Ceriatone Forum

I should probably call this topic how not to build an amp :) but here's what I ended up doing. I tried to plan ahead as much as possible, if I needed extra lines for ground etc I did them as I was working through. I also kept 2 things in my head: A connection was never made better by having more solder than needed, and you need a good physical connection first before making a good solder connection.

Basically I did it in this order.

Mounted the heaters + transformers + the posts for the board + grounds
Wired up the heaters
Mounted the large capacitor on the back and wired through
Mounted the board
Mounted and wired the front hardware, then the back

Things I'd probably change.
Shorten up wires more than I have.
Remove the buzz and get the trem working! (yeah I have stuff to fix already!)

Most useful things I'm glad I bought
Pocket wire stripper - one of the few wire strippers I've found that work well
http://www.jaycar.co.nz/productView.asp?ID=TH1817&keywords=pocket+wire&form=KEYWORD

Solder iron cleaner - never had one before, fantastic thing
http://www.jaycar.co.nz/productView.asp?ID=TS1510&keywords=brass+clean&form=KEYWORD

The .8 solder a work mate gave me - I ran out and had to get some 60/40 .9 The difference was incredible. .8 much easier to flow and use in comparison - unfortunately he couldn't tell me what sort it was.

So here we go, 4 by 4 :)

4 more

Last 3 'scuse the wiring :) Nik will probably lynch me :)

There we are, so yeah bit of tidying to do, will post when things are working a bit better :)

No offence but your amp looks like a birds nest. No wonder you have noise issues.

The way you should do this is to install the main board first and than solder the leads. This way you can cut the leads to a appropriate length... and also the PT leads are way to long, fix those as well.

 ;)

yeah I know, no offence taken :) tidy tidy.... I'll be heading home a bit early tonight to fix  :-[

Chomped on all those power leads, shortened a few other long leads. Still got a little noise but maybe I'm being too picky :)

Still get a clicking noise when plugging in the footsw for the trem - not sure why. Also tone stack/tweed sw doesn't appear to be making any difference.

Going to have another play tonight.

Feel kinda silly, didn't notice the little red switch for the tweed had 3 little bridges across the connectors on the diagram.... all working fine now cept the tremolo foot sw which I'm going to ask about before I dig further. After tidying up the wires I was able to get to the resistors better and bias the amp. I have this running through a Blackstar 1x10 at 16 Ohms. It sounds mint. Suprised the heck out of my vocalist who scoffed at the tiny 17 watter.

I was running in Blackface mode (non-tweed) at 8 on volume with single coil tele and 6 with les paul style humbucker, competing with a drummer bass and vocal for about 5 hours straight (practice). It was cutting through pretty well, using full vol on guitar for lead and just a small turn down (I guess about an 8, my tele has no numbers) for rhythm. Brownface (tweed) was too loud for garage setting. Reverb was not missed.

With your little tease, now I can't wait to hear mine... I started building my little Prinze today.
 ;)

Thought I'd better put up a new pic. Found the trem issue was a short between the #2 and #3 leads on the 2nd tube in from the right (what is now a Sovtek 12ax7 on the updated layout). Damn stray wires! Everything is now behaving itself. Found it just by wiggling wires about (with a stick, not my fingers... zap!)

I'm now setting up this amp on a chair about knee height with the amp (in need of a box) on top. In rehearsals we all point into the middle of the garage, but our vocalist is now pointing the speaker away from him and at me since it's too loud lol.

Mcinku I send you a message, but I haven't heard back. You might be thinking about it ;) but I'm looking at a HRM Bluesmaster. How do you find these to play, and how does the tone compare? Most of the clips I hear of the HRM have some effects involved so it's a bit hard to tell ;)

That's a great sounding little amp!! ;D

I was on my vacation...
...you have my replay in your mail box.

 ;)