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| | |-+  The Robben Ford-quest; how close can I get on a "standard" OTS?
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Author Topic: The Robben Ford-quest; how close can I get on a "standard" OTS?  (Read 37034 times)
bluesfendermanblues
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« Reply #15 on: November 04, 2010, 02:48:53 PM »

my thoughts......regardless of the mods i have found that the pickups in your guitar will influence the amp the most.....especially humbuckers.....i have found that PAF like humbuckers are the best to achieve the robben tone....although my yamaha SG also gets close too. ... albeit the yamaha pups have quite high output.

i would suggest using some nice alnico pickups in your guitar and the rest is up to you and your hands.  PAF's are great for this amp as they have clarity and match the amp well when it comes to the touch sensitivity from clean to dirty just by changing your touch and picking.

RF has many great tones on his albums and i guess like all of us... he changes his settings for each song and type of guitar depending on what is required.

I agree 100% with you on PAF-type pickups, being important for RF sounds.

Having read about RF using a Seymour Duncan combo of 59 in neck and a JB in bridge, I bout a set for my Les Paul...boy was I dissapointed with that bridge humbucker. Its all mid - no top, no bottom.

After this experience, I fitted the pickups to a strat, only to get same result.

I cannot believe that RF should have used a Seuymour D JO in his bridge pos. on ANY of his recordings. It's simply not his sound.

I have just swopped the JB for at Seth Lover, which I'm sure will deliver the goods.
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Emiel
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« Reply #16 on: November 04, 2010, 03:02:55 PM »

Bluesfendermanblues, have you tried the JB with a 250k ohm volumepot? It's specially designed around that value, if you use it with a 500k ohm pot you'll end up with a thin harsh sound. I once had a JB in a Les Paul copy, great thick rock sounds. Then I put some 500k pots in and the result was horrible!

Then something else. If I listen to recent Ford's sounds, say from 2008 to now on, I notice the bottom end is something I haven't heard in any Ceriatone OTS clip so far. It is very aggressive, tight and singing.  Are you guys getting close to this? To me a lot of the 6L6 OTS' low-end can sound somewhat flabby/overly bassy. But I once read in a recent interview that Ford is using Sovtek 5881's just as Carlton is? I'd be pleased to hear if I'm wrong or not. Have a listen to the clip.



This is properly my favourite guitar sound ever, would love to recreate this.
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mr fabulous
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« Reply #17 on: November 04, 2010, 03:16:25 PM »


i have an LP with a SH1n in the neck and SH4 in the bridge (nickel covers which help to make thm brighter)...... and i agree the sh4 can sound a tad thick and dark in the guitar, but i love the tone i get with both pickups on together. all pots are 500k but the dark mahogany tone complements the pups well.

i recall RF removed all the pots out of his axe and only used a volume pedal to control his volume......maybe this is how he gets some clarity out of the SH4....? (this was when he was still using the fender signature model)

maybe a 1Mohm pot will clear it up some.......any thoughts?...
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johanare
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« Reply #18 on: November 04, 2010, 10:44:23 PM »

Told you through YouTube, I love the tones you have on the recent clips.
Don't mess with your amp.

BTW. I prefer the 65 speaker in a 212 format, not 112. + You need quite a lot of treble to make it sing.

Humbuckers, JB and 59, that was a long time ago. Robben has used Sakashta/Rolphs or vintage PAFs recently.

Cheers
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bluesfendermanblues
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« Reply #19 on: November 04, 2010, 11:22:32 PM »

Bluesfendermanblues, have you tried the JB with a 250k ohm volumepot? It's specially designed around that value, if you use it with a 500k ohm pot you'll end up with a thin harsh sound. I once had a JB in a Les Paul copy, great thick rock sounds. Then I put some 500k pots in and the result was horrible!

Then something else. If I listen to recent Ford's sounds, say from 2008 to now on, I notice the bottom end is something I haven't heard in any Ceriatone OTS clip so far. It is very aggressive, tight and singing.  Are you guys getting close to this? To me a lot of the 6L6 OTS' low-end can sound somewhat flabby/overly bassy. But I once read in a recent interview that Ford is using Sovtek 5881's just as Carlton is? I'd be pleased to hear if I'm wrong or not. Have a listen to the clip.



This is properly my favourite guitar sound ever, would love to recreate this.

I copyied the layout of the fender Robben Ford signature model which use 1 meg pots all around. This could off course have some sort of impact , but I doubt that the difference between 250k vs 500k vs 1meg would be night and day.

Regarding output tubes, all I can say is I've tried a lot of different OT tubes in my D amps and IMO the best is the Winged C svetlana 6L6. I've got NOS GE's, 5881 etc. but the winged C's are the beef.

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bluesfendermanblues
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« Reply #20 on: November 04, 2010, 11:24:25 PM »


i have an LP with a SH1n in the neck and SH4 in the bridge (nickel covers which help to make thm brighter)...... and i agree the sh4 can sound a tad thick and dark in the guitar, but i love the tone i get with both pickups on together. all pots are 500k but the dark mahogany tone complements the pups well.

i recall RF removed all the pots out of his axe and only used a volume pedal to control his volume......maybe this is how he gets some clarity out of the SH4....? (this was when he was still using the fender signature model)

maybe a 1Mohm pot will clear it up some.......any thoughts?...

The bypassed pots makes sence, I guess, but still the JB is noe muddy HB, that I don't associate with Robben's sounds at all.
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bluesfendermanblues
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« Reply #21 on: November 04, 2010, 11:25:04 PM »

Told you through YouTube, I love the tones you have on the recent clips.
Don't mess with your amp.

BTW. I prefer the 65 speaker in a 212 format, not 112. + You need quite a lot of treble to make it sing.

Humbuckers, JB and 59, that was a long time ago. Robben has used Sakashta/Rolphs or vintage PAFs recently.

Cheers

Yeah, vintage PAF style PU's are the way to go.
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mr fabulous
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« Reply #22 on: November 05, 2010, 04:33:36 AM »

i build and sell guitars for a living.... and finding the right pickup for a particular guitar can drive me crazy.....however its not just the pup.....its also the tone pot.....i generally will swap in the pup i think would be good..... then i will cange the pots to get a sweet tone....not to trebly and not too dark. strating with the volume pot and keeping the tone pot at 500k. the 500k tone pot has less influence in tone and then i can change to 250k  and play with tone cap if i need to reduce brightness more.

the g12-65's are a great speaker, but i found it useless in the combo in its own....it changes its tone at higher volumes.....at bedroom levels its great. so i put the EV12L in the combo and use the g1265 in an extension 112 cab.....they sound excellent together becauae the EV provides the clarity and solig low end... and the g1265 does its thing in support of the EV.

if i was to use two g12-65 then it would probably not be such a problem as the speakers would be sharing the load and not driven to the point where a single would be.
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Tone Control
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« Reply #23 on: November 07, 2010, 01:42:37 AM »

how about the new Ford Mustang?

http://www.ceriatone.com/images/layoutPic/OvertoneLayout/OTSFM100W.jpg

I assume the name is not accidental
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Dr Tone Control, Strats mostly, prefer saturated clean tones, a little OD sometimes
BM50, JTM45, 36w EF86, DZ30, Expression, + non-Ceriatones (Matchless, Victoria, Wienbrock)
Just started with pedals a little after a 10 year purist spell, but usually just delay
Emiel
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« Reply #24 on: November 07, 2010, 10:12:10 AM »

how about the new Ford Mustang?

http://www.ceriatone.com/images/layoutPic/OvertoneLayout/OTSFM100W.jpg

I assume the name is not accidental

Thanks for this. Could someone verify whether these specs are true to the current specs of Robben's Dumble?
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exocet
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« Reply #25 on: November 07, 2010, 10:29:22 AM »

The Mustang is a clone of a clone. I believe that the source was a Bludodrive Ojai and it's 'secrets' were not revealed by the proprietor of Bludo rather another US amp builder who came across it. I don't know if Nik has followed the information 100% - the Ojai circuit is quite specific about the use of components / tolerance especially the Pots for Input gain and Midrange. These are Audio taper pots but the taper response is 30% on Robben / Ojai amps rather than the more common 15% on standard tape pots. In practice this means that for any given setting (say Noon), the 30% taper pot is electrically further along it's travel. In simple terms, Noon on a 30% taper pot gives more midrange than a 15% pot set at Noon (similar impact for gain on the input gain control). There is no more gain / midrange available overall, it only impacts on where you end up setting the pot to achieve the sound that you desire.
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erwin_ve
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« Reply #26 on: November 07, 2010, 11:32:24 AM »

how about the new Ford Mustang?

http://www.ceriatone.com/images/layoutPic/OvertoneLayout/OTSFM100W.jpg

I assume the name is not accidental

Thanks for this. Could someone verify whether these specs are true to the current specs of Robben's Dumble?

They are spot on. The specs are made public at ampgarage by the maker of Bludotone and 2 other members.
Emiel , you played my amp, these are the specs I had in my amp.
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erwin_ve
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« Reply #27 on: November 07, 2010, 12:01:55 PM »

The Mustang is a clone of a clone. I believe that the source was a Bludodrive Ojai and it's 'secrets' were not revealed by the proprietor of Bludo rather another US amp builder who came across it. I don't know if Nik has followed the information 100% - the Ojai circuit is quite specific about the use of components / tolerance especially the Pots for Input gain and Midrange. These are Audio taper pots but the taper response is 30% on Robben / Ojai amps rather than the more common 15% on standard tape pots. In practice this means that for any given setting (say Noon), the 30% taper pot is electrically further along it's travel. In simple terms, Noon on a 30% taper pot gives more midrange than a 15% pot set at Noon (similar impact for gain on the input gain control). There is no more gain / midrange available overall, it only impacts on where you end up setting the pot to achieve the sound that you desire.


The Ojai was made public by someone else, the maker of Bludotone jumped in the discussion and altered some specs regarding the amp of RF.
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Emiel
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« Reply #28 on: November 07, 2010, 01:25:52 PM »

how about the new Ford Mustang?

http://www.ceriatone.com/images/layoutPic/OvertoneLayout/OTSFM100W.jpg

I assume the name is not accidental

Thanks for this. Could someone verify whether these specs are true to the current specs of Robben's Dumble?

They are spot on. The specs are made public at ampgarage by the maker of Bludotone and 2 other members.
Emiel , you played my amp, these are the specs I had in my amp.

Thanks Erwin!  I'll just have to find for someone who can mod my OTS to the RF specs!

Though the new 'OTS 183' looks promising as well! The clips I've heard so far do sound great too...
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ampkits
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« Reply #29 on: November 16, 2010, 09:00:49 PM »


I changed the OD pots to linear.

Most of the changes needed to go from regular OTS (or S&M) to the FM have been marked (shaded colors).

Not that hard to do if you want to do it, ie mod.

How does it sound? I highly recommend it, really. The OD is real creamy...

Thanks!

Nik
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