Starting my first D* build, just need a sanity check.

[LeftyStrat]

First just some background. A few years ago, my best friend passed away, and at the time I was in dire straights financially. Another close friend stepped up and loaned me the money to fly across country to speak at my friends funeral.

It took me a long time to pay my generous friend back. When I asked what I should pay him interest, he said, "Build me the ultimate amp."

Now this friend is more of a singer/rhythm guitar player, so I don't think a Trainwreck is appropriate.

His two main guitars are a Tele and an ES-335. He complains about not being able to get good tube distortion at the gigs and volumes he plays at. Yet he needs clean and distortion tones.

I've spent a lot of time reading threads here, and I am leaning to a non-hrm, early eighties generation, with a 6v6 power section.

I wouldn't ask for help, since I normally could go through various iterations with a customer and arrive at something they love, but my friend is on the east coast and I am on the west coast, so shipping the amp back and forth for tweaking would be hard (and expensive).

So I am looking for the Dumble generation that "plays itself" and would be a noble repayment to the friend that was there for me.

Any advice would be appreciated.

[Bob-I]

I think you're on the right track. I built a very similar amp into a Princeton chassis (honeymoon fit). Sounds great, provides a nice rich clean tone and great chunky ryythm tone using the od and backing the guitar volume down a tad. 6v6's give me enough power to be heard over the drums but without getting out of control.