Ceriatone Forum

The Overtone seems to be liked by alot of people.  There are some who think it can be made even better with some mods or tweaks.  From your experience with the Overtone what changes do you think would make the amp even better? 
What are the thoughts on the Overtone with the "HRM" circuit?  Basically what would this do to the tone?

This depends on a lot of things.
What guitar & pickups?
What speakervabinet & speaker(s)?
What sort of music do you like?

All these things determine what mods or tweaks you need to apply.

I use a Fender strat with singlecoils, a 1x12" cabinet with a C12K en I like
Country, Rock, Blues & Jazz.
The stock Overtone was to bright so I went from there.
Then Clean was great but OD to harsh.
Then Clean & OD were great but with PAB engaged OD to harsh.
Now it seems it's where I like it the best.

Mods:
- Bright cap from 270pF to 100pF.
- Snubber caps from 270pF to 330p to 270p+330p parallel.
- PreOD resistor from 150k to 220k.
- Removed Filter from Effectsloop (R+C).
- Resistor before the Ratio pot from 150k to 300k.
- Mid cap from 0,01uF to 0,047uF.

I wonder if you could give some background to these mods and what each change was intended to cure. I have little knowledge of electronics and am trying to understand how things work.

I'm assuming the following. The 'snubber caps' are those on V2 socket? And the mid cap is the one on the far right of the main board?

The current layout has a 220k for the preOD resistor already with a 100k pot.

Did the removal of the filter cap and resistor on the effects loop sockets have an effect even when the loop was not used?

Many Thanks

Hywel Harris

OK,

- Bright cap was 270pF but regular Fender values are about 100p-120pF.
Less bright, but more usefull I have it on now.

- Snubbercaps indeed both on V2, to roll off the highs in OD.
Clean was great but OD was harsh, now there is more tonal balance.

- PreOD 150k to 220k, I read about that one, it smoothed the OD.

- Why place a filter on an Effectsloop? So never installed that one.
And that gave me a 220k resistor to replace the PreOD 150k.

- 150k to 300k pre Ratio pot, now I can turn the ratio pot a little higher
Clean Volume is on 6 and Ratio was on 1- before the mod, now 6 & 2.

- Mid cap, the mid pot became more effective, I like it better with my guitar.

I studied electronics but all of my theory has faded over the years.
What I did was search for possible mods and looked what others tried
to achieve.
Then I copied it...  :-[

Thanks very much for that explanation. I don't intend trying anything until I've built my cab (and decided which speakers to put in it) and played with the amp for a month or so.

Cheers

Hywel Harris

XLR connectors for the footswitch

Yeah, done that and moved the FET and OD trimmer to the rear panel.

Just finished the build, will pass it to my amp tech tomorrow for him to test it for me.  Other mods will wait a while, since I'm sure what most people are doing is fine tuning for their guitar and speaker combination.

Next job is build some cabs.

I am looking to get a sweet, smooth and singing sustain quality to the overdrive.  I really don't like the too rough edged Marshall like tones I have heard with some of the sound samples.
Does anyone understand what I am looking for tonally?  Also, can the Overtone achieve the tonal quality I am seeking or would it needed to be tweaked or modded?
If it does need some mods does anyone have suggestions for those mods?

Has anyone tried disconnecting the neg feedback? I suspect on the OD channel things might get a bit uncontrollable, but I'd still like to know.