Bare Knuckle Pickups Forum
Forum Ringside => Guitars, Amps and Effects => Topic started by: Dmoney on March 20, 2010, 04:47:00 PM
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Premature New Do-It-Yourself Amp Day
So I decided that since I would no longer give money to Sounds Great... and since I did try to dip my toe back in the water which subsequently failed, that I could build myself an SLO to a decent spec/standard.
This is what my technical questions have been about recently, and shout outs must go to HTH, Martin and Frank JPF for the help, as my inexperience has led to this... which (and this is where the premature bit comes in) should be a great build, even though it's not currently in my possession! After the epic red plating bias fail that you may have read about in the tech pages, It seems to have transpired that the output transformer is actually still within spec, but that the FX loop jacks where causing volume loss even after the switched contacts had been cleaned... weird.
So I've yet to hear this amp in its full glory, which will happen on monday night!
These photos are still from the build stages, although the PT and the power supply board are all in place now. I'll post up some more pics once i get it back.
(http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_e9gS3LdMSCA/S506UzW4qKI/AAAAAAAAACY/ctiUyizDNcI/s1600/000_0902s.jpg)
(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v174/xtattybobx/IMAG0079.jpg?t=1268448983)
I think its a pretty tidy job and I'm secretly kind of proud of the effort I put in.
as for spec...
its an EL34 powered Sloclone with vishay 0.5W resistors, obviously Orange Drop caps, couple of sprague atoms. The filter caps are united chemi-con I think. pots are clarostat's. Ground bus is 18gauge tinned copper and the thinner stuff on the 12AX7 heaters is 20gauge. The hookup wire is a mix of 18 and 20swg teflon coated silver plated wire. transformers are made by O'netics. Valve sockets are Belton. The knobs are fancy concentric grip ones that grip the whole pot shaft. TSL used to use these when I worked there on their audio monitoring units. Parts came from a bunch of different places in the end.
Hopefully I can get this working as it should be and do some sound clips.
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Very nice indeed., :D
Kudos to you for such lovely workmanship. The fact that the amplifier experts on here were willing to help and inform, being yet another indication of the good will around the B.K.P forum. I look forward to the 'finished' photographs and subsequent sound clips .
Excellent. 8)
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thanks man,
This was very much an exercise in 'measure 9 times, cut once'.
I got just enough components to build this thing without having spares. I finished up with excess wire but that's all.
Had to get a few cheap tools to help me out which will probably get ebayed in the coming weeks.
hopefully I can do some nicely lit close ups.
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nice!
I haven't tried an slo, but I've tried an avenger, and that thing kicked ass. the SLO has the rep of being even better, so...
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That looks brilliant - is it a Ceriatone?
Mark.
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no its not a kit.
the chassis and a lot of the switches, jacks, pots etc came from c3 amps.
pcb components came from a mix of hoffman amps, mouser and farnell.
bus wire came from bluebell audio
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Premature New Do-It-Yourself Amp Day
So I decided that since I would no longer give money to Sounds Great... and since I did try to dip my toe back in the water which subsequently failed, that I could build myself an SLO to a decent spec/standard.
can i ask what happened with sounds great..? i think soldano need to change their importer here..
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That looks great. I admire you guys who can build amps-I wouldn't know where to start.
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Premature New Do-It-Yourself Amp Day
So I decided that since I would no longer give money to Sounds Great... and since I did try to dip my toe back in the water which subsequently failed, that I could build myself an SLO to a decent spec/standard.
can i ask what happened with sounds great..? i think soldano need to change their importer here..
I had something break and they tried to tell me I was a liar with no consumer rights. Amongst other things.
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If that amp sounds as good as it looks you'll be quids in.
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nice
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cheers!
quids in is one way to put it. it cost a lot because everything is at least or over the spec of the real SLO, but its still WAY less than a real one. I can see where labour costs would pump up the price of a real one though, plus you get the lifetime transferable warranty with the real SLO.
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Very neat job.
It's always really frustrating when you finish wiring an amp, and then can't fire it up straight away!
Looking forward to hearing how you get on.
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I nearly ignored this thread because I guessed it would be a techie-amp-based thread of some sort...
I'm SO glad I popped in for look :D
Now I understand what all those other threads that were going so far over my head were about :lol:
That looks really good, congratulations on going for it...
Good luck with it tonight :D
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Super Badass.
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so today i got the amp back!
bit of my fancy wire bending got undone with having to change the FX loop jacks, even cleaned and sanded they still didn't pass signal right, so the easiest thing was to change em.
the amp is a lot louder... but as loud as it should be? im not sure... so tomorrow im gonna try and cut down the little bit of noise it has, and to test it next to some other amps.
changed the red plated E34L's out for a fresh set of EL34's. Just got some random preamp tubes in it right now. sounds AWESOME but it could be better by doing the usual bits and bobs!
(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v174/xtattybobx/000_0917.jpg?t=1269299253)
(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v174/xtattybobx/000_0910.jpg?t=1269299540)
(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v174/xtattybobx/000_0911.jpg?t=1269299595)
(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v174/xtattybobx/000_0912.jpg?t=1269299682)
(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v174/xtattybobx/000_0914.jpg?t=1269299738)
(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v174/xtattybobx/000_0913.jpg?t=1269299794)
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did a cr@ppy video. playing sucks. its just to show the amp working.
My macbook mic did some weird phasing at some points. Maybe I'll try and do a proper video in a few days or something.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hX9KeC6P2Pw&feature=player_embedded
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WOW !!! :o
That wonderful creation ; just does everything very well, from warm Country cleans, to Rock rampage ! I did also like your playing in the early stages, probably as the first part would be the speed / channel / setting I would spend ALL my time on. :lol:
I just think the whole project is stunning, from the courage of your initial vision, the quality craftsmanship in building it all ( Even the chassis ! ) - and then bringing it to full fruition with ( amongst other things ) a perfect pick of the components used .
Brilliant, just brilliant ! :D
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thanks man. i didn't make the chassis or pcb's though. would have liked to! maybe in future.
PCB etching in my bedroom sounded like a bad plan.
I want to get some clips with new preamp valves, sort the hum out, maybe take some time and do it well and not have all that horrible audio phasing. maybe get a mic out and mic my cab up.
there is a bit of a level difference between clean and overdrive.
clean is pretty much unclipped. If you flick the crunch switch on the clean channel you'll go up to JCM800 gain tones I reckon with the normal channel gain maxed out.
its nice. just need to eliminate this hum!
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where'd you get the PCB? am i right in assuming SLOC stands for SLO Clone? (I know that's what it's supposed to be...!)
stunning build by the way, I'm hoping to do quite the same project but with a single EL34 and 2-3 preamp tubes. it's a fun project to work on.
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fun till you start spending days tracking down hum...!
thats what ive been doing today.
can seem to get it gripped.