newbie :)

[kindred]

hello there everybody. im prety new to this whole amp building thing, although i have been lurking in these amp forums for quite awhile. all i have built so far is some cheezy little 9v battery powerd solid state amp for some good ol camp fire songs . sounds terrible but thats probly mostly due to the speaker i ripped out of an old computer monitor (dump find haha). i would like to eventually build myself one of these coveted wreck's but from what ive read i dont think it would be the best place to start, maybe a little champ for them trashy rockabilly sounds or sompthing. anyway i think i might have stumbled on to sompthing you guys might find interesting... sound clips.. of a ruby mind you, evin has amp settings. sounds VERRY tight, i think i would have way too much fun with one of these, anyway here's the addy.

http://www.proguitar.de/AudioDemo/Compa ... eAmps.html

there is alot of other amps in there too... you just gota find the ruby under the two rock pull down. oh ya, its my first post too yipeeeeee.

[ampdoc1]

Great site! Thanks for the tip.

DEH

[Robert]

THanks for the site Kindred. Interesting to see how similar the TR Onyx is to a Dumble topology -- no coincidence there! The Ruby/Express was my first build and I have no formal training in electronics. The available resources are tremendous, schematic, layout, quality parts-Pacific transformers, chassis, AND the TWreckers here. It was not a hard build and you will have an amp you really want.

[kindred]

thanks for the advice Robert, i may give the tw a try after all...
btw check out my super hi tech, ultra complex, magnificently sounding, sexy looking, battery powerd guitar amplifier haha. i name it "potty mouth"... kinda apropriate!

incase you are wondering the little pcb chunk hanging on there is an ad/dc converter jack thingie that i yanked from the speaker

[Elcabong]

Hi Kindred,

did you also spend some time at the ax84.com site? This is a good place to start in case you do not feel confident to tackle a bigger project. They offer some good tutorials for starter.

[kindred]

hi Elcabong,

ive been floating aroung ax84 passively for the past two years or so... i swear i read over that p1 theory doc a million times by now (along with the different amp schematics they have there) trying to make myself understand how they work before i decide to tackle building anything... ive always been facinated with how stuff works but it makes me nervous building or playing with sompthing that i dont at least have a working knowlage of. i like to think i can generaly understand what most of the parts of the circuts do now. i am kinda torn between a few projects actually. i think eventually, knowing me, i will build them all and have a totaly new list of projects waiting. so if you think of it that way it realy dosnt matter a whole lot as long as it dosnt sound like pooh and discourage me after all that effort. i dunno... eh maybe ill just flip a coin haha

[Elcabong]

Kindred,

this is a personal matter since you and only you know what is your ability level to tackle any given project. But the consensus seem to be to start with a simpler project so that it does not end in frustration when troubleshooting it.

I was planning to build a November for my first project but finally went with a CB P1 Extreme. A simple project but giving a nice result IMO.

[Funkalicousgroove]

What I found was VERY helpful when first learning circuits was to actually read and memorize schematics, to this day I can take out a pen and paper and draw you a 5F6A Bassman, or an AB763 Deluxe reverb. The point is not in memorizing the minutia, but in understanding the role different components play within the circuit. I also found that after the first project that they're all about the same, IE there isn't a ton of difference between building a champ and a Bassman. For a first project I wouldn't reccommend building a High gain channel switcher or anything crazy like that, but if you're comfortable with your soldering skills, patient enough to triple check all your components for value, triple check all your solder connections and ground connections before firing it up you'll do fine-It's not rocket science, it's 1930's technology!! Read these:

Dave Funk's "Tube Amp Workbook"
the tech info section at www.aikenamps.com
Both Gerald Weber books are worth a read, "Tube amp talk" and "a desk top reference of hip vintage guitar amps".
"Valve Amp" and the companion "Building Valve Amps" by Morgan Jones.

The other thing would be to build a David Allen Kit, they are built such that it is almost impossible to fail, and the Instructions are written for the lay person, in an easy to follow step by step format. I built one of his Class Act kits a few years ago and it is still one of my favorite amps to play-TOP quality for sure. The build process was easy and only took a couple of days, and I'm sure that it would have been an easy build for someone with little to no experience.

[mojo]

My suggestion (which I did) is to get a silverface Champ that works but has a cheesy replacement speaker (not uncommon, and cheap). If you're patient you may score one for about $125. Then get the schematic and some newer caps and resistors and rebuild it. Replace the speaker with a Weber or something similar. Play around with the values of caps and resistors as you go and read up on the net, thus learning what changes adjusting the values gives you - build it stock first to make sure it works okay. The result is you get a great cheap practice amp that sounds better than the original, you have practice various mods at little cost and can customize it to suit you. My version has higher end caps and metal film resistors for the preamp with close to the original values, but with carbon comps near the power tube for that "magic mojo". It sounds GREAT!