Ceriatone Forum

I heard preamp tubes make a big difference in this amp depending on what you use.

Does anyone have any suggestions on which ones would be good.

Thanks,
JD

A 5751 in V2 makes a huge difference, but if you are after the RF tone you'll probably not like it, however if you're finding you like the OD trimmer set very low 8-9 o'clock, try one, it'll open up the sound a lot and the gain will be still there when you crank the trimmer up again.

A 12AX7LPS (long plate spirial) in V1 produces a warm clean tone that`s very Fender like.

im not really after a particular players tone, but i want a really warm fat smooth tone.

Right now the amp seems sort of harsh and icy picky in the highs, which im trying to stay away from.

Heres an example of what i'd like my high gain tones to sound like
(listen to the G&L strat player)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7QFBDBUr8iU&feature=related

The stock JJ's sound ok if a little 'woolly' at times- I managed to get some NOS RFT tubes ( Marshall used these in big quantities from the late 60's) for the front end of my OTS, and I must say it made a huge difference.  Much more sparkle & spank from the cleans without the ice-pick frequencies & loads of gain for OD.  I have some old Mullards but they're all a bit microphonic & noisy.  RFT's are still (relatively) cheap if you can get 'em...

For clean only I like Mullard (reissue) and Ei but if you mainly use OD ch., I like Tung-Sol.

Good help and overview by Preamp tube report created by Dirk Munzinger :

http://www.tube-town.net/info/doc/tt-report-preamp-tubes-engl.pdf
and
TT ultimate Tubemap
http://www.tube-town.net/info/doc/tt-tubemap.pdf


My tubes :

V1 :   TT 12AX7 classic V1    or
         TT 12AX7 classic :
       "open end tube" very good for clean sounds.
        In the describtion of preamp tube report mentioned :
        "We do not recommend this tube for Blues2,   
         but dont forget OD delivers mids like ...

V2 :  JJ 12AX7 / ECC83S
        high amplification with smooth and very warm sound.

both tubes together : ;D
        with 20% vol of my guitar , good chrunch
        vol pot at guitar more than 2/3rd, lead sound with rich rich harmonics


( I'll tried many Power amp tubes :
 My peronal favorite    SED 6L6   real allrounder with nice headroom

         

Here's what I have in my stash, all NOS:

(http://mnjordan.com/images/gear/tubes.jpg)

Jan Philips 12AX7WA
GE Electric 7025
Jan Sylvania 12AX7WA

Any ideas, or should I just move things around until I find something I like?  I've read here about putting a 12AY7 into V2 to lower the gain of the amp - but if you have to crank the OD trimmer, isn't that sort of the same thing as keeping the trimmer low with a 12AX7 in there?

I'm trying to get the perfect balance between clean and OD tones.  I know there will probably have to be a compromise somewhere, but we'll see.

What kind of OT do you have?

I found that an vintage RCA short plate in V1 with JJ's elsewhere sounds OK for my tastes.

I tried a long plate in V!, but it seemed too smooth. Putting them in V2 or PI made the amp even smoother - more like a Marshall than Dumble.

Yes. Just try every combo you can, because even similar tubes will sound different in the same spot.

Are those tubes you have definitely NOS?

If by OT you mean Overtone, I have a regular 80's OTS being built my Nik right now.  If you mean transformer, whatever Nik is currently using in his builds. 

I'm a bit confused by your comment about smoothness - wouldn't a Dumble tone be considered smoother than Marshall?