Hi rane,

I guess the difference stems from using EL34 versus 6L6. EL34 are generally much more bass intense in the lower frequencies. Hence, You got to keep the bass control lover with these power tubes.

Most of us at this part of the forum are Dumble religious. Great to get 'new' ears around here :-)


No, not really, but the Bluesmaster is known to benefit from at little power amp od, contrary to the other Dumble versions.


I prefer the trimmer in my bluesmaster between 20k and 24k (measured from the trimmers center pin to ground). However, people who are more rock-oriented sometimes like the trimmer as high as 40k.


If you like the sound of the OD as is, DONT tough the HRM trimmers, it can really be frustraiting and time consumming to tweak these.

However, if you absolutely must mess with these, make sure to mark the present trim settings with a pencil or similar, prior to tweaking.

Gotcha 

I actually liked Larry's tones much better back in mid 80s when he used the 'piece of shit' and he changed guitar to a vally arts strat, check out the clips on youtube.

At ampgarage people (Ayan and Dogears) claim taht larry carlton has 'lost' his tone - Dumblelator missing??? 


"Piece-of-shit" tone  :

 
 
 

New - no "Piece-of-shit"      

http://mr335.tv/?channel=performances&videofile=mr335/performances/lcbn7

Your choice 

Hi Pick,

I've posted a parallel mod on ampgarage: http://ampgarage.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=13576 which you might like, if you prefer the brighter and harder tone.

However, I prefer the normal ' piece of shit' operation in series mode :-)  Its like i a studio - where you put guitar and bass through an LA2 tube compressor and it'll sound larger than life. IMO. In my opinion the Dumblelator is mandatory, if you want smooth Robben Ford tones out of these amps.

Pickmaster, you are able to get great tones without the D-lator, but thats due to your skills and not so much the gear, IMHO. ;-)

I have an EV12L clone (Emi Kappa Pro) that I bought new 15 years ago, but never used until a year ago, when I build a Thiele cab.

I've been playing it for a year now, about 5 hours a week, but it's only starting to break in now. So that 250 hours of playing!


My Emi speaker is a 'hard cone' speaker - like JBL D120, EV12L, ALTEC 417 etc.. They are all build like tanks with stiff speaker cone, heavy chassis and very large magnets -  and therefore not 1:1 comparable to your Gold Tone.

Celestion speakers generally have softer cones in comparison and pressed steel chassis, but like JD0x0  said, a speaker mature over its entire life circle.

Maybe your EV is more 'played in' and mellow than my particular EV12L. I actually like my EV12L copy, an Eminence Kappa Pro, much better.

Agree with bold about the klein, It only for home practice levels, if I get my master vol above 3 (9 o'clock) it starts to clip and sound bad.

Go for a C-later, you won't look back

Totally agree about 3D and small (but important) compression that the D'later adds to the sounds.

, I've spent 3 years building AND tweaking 4 dumble clones (#102, Bluesmaster, HRM, OTS50) only to realise that you need the dumblelator with 180-200p cables to/from the amp in order to get the tones right.

You can tweak forever, but the dumblelator is an essential part of the system....even if you don't use effects in the loop.

Very nice video with good playing.

http://www.electrovoice.com/sitefiles/downloads/ProSound_proof8-16-10_LowRes.pdf

page 51: 100dB

However, its a bright speaker, that can have a piercing high frequency range if you don't use a dumblelater.

Ampgarage.com

That where the latest Ceriatone FM50 and FM100 come from.

Regarding C-lator (Dumblelator) or not.

Remember the FM amp is an clone of Robben Fords amp and Robben Ford always use a dumblelator loop to interface his TC2290 with his amp.
The external loop does two things
He uses fairly long connector cables, that 1) dampends the high end. This is why the FM amp uses a 68pf bright cap across the master volume.
Furthermore, the loop can 2) add some compression if you run it like Robben Ford with amp master volume at 11 o'clock and send and return controls on the loop also on 11 0'clock..

Regarding 1) dampening the high end
I have build the (parallel) loop into my #102 clone amp, so I don't use long cables in/out of the amp, and in order to get the same amount of high end dampening I use a 470pf cap across the ratio pot in and ground buss bar................this is infact the same mod forumite 'Pickmaster' presented last week. Only his mod is more flexible, using a 12 step switch with different cap values for different situations.
The cap on the ratio pot only affects the OD channel and I dont feel the need for a bright cap on my master volume.

Regaring 2) compression
I made some experiments this weekend with my build in loop.

I have added a switch allowing selection between series mode, like the c-lator or dumblelator, or parallel mode. I use the latter which allows you to use moderate quality effects, in my case an old Boss SE70.

I wanted to test parallel versus serial in higher volume situations, how much impact does the serial mode has on the sound - how much compression. I used a cable in the loop ot take effects out of the equation.
Using the loop in seral mode, does indeed allow you the get more compression/light distortion from the loop, but it tends to blur the clean sound, so I concluded that I found that I really don't need that extra compression effect and I'm quite happy with my build in loop in parallel mode.
 
Hope you can use this info
for deciding on wheater or not you want to use a loop
wheather or not you need a bright cap
and wheater or not you will run it in serial or parallel mode

You could take inspiration from the Dr.Z ZWreck 2x12 cabinet, where a Celestion Gold is parred with a Celtion Blue:


Which is the amp that was referred to in the beginnin gof this post.
http://www.drzamps.com/amp/z_wreck/

Sorry about that, no pun intended.


You're right about different impedance curves for different speakers, but I don't think that is the explanation for differences in sound.

Were the speakers played in for at least 100 hours, when you made the test.
New speakers are a little stiff and will sound hard - especially an alnico like the Cel Gold.

I bought a Tone Tubby a year ago and it was a big dissapointment, spikey and ear pearsing sounds all around until it was broken in. Now its much softer and too far away from my old Cel greenbacks.