Add a tube rectifier to your amp

[KB2WIG]

Whenever I do something stupid, or feel like a bonehead, a search of the web helps me feel superior...


http://www.torresengineering.com/addtubrectoy.html



klc

[WA1GFZ]

how about the solid state model for a 28 volt supply.

[N3DRB The Derb]

musicians are really stupid technically, generally speaking. they fall for the exact game garbage that audiophools do. Mostly the rock gitbox playas. They are always forever seeking "that sound". And they buy and buy and buy in search of it. but they never find it.
They're looking in the wrong place.

The B52's guitar player who died of aids, Cindy Wilsons brother, Ricky, who played on rock lobster and everything else on the first 2 records they did before he died used a mid 1960's Sears silvertone, really cheap thing worth about 20 bucks at the time.

[k4kyv]

The B52's guitar player who died of aids, Cindy Wilsons brother, Ricky, who played on rock lobster and everything else on the first 2 records they did before he died used a mid 1960's Sears silvertone, really cheap thing worth about 20 bucks at the time.

Wonder what that amplifier would fetch on ePay to-day?

The "sag effect" could just as easily be achieved with a series resistor.  It's a good idea to use one when converting from hollow state to solid state to avoid damaging overvoltage.  Another factor is the delay while the rectifier filament warms up.  Sometimes tube type equipment depends on that delay for the safety of certain components.

But going from solid to hollow state may present other problems.  Solid state rectifiers can stand higher peak current than tube types, even though the ones made of sand will self-destruct if peak voltage exceeds a certain value.  That's why solid state rectifier filter circuits can tolerate such high values of filter capacitance.  It's quite likely that those hollow state  rectifiers will be very short lived.

Now just watch the prices of 5Y3's, 5Z3's, 80's, 83's, 5AR4's and 5U4's go stratospheric, right up there with 2A3's and 845's.  I'm glad I have a  lifetime supply stashed away already.

[WA1GFZ]

I have burned in 5u4s at 1/2 price and I bet they were made in the USA. I'll throw in sockets and some crappy plastic insulated wire

[N3DRB The Derb]

he only used it in the studio - his guitar was a silvertone as well. Back then worth maybe 40 bucks, now in the hundreds.

[Opcom]

For the solid state crowd, I have some 6-amp tungar rectifiers available. I wonder if they'd be silly enough to do it.. mount the tubes and fil. xfmr in the bottom of the git-amp case..

[k4kyv]

Tungar rectifiers would make good low voltage high current rectifiers.  Back in their day, they were about the only option for the application, other than a motor-generator, for high current DC.

[AF9J]

Believe it or not, there is a difference soundwise between tube and solid state rectifiers in guitar tube amps.  I used to have a Mesa Boogie guitar amp, had both a tube and a solid state rectifier (it was a part of their Dual Rectifier series). You could select either rectifier to run the amp (99.99% of the time I used the solid state rectifier). When the signal is kept relatively clean, the difference beween the two sounwise is hardly noticeable.  But, the more distorted the output signal becomes, the more noticeable the sound difference.  It's not that one becomes more trebly or bassy than the other.  It's just that as more clipping occurs in the signal, the better the solid state rectifer responds to the distortion.  

Under distortion conditions, solid state rectifered amps sound more percussive/biting.  Tube rectifiered amps by contrast, (due to the so-called voltage sag effect under distortion) have a less bitting distortion sound. Some so called tone conisseurs say that a tube rectified guitar amp, that is running distortion, sounds "squashy".

I used to play lead guitar in heavy rock bands.  I never used the tube rectifier in my Mesa Boogies.  There wasn't enough attack, or bite to the sound to do decent metal or heavy rock. The players that like tube rectifiers, are usually looking for an old school blues sound (ala some bluesman from the 40s or 50s, getting a ratty sound from a small guitar amp that's turned all the way up), a Neil Young lo-fi kind of garage rock sound (Neil likes Fender Deluxe amps, which use tube rectifiers in them), vintage 60s rock, etc.

I know that it seems cheesy, but there definitely is a difference soundwise between the two types of rectifiers in guitar amps.  BUT, it's really only when the amp is run with distortion.  Clean? - give me a break.  Either will do.

73,
Ellen - AF9J

P.S. - somtheing to add:  yeah Don, you could probably add a resistor to a solid state rectifier to approximate a tube rectifier's sag.  Whether it would sound the same, I don't know.  Also, as much as I hate to say it, many guitarists are quite conservative in their gear preferences, and would probably insist that the only "good sounding amps" use tube rectifiers.  It's kind of like the purists, who insist that all solid state guitar amps sound bad (sorry, I beg to differ).

[Steve - WB3HUZ]

But since many guitarists have damaged their ears from years of high SPL, I don't take what they say about sounds very seriously.

[Rick K5IAR]

huh..? speak up..   

Rick

[AF9J]

LOL!!!!

Serously though, I do try to watch my hearing.  I don't want to end up like my Uncle Joe (the 2nd generation guitarist in my family), with over half of my hearing gone.  Besides not playing so loud, one thing that helps, is to not run a very trebly sound.  Deafness comes from the hairs in the inner ear (which are like little tuning forks), breaking off.  Once they break off, you've lost hearing for the freqs. those hairs responded to.  Higher freq. hearing is usually the most likely to go (due to the inner ear hairs for those greqs., being the smallest & most fragile).

Also, like many guitarists, I may use a fair mount of distortion, but I DON'T use a stack.  They're too loud.  Believe it or not, many of rock's most memorable cuts, were recorded with small amps.  Jimmy Paige recorded many of Zep's classic songs with a 15W Supro amp, with a single 15" speaker in it - not a 100W Marshall stack.  Even Hendrix wasn't averse to using small amps in the studio.  Smaller, high gain amps are gaining in popularity.  People want to save their ears (and if they're practicing at home, not tick off the neighbors).  The whole concept of distorted guitar = loud guitar all of the time, is a bit of a misconception nowadays.   It's a holdover from the days when guitar amps were relatively low gain (so you had to crank them up to get any dirt soundwise out of them), and did not have master volumes (basically a level control between the pre-amp and power amp stages, that allows you to crank the gain up in the pre-amp stage [for pre-amp distortion], and keep the feed [and resultant volume] down in the final amp stage).     

73,
Ellen - AF9J

[W3SLK]

Derb said:

he only used it in the studio - his guitar was a silvertone as well. Back then worth maybe 40 bucks, now in the hundreds.

 


Hmmm, I'm wondering if it was the Silvertone with the 5 watt Class A amp built into the case

[Ian VK3KRI]

LOL!!!!

Also, like many guitarists, I may use a fair mount of distortion, but I DON'T use a stack.  They're too loud.  Believe it or not, many of rock's most memorable cuts, were recorded with small amps. 

73,
Ellen - AF9J

Just because you have a stack on stage doesn't mean you have to use it. If you stack 4 quadboxes on stage , you 'look' louder. It is, after all, showbusiness.
                                                                                             Ian VK3KRI

[ka3zlr]

Never loudness....Density...Thickness of amplification....The who Kansas and Van Halen were masters of Density... even ZZ Top and Rush in later shows were phenomenal once they learned the Stage technique...Turn it out not up...