Nova. I own a solid state Berkeley II, a Berkeley III, a Buckingham, a Beatle, a There are also a lot of tips here on how to get a dead one running again. I love the way these amplifiers look (and sometimes the way they sound) and in fixing a couple that I have, I came up with several things that should make them vastly more reliable, and possibly sound better. The Thomas Vox solid state amplifiers are notorious for their poor reliability. Replacing the 3P3T Rotary Power/Standby Switch Getting the Chassis Into and Out of the Cabinet that's the difference between this and my ss practice amps.1999-2011 R.G. I play more often now, and I pay more attention to tone. ![]() going back to my sears and ampegs and fenders from the sixties. It's the best little practice amp I've ever owned and I've owned a few. I'm going to replace more caps, swap out a few resistors, and eventualy add tone controls as well. Try alt.guitar or for more info and details. you can plug just about any old thing in front of it and the amp just rocks out. nice covering and fine cosmetic appearance and construction throughout. I've got a lot of mods to try out yet, but so far, it's fairly easy if you're familiar with this sort of thing, and the benefits are waay cost worthy. a couple of bucks and the difference in tone and overall performance was much better. I replaced the stock with sprague orange drops. Now, my tubes should last much longer, and I can hit standby if I have to go 'sink the bismark' or something. (don't try without help or instruction if new at this. With the modded head, the firs thing was the standby switch. The Tube Store is a good outfit, good prices, good product, nice reviews and descriptions. I swapped the sovtek stock power tube for JJ/Tesla and that's much much better, too. I like the Tung sol best, smoother, later breakup, nicer crunch. First I swapped out the chinese pre amps for sovtek 12ax7s, then Tung Sol. I've decided to keep one stock and do mods on the other. I scratched the fuse ends with a file, put them back in tight, and voila. Turned out both had poor fuse connections. Nothing cosmeticaly wrong, but neither would make a peep when fired up. I managed to get two blems off Musicians Friend. Synopsis: A great buy for a tube practice amp stock, but add a little dough, some solder, and some sweat and you can have a nice little recording amp for under $200. All of which are relatively simple, as the circuit on the Valve Jr. There are mods for adding bright/dark switches, hum reduction, tone pots, etc. There are already SEVERAL mod schematics for this amp floating around on the web. The output transformer has an unused 8ohm tap that can be switched out with the stock 4ohm tap or you can throw in a switch and have either 4 or 8 ohm available to you. I have now chopped it into a separate head, and am going to use both speakers in a series cabinet to get the best attributes of both. The real beauty of this amp is it's potential for tweaking. Nice and chimey anywhere from 7 to 11 o'clock with increasing grind from there on out. With just those minor mods, it was a different beast altogether. Stock, this amp was exactly what I paid for, a very iinexpensive, simple tube circuit. I also replaced the stock Weber signature 8 ceramic with a Weber signature 8 AlNiCo which tamed some of the high end brittleness. This definitely fattened up the lows and low mids, and the ECC83S goosed the gain a bit. So far, I've done these easy mods: replaced the stock Sovteks with a JJ EL-84 and a JJ ECC83S longplate with matched triodes. Great for classic/indy rock, but NO hi-gain applications obviously. It's got that ratty Class A, lo-wattage, small speaker OD sound. The sound on this little amp is very subjective. Review: I've had mine for about 7 months now, and I use it in a stereo mini-rig with a Vox Pathfinder 15R. Pros: Very inexpensive, all tube, easily modded Price: Most mail order places have them for $120 ![]()
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