When does "authentic" not matter anymore?

[scattitude]

OK. This has got to be one of the most ridiculous things I've seen yet. I've already successfully built a wonderful sounding ODS clone using premium parts and build techniques. And as I've heard, Dumble was even known to have used parts found at, yep, Radio Shack (please correct me if I am mis-informed). And as I did my usual browsing on eBay today for anything Dumble-related, I came across a series of ads for 'Dumble spare parts' - i.e. commonly found carbon resistors selling for $15 each. Yikes! Probably identical to those selling for a nickel through outlets such as Mouser. Please tell me if you really believe every last nut and bolt must be blessed by the man himself to achieve that 'magic tone', and thus justify $15 for a resistor! Or maybe, just maybe, someone is trying to pull a fast one here! See for yourself:

http://cgi.ebay.com/Dumble-Amplifier-Vi ... 1|294%3A50

Added: 1/14/09 - thanks for the responses so far! The general point of my post was that I AM aware how SPECIFIC components in an amp-build can make a significant (or subtle) difference in the sound; however, the eBay seller did not make this distinction in the ads for the parts - as to which circuit element would benefit from the upgrade and how - sonically. In fact, if you noticed, there were many ads for different resistor values without distinguishing any benefits in any part of the schematic. If the seller displayed some knowledge of those specific benefits, there might be SOME rationale to spending a few extra bucks. But my amp still sounds great without $15 resistors!

[Structo]

Yeah but those resistors have <<<<***M0jo!***>>>>

[heisthl]

Shipping is only $17 to Arizona - $32 of 1 Meg heaven! Lucky for me I only need 2 to do an amp.

[Bob-I]

I'll need 10 of them.

[glasman]

We had better chip in and buy one, have it reverse engineered and become millionaires .

I think those were made by Sprague FWIW. I am sure that you could find several hundred of them if you are willing to muck around at Apex Electronics in LA. Well worth the time if you are ever in the LA area and want to root thru literally tons of STUFF.

Gary

[Aurora]

I can understand the Mojo bit, but as the OP asks, do you seriously think that one brand of carbon comp resistors are superior to another?
Or one brand of polyprop caps over another?

Since I work in electronic design and service, I do know that the published / measured specs for similar types of various makes are next to nothing.
Still I read the claims of vastly different sonics.

While I have almost the utmost (?) of respect for the work of many of the regular posters at this forum, I often wonder about several of these claims.
Having spent many years as an HiFi Phool, the claims over in that camp are even stronger, and quite often tips over the fence to downright foolishness.
Some serious, down-to-earth answer will be most appreciated!

( BTW - do I need a flamesuit and some serious ducking here? )

[BobW]

All Resistors and Caps are not ideal components. They both contain small components of resistance, capacitance, and inductance. These small amounts vary from manufacturer to another and from resistor and cap types as well. This is mostly due to mechanical construction, the materials used, quality control of the whole process, and proximity to temperature differences, noise, etc.. So there definitely can be a sonic difference from one component type to another, and how it's being used in the circuit. As we have all heard when comparing say, one speaker to another.

Is it Mojo?, Nope, being from New Orleans, I wish there was a little Mojo to it all but there isn't. It just understanding how non-ideal components react with each other and their environment. This is where HAD's experience excelled.

[jelle]

As for the 1M resistors....Dumble has used several types of resistors in that spot in the phase inverter. Not critical, IMHO. Believe me, I have tested this.

Based on the stuff that this ebay seller has to offer and his geographical location I would guess it is the builder that made Joe Bonamassa's (main?) D-amp. The ebay seller has a lot of old marshall parts.

[jaysg]

I thought it was a joke.

[Structo]

I was joking about the m0jo bit.

All one has to do is scan the ebay ads for a couple tools, one Eddie Vegas and one Tune-0-Matic.

They both part out vintage Fenders and sell the parts for more $$$.

The Vegas dude uses all the buzz words known to man.

"These parts have "Moj0" and "Tone for Days" and "Sustain until next WEEK!"

[talbany]

Here is an intresting bit a Mojo lore for ya..We design and build an amp called the Lindy Fralin Model. We build about 60 or so a year..Have been now for 4 years.. We made a few changes early on to do our best to produce a consistant high quality amp.. I play through every one before they leave.. Up until this point I have been extremely pleased with keeping our amps pretty consistant.. Several weeks ago we noticed several amps that came off sounding amazing!!!! head and sholders better than any wev'e done.. Thinking it had to be something in the transformers...Called Paul @ MM he said they had changed nothing.. after the 3rd amp they went back to the normal production standard...We racked our brains trying to figure out what made these 3 so special.. We blue printed them made transformer measurments and still to this day don't know why these 3 had it going on...One of the three is going to Tomo Fujita!!!


Tony VVT

[Structo]

Perhaps on those three the tolerances all fit together nicely.
Or maybe the phase of the moon?

j/k , but maybe just all the values were such it just came together really well.

Like in the old days when they would build engines by hand and every so often the balance, tolerances and clearances all were just right to make an exceptional motor.

[talbany]

Perhaps on those three the tolerances all fit together nicely.
Or maybe the phase of the moon?

j/k , but maybe just all the values were such it just came together really well.

Like in the old days when they would build engines by hand and every so often the balance, tolerances and clearances all were just right to make an exceptional motor.

Really no other explanation... The weird thing was it was 3 in a row.. The odds would be much greater if it were spread out over several months..
This I am sure is nothing new to some companies lurking here that produce a fair amount of amps.. Hell we all know Fender had there golden cherry's...

Tony VVT

[rooster]

Tony - That was a cool story and I am glad you shared it. I have one too, about a Fender 4/10 HR Deville.

I worked at a Fender store and we got these in all the time. This happened about 4 years ago. To me, these amps as a rule are the harshest, most paint peeling things to come down the road. I even remember putting one - a particularily harsh one - in a room with a guy to demo. It was unkind of me, yes, but he was going on about how the Fender amps were wimpy and not as loud as his Marshall combo - something we didn't sell. I gave him a Strat and I turned the amp on 6 or 7 in the higher gain channel with the Master V up, and exited the room. Our building was a former bank, built with a lot of concrete - still I could hear him out at the front counter. He tired of this after 5 minutes or so, turned down and eventually came out and said, 'OK, that is pretty loud.' And hell no, he didn't buy it.

And this was very typical of the 15 or so that I saw come in there while we stocked that amp. Yeah, people bought them on rep alone...

Well, then one day, we get another fresh one in, nobody has played it, we just turned it on for five minutes or so, made sure it had audio, that was it. And soon enough someone comes in and they are debating whether they should buy a 40 watt HRDeluxe or the 60 watt HR Deville. Knowing what I know about the Deville, I said that 60 watts was probably way too much power for most gigs, and then I got a Strat and plugged it in. Thinking this was going to be over pretty quickly, I turned it up a bit on the clean channel and beat a few chords out of it. Smooth as silk!!!!!!!! Unbelievable, actually. Just like a great BFSR - really! I thought there must be something wrong, and I did my best to recover, saying something like, 'Hmm, this sounds pretty good, maybe Fender changed something here'. The customer hung out for a while, we ran into the HRD, and then left, said he would come back later because he didn't have the money just yet, you know. So later that night I pulled the tubes out of a HRD and swapped them with the HR Deville - still sounded great. I checked the bias - a little low but not bad. I also pulled a fresh set of Fender GT graded pwr tubes and tried those - still great! WTF?????

I sold it two days later to a different person - someone looking at a HRDeluxe, actually. And man, I was really anxious to get the next one in. (Here I really was thinking that Fender had figured something out, that they had really gotten some things together, you know?) It finally arrives and - you guessed it - back to square one, horrible amp. And all the others that came later were just as bad.

Anyway, that's my story. To this day I still wonder why that amp sounded so good. I will never know. BTW, I have played one of your amps here not so long ago and I thought it sounded great. The reverb was very balanced I remember thinking at the time, and the amp stood up real well next to a couple other amps that were in the room. Good job, Tony.

[selloutrr]

WOAH !!! The worst part... Some idiot will buy it.