Ceriatone Forum

Hey all!
I have an OTS 50W with built in C-lator in the head cab coming very soon just in time for all of my Super Bowl related gigs (14 nights straight!).  Because I will be cutting it close to the deadline I won't have time to noodle and tweak.  I basically need it to sound great and be ready to use upon arrival.  I just got done building a 2x12 vertical cab with 2 long ports on each side (I ripped the idea from Forte 3D Cabs.  Check it our for reference here http://www.fortemusical.com/3d2x12vertical.html).  I bought WGS et65 and Reverend 30 speakers because I heard it was a great combo.  Do you guys think this should be a good setup?  Also I have an OCD, ZenDrive which I probably won't use because this is already a D-style amp, TS808, and DD7 delay- will run in C-Lator, oh and my standard crybaby wah.  Any setting suggestions.  I am a midrange freak with a few exceptions.  I play sounds similar to Joe Bonamassa, Sanatana, Jeff Beck, Warren Haynes, and Trey Anastagio.  I imagine I need a reverb pedal to top it all off though.  Due to the time constraints I would very much appreciate any help for go to settings.  BTW the speakers are 16ohm parallel to 8ohm output brand new so not broken in.  Would you also suggest some diffuser panels (those circular foam things) mounted over the speakers to stop beaming?   THANKS!!!!!!

It is the normal 50W OTS.  I have MM Tranny a half power switch and all 2 way switches are 3 way for more control to harness the bright sounds.  ANy help would be huge.  THANKS!

Well, i'll tell ya it will be a completely different animal once it breaks in. If you can before your gigs, i would hook it up to a cd player and let it burn in for about 12 hours, it willhelp smooth it out. There's a lot to breakin these OTS amps in. Other than that your rig sounds very good for the amp. I'd bring your OD pedals, just in case the OD isn't quite to your liking yet. It can take some tweaking and break in time to get it just right.

Gregg

I'd totally agree with Gregg - burn that baby in for as long as you can before gigging it - I'm still getting 'used' to my Bluesmaster - currently I like the OD side for crunch/dirty rhythm and kick onto the clean channel with a Rangemaster clone or Zen drive for leads - just seems to cut through better...YMMV of course and I'm finding it changes from gig to gig. Tonight for example I got my best tone with the clean channel +PAB and the Zen - just used the guitar volume to control things....next week it'll probably change again! I really need to get the chassis out and see if I can get more mids from the HRM trimmers because thats what I'm missing on the OD channel atm...

I bypassed the HRM on my Bluesmaster a while back ;) I've actually stopped using overdrive pedals, i am just using a clean boost in the front end of the amp, well actually a boosta grande, which adds a touch of mids. I can actually get pretty nice drive out of the clean channel with it as well. If i want i nice fat uncompressed drive sound, i can drive the clean channel with the clean boost either alone or with the PAB if i want more hair. It is nice, fat, reponsive, and punchy. I use the OD side if i want a more gainy, compressed, singing, but still raunchy (it is an non hrm bluesmaster, after all) sound. I put a JAN GE 5751 in V2 and run the OD without HRM, drive around 6 out of 10, and it sounds like a cranked early marshall. step on the boost and it will sing for days, add the PAB and it will sing forever! Love it!

Interesting!  How would you hook it up to a CD player?  The amp or the cab or both?  Also would you run it at a high volume or room volume? Thanks for all input it has been vey helpful!

I broke mine in by running is through an old stereo that has the positive and negative terminals on the back for probably about 25 hours. I wouldn't hook it up to the amp, just the speaker (mainly cause I wouldn't wanna run the amp for that long). It was a mix of some dynamic songs, types of noise (brown, white, pink etc) and then some different frequency tones (1hz etc).

Before I did that it was so brittle that it would hurt your ears when playing and I couldn't dial those highs out. So break the speaker in as much as you can and also play it cause it'll take a bit to dial and get used to what the controls do, although it isn't overly complicated to use, just unconventional.

That's good for breaking in the speakers, but not the amp. The amp itself needs a good burn in. i ran mine whenever i was at home at moderate volume with my ipod plugged into the input. whatever you plug into it, be sure you can pad the output of, as it will be line level and can cause some problems (you'll hear if it the level is too high)
I played mix of everything through it to open er up and loosen the speakers up. between actually playing guitar through it and playing music thru it, from the time the amp arrived from Nik to my first lil gig i had about 60 hours of burn in time. Sounded amazing!

So you just plugged your iPod in where you would normally plug your guitar in and ran the whole rig (OTS plugged into Speaker Cab)?  This would make sense so the amp's tubes would heat up and work while the speakers would get a work out too.  I just am unsure if I can plug the iPod right into same spot I would plug my guitar in.  I plan on playing music  and jamming this thing quite a bit now before I gig.  This will be a lot of hours squeezed in a short period but I think I can do it. 

you can, just be sure to turn the volume on your ipod down. I turned mine down to half.

I listen to music when i sleep, so that was an easy eight hours a day right there ;) I'm a light sleeper, so if for some reason the power went out or anything i would wake up and shut it all down and unplug it, incase there was a brown out or a surge. Don't leave it unattended.

Depending on your speakers it can sound anywhere from good to grating, though. Apparently the Weber 1265 Alnico's are pretty musical, so it was a pleasure. Set the eq on your ipod flat, or to Jazz, crank the bass on your amp up to 10, mids around 7 and treble around 8 and adjust the presence to taste, and it should be fine. I just played all my jazz and classical through it, and occasional booty music, to help loosen the speakers up.

Gregg

Thank a lot Gregg.  Funny you say that.  Tons of construction is being done downtown indy trying to squeezed thing in for next weekend 9,500 people have been out of power downtown today not even the stoplights are working!  They blew a transformer.  I am waiting by the door for the amp to arrive and will take your advice for sure.  I work from home and play music from my computer during office days.  I could work up a 24 period in no time if I let it play through the night.  Great idea and thanks.  All I need is a 3.5 male to 1/4 inch adapter right?

Yup! That'll do it!! Unless you are able to switch to mono on your iPod, it may sound kinda off at only one channel is being reproduced, but other than that it should be fine

Yeah I remember checking out your diagram for that mod - where did you put the switch Greg?

Cheers

Kieran

Hey Kieran.

when i had it on a switch, i had a lil toggle in one of the output tube hole covers. Nik put my sag switch on one, to i out my HRM switch on the other. I keep it bypassed all the time now

Gregg

Cheers for that Gregg - I have a 100 watter so I'll need to see if I can squeeze a toggle switch in somewhere else. I have to replace the pilot light on mine so I'll maybe give it a go while I'm doing that...

Kieran

one idea i had was taking the low input out, since i never use it anyway, and put a pot in there for the HRM stack so i can have dialed all the way or mix it in to whatever degree i like, or just put the switch there. I just don't know if i would use it that much. It's almost too smooth with the HRM on  ;)

Gregg

Any idea what Nik sets the HRM trimmers when he sends them out - I'm wondering if the mids on my Bluesmaster OD could be increased..I'll search the forum for this too...

Edit - yeah the search has given me plenty to ponder - I don't want to change any components but I might try increasing the mid HRM trimmer just a hair to see if that helps...

OD trimmers from Ceriatone are Treble & Mids @ 10:30  Bass Barely on

Thanks for the info on the HRM trimmers - had my amp at a mate's rehearsal room last night and still finding it difficult to get the drive side to cut through as well as the clean side - maybe I'm using too much gain? - I have the OD rear trimmer set at 10 o'clock and had the first volume on 6 (on the dial) and front drive between 4 and 6 playing the Strat...still liking the clean channel with the first volume control cranked up to 7 or 8 - I'll keep working at it :)

Sorry should have said I'm using a Klein in the loop and a slightly oversized semi-open back 1x12 cab with an older EVM12L - I've had the amp for over two years so it should be well broken in by now. Everything on the amp is stock apart from the preamp tubes which I changed for nos Brimar, Tungsol and Sovtek LPS in V1,2 & 3 respectively - just finding it hard to get the OD side louder or punchier than the clean side at gig volume. Think I'll back off on the gain for next gig and see how it does...

Thanks for the tips so far  :)