Too freakin bright

[silentrage]

I just got a bigera 6262-212 recently and have been liking it a lot.
Real crunchy, fairly tight with the bugera speakers and lots and lots of gain.  :lol:

But I heard that amps will sound very different on and off axis, and since I've been putting it on the floor most of the time, it's always been way off axis. Yesterday I put it on a chair so that it's directly facing me when I sit down to play, and it just sounds so different now.

There's a more punch and power, and there's less bass, which I like, but there's also a lot more hi mids and highs, which I don't like too much. I like my lows and low-mids.
I put trebel, presence to 0 and mid to 6/10 and it's still bright, even with my neck CS which is really round sounding already. I even adjusted all the allen bolts to provide less treble and more bass, but it's still piercing.
And the weird thing with the treble and presence control is they don't do anything for the highs when they're between 0-4, at this range they just affect the lows and mids. Anywhere past 4 and they start to affect the higher strings.

So any suggestions on what would improve the sound?
I'm thinking some G12K100s? Then a tube change?

[f.sardis]

the chair is your problem. put it on something more solid that can transfer the bass frequencies to the floor better. i got mine on a small mahogany desk.

[WezV]

put it back on the floor ;)

[silentrage]

Ok thanks, I'll try something else more solid, but does the chair boost the highs or something?
Because right now I'm happy with the amount of bass, I just wanna roll off the highs a bit.

put it back on the floor ;)

Haha, good point.
Call me silly but I just wanna hear what it "really" sounds like in case I take it to a show
or something and everyone else hears a different tone to what I'm hearing.

[f.sardis]

no the chair is not boosting anything. it just fails to transfer any low frequencies and that makes it sound very bright.

[ailean]

If you are going to mess with the amp, play with the tubes first, much cheaper!

JJ's are a darker sounding tube if I remember rightly and not too expensive either.

[silentrage]

no the chair is not boosting anything. it just fails to transfer any low frequencies and that makes it sound very bright.

I'll find something then. I wanted to stack a bunch of 4x4s in the beginning but they were way shaky when stacked high, lol.

If you are going to mess with the amp, play with the tubes first, much cheaper!

JJ's are a darker sounding tube if I remember rightly and not too expensive either.

I wanted to do that at first but I hear speakers have a much bigger impact on your tone than tubes so I'm thinking speaker replacements first?

[f.sardis]

speaker first. i have never found valves to make a big difference. mostly you will notice differences in gain but not tone.

[ailean]

I wanted to do that at first but I hear speakers have a much bigger impact on your tone than tubes so I'm thinking speaker replacements first?

Absolutely true, but speakers will cost you £30-£50 each and you might not like them, tubes cost £10-20 and you need less of them (you get the most impact by changing the 1st tube in the signal path). They can have a reasonable impact, but not as much as a speaker replacement.

You can stick a jj in p1 for about a tenner and have your answer as wether it works for you. That just my way of thinking :)

[hamfist]

Just putting the amp back on the floor will solve things for you. As lifting any speaker enclosure up off the floor reduces the bass response dramatically, and also puts your own ears waaay off axis.

However, this will not help the front two rows of punters at a gig, who will still get blasted with the death ray of super treble, as they will be pretty much on axis to the speakers.

  If you plan to use the amp at a gig, what the audience gears is actually more important than what you hear yourself .... so this is something I would recommend you sort out.

I would go for two main lines of attack.   Firstly, beam blockers - http://www.webervst.com/blocker.html - or something home-made which does the same thing. THese really work very well at cutting down treble output (much more than any change of speakers) and give your amp a much more even spread of sound.  You can find out if this might work for you just by experimenting with some gaffer tape, or sticking on a couple of circles of cardboard with double-sided tape onto the grill cloth in front of the dust caps of the speakers.

  Secondly, it is pretty likely that your amp has a bright cap(s) across the gain pot(s). Experimenting with removing the cap(s) might cut down the treble considerably. However, as always, going into the chassis of a tube amp is very risky unless you know how to drain the high voltages that still exist even whenthe amp is switched off and unplugged.  Certainly a reasonable tech armed with a schematic of the amp would be able to reduce the treble response of the amp considerably.

Good luck !

[jibidy]

Putting it on the floor should help but for best bass, putting it snuggly in the corner will help boost the lows nicely.
I found putting my Randall in the corner gave me a much darker sound but it still keeps the 'cut'.
Sounds crazy but i like to stand in different places while I play to. corners are great for bass. Aiming the speakers at your head probably wouldnt be best.
Maybe let your strings get old. I like the sound of my old strings, even though they are getting abit manky.

[Elliot]

I'd agree with a make shift beam blocker idea - don't bother with the expensive Weber ones - just get three 5-6 inch circles of thick packing card and stick them together and then attach it to the grill cloth in the line of the speaker cone.  Should do the trick.

[silentrage]

Absolutely true, but speakers will cost you £30-£50 each and you might not like them, tubes cost £10-20 and you need less of them (you get the most impact by changing the 1st tube in the signal path). They can have a reasonable impact, but not as much as a speaker replacement.

You can stick a jj in p1 for about a tenner and have your answer as wether it works for you. That just my way of thinking :)

I might try that seeing as how cheap it is. Just to clarify I should change the V1 tube right?

Just putting the amp back on the floor will solve things for you. As lifting any speaker enclosure up off the floor reduces the bass response dramatically, and also puts your own ears waaay off axis.

However, this will not help the front two rows of punters at a gig, who will still get blasted with the death ray of super treble, as they will be pretty much on axis to the speakers.

  If you plan to use the amp at a gig, what the audience gears is actually more important than what you hear yourself .... so this is something I would recommend you sort out.

I would go for two main lines of attack.   Firstly, beam blockers - http://www.webervst.com/blocker.html - or something home-made which does the same thing. THese really work very well at cutting down treble output (much more than any change of speakers) and give your amp a much more even spread of sound.  You can find out if this might work for you just by experimenting with some gaffer tape, or sticking on a couple of circles of cardboard with double-sided tape onto the grill cloth in front of the dust caps of the speakers.

  Secondly, it is pretty likely that your amp has a bright cap(s) across the gain pot(s). Experimenting with removing the cap(s) might cut down the treble considerably. However, as always, going into the chassis of a tube amp is very risky unless you know how to drain the high voltages that still exist even whenthe amp is switched off and unplugged.  Certainly a reasonable tech armed with a schematic of the amp would be able to reduce the treble response of the amp considerably.

Good luck !

I'd agree with a make shift beam blocker idea - don't bother with the expensive Weber ones - just get three 5-6 inch circles of thick packing card and stick them together and then attach it to the grill cloth in the line of the speaker cone.  Should do the trick.

Beam blockers sound like a good idea! I'll make some home made solutions.
Any idea what's the best material is the best for deflecting soundwaves?
I'm thinking a piece of foam cut into a dome shape with some paper wraped around it,
wonder if I could find foam that thick around the house ... hmmm...

[ailean]

I might try that seeing as how cheap it is. Just to clarify I should change the V1 tube right?

Yep, the V1 (or is that p1?, whatever) is usually the one closest to the input jack.

[silentrage]

On the topic of modifying the amp, it seems like I have to be able to identy some charge storing components on the board and discharge them to ground in order to not kill myself?
Any one know how to do this?

And how hard is it to do a 10% power mod on the amp?