Brilliant, thanks. I think I'm going to modify my template to increase the cutout width  since the TR and D'Lite seem to be narrower and cover the pre-amp volume knob. I'll probably move the chassis forward 5mm aswell. Any idea how wide the aluminium strip is it looks like ¾-1" to me? (mixed units again, sorry) Whats the overall depth of your cabinet ?

I'm not trying to copy a Dumble exactly, just want to get it to look similar.

I was looking at the Two-Rock and trying to gauge the set back dimension.

http://two-rock.com/photos/cl/cl1.jpg looks like 25mm 'ish

and the D'Lite

http://us.st11.yimg.com/us.st.yimg.com/I/yhst-89931406377916_1998_4061762 which looks nearer to 30-32mm to me.

I think the 18-20mm set back you use will only work without the cutout. My cutout is 20mm deep.

 I was also constrained a little by the fact that I already had birch ply in 268mm width so I placed the OTS equidistant from front and back. Maybe it was a little too wide at 268mm. Its not too late to move it all forward.

Did you make the cabs? What glue did you use for that blonde. The blonde I can get seems very thick and rubbery and whilst I've used both contact adhesive and PVA in the past I'd rather use PVA anyday, but I'm aware that some stuff it won't stick well enough. I think its to do with the cloth backing. Fender Black seems a lot thinner and is fine with PVA.

I've got the OD trimmer on the back panel and I think I'll get what I want with it set very low indeed, approx 9 o'clock. If I need more I'll use a pedal. I think having the OD trimmer higher can get you a nice lead tone, but if you need some crunch for chords its not that nice.

I found (and I haven't taken mine to a rehearsal yet, need to finish the box) that with the MV at 1½ it sounds dead, very flat no sparkle, but with a hotplate on -8dB and MV on 4 it is transformed, great clarity and sparkle. Can't wait to try it on 4 without the hotplate.

Just finished for the day. Headshell cab is assembled. Just need to attach battens for mounting front and rear fascia panels and then I can get it covered. First cab is going to be Fender Black tolex with nickel/chrome fittings. Considering Blonde with black fittings for number two. Then I'll decide which to keep. I really would like to get a brown/cream faceplate to go with cream chicken head knobs, but i guess thats just being obsessive!

I think I might have positioned the chassis about 5mm too far back. I wish I could get a really good photo of a D style head, or if someone could tell me how far back the face plate should be.

If yours is centre tap red then

red-blue = red-brown =  (blue-brown)/2

Jack I'd be very interested to hear your thoughts on the tone/breakup when lowered to 30mA. My tech set mine to 35 from the start saying that was the recommended setting for the 6L6. I was going to try 38 in a while when I've had a good play with it at 35, but maybe I should consider going lower instead.

Thanks

Hywel Harris

Just spent 10 minutes with my strat and the Hotplate, master on 5 preamp vol on 5 and boy does it sing, its just on the verge of breakup on 5, switch to OD and it bites, hit PAB and it takes it up another level. I can't wait to get it to a rehearsal and use it without the Hotplate. I also tried the FET input with the strat, its got Fralin Vintage Hot pups and the FET  cahnnel was much more controllable, not sure its'll be of much use though unless I use A/B switching and I'm not sure that the inputs can be used that way.

Making a start on the headshell on Sunday.

Nik did admit that my transformer is wrongly colour coded and it does happed occasionally and that his transformer manufacturer will get a slap!

Just got it back from my amp tech and had a short play with it. Clean seems to be very dry and lacking 'sparkle' at home volume levels (master 1½ ish) I tried it for a short period at 4 and its much better. My tech biased at 35mA and I'm wondering if the onset of breakup will be earlier if I bias it a little hotter.

I'm going to try my Hotplate in line later (its getting late here now so I'd better wait till tomorrow!) to see if I can get master to 4 at sensible volumes, though thats not what I wanted the amp for, I need it to do the business at rehearsal and gigging volumes. I have been investigating Power Scaling and would be very interested to hear of anyones experiences.

I prefer the OD trimmer set low and the ratio 9 o'clock ish. Though the OD is really nice for a solo lead sound when wound up a little more its not so good for chords then, I think I'll be experimenting with my OD pedal to achieve that and keep the OD channel pretty clean.

The FET input is nearly unuseable with my Ibanez335, it just starts to feedback at any opportunity. Have't had chance to try an acoustic yet as I don't own one.

So far with my 4x10 Jensen P10R cab its sounds warm and not overly bright but that changes as you wind up the master, I need more time with it and to try using the speakers in my Fender Twin Amp (fender 'special' design though I suspect there's very little special about them). I need to borrow a g12-65 cab to see what its like.

Just found out that on my OT the red is NOT the centre tap on my tranny. I had read the reports of the blue and brown being reversed and my amp tech told me that red for centre tap is standard in Fender and Marshall OT trannies. I had completed the build and gave it to my amp tech to test and he found a problem which he thought was the OT being faulty. Nik suggested measureing the resistances red-blue-brown-red and sure enough red was NOT centre.

Easy if you know to check and kit builders should be made aware of it I think.

I just hope that the secondaries are correctly colour coded as per layout drawing.

Agreed, for new builds, but I guess most current owners wouldn't want to start drilling holes in the chassis.

A fairly intensive effort at the weekend!

Spragues here http://www.hotroxuk.com/store/erol.html

Not sure about the Dales resistors, I would try ringing Watford Valves and see if they can help you.  http://www.watfordvalves.com/products_harma.asp?page=2

Is there any possibility that this could be fitted into the OTS cab, possibly as part of a modified back panel or similar. To keep it all neatly enclosed in the same box would be really good. The mini-toggle switches would need a rethink, they would be very vulnerable.

I did try it that way, but the angle it had to go to get down under the board from the FET trimmer position was a little too extreme for the 2 core shielded that I'd got to use.