Where Do I Start?

[Rob64]

I love music, being a guitarist, at 24 I've been blessed to share the stage with some of my idols, always have had a keen interest in building amps, pedals, etc have decent soldering skills have done pedal modding kits, work on guitar electronics all the time......lets just say I want to understand how to and start working/building amplifiers and understanding schematics..seems like a lot of bright minded people here so I felt compelled to join the forum and see if anyone could give me a little direction.

Rob Smith

[Structo]

Hi Rob and welcome to The Amp Garage.

I don't mean to be boastful but this forum has some of the brightest minds in tube amplifiers on the net.

You sound like a lot of new members in that you have gotten your feet wet, so to speak, by building small projects like pedals and the like.

A tube amp is quite a step above a pedal in that it encompasses just about everything in the electronics realm.

I suppose the main thing that sets a tube amp apart from most all other electronics is the high voltage that is present in the power supply that supplies the B+ power to the vacuum tube plates.
This is also the lethal part of the tube amp and if you are not careful you can get a bad shock or worse.

So we preach safe work practices to help protect the beginner from these voltages.

In the Garage section there is a thread about reading material.
Check it out.
https://tubeamparchive.com/viewtopic.php?t=9023

A tube amp kit can be good for the first build because believe it or not, sourcing the right parts is half the battle.
So if you consider that, you have to decide what amp you want to build.
I would suggest an amp that you would be interested in playing through compared to some very simple amp like a Fender Champ.
Although those are cool single ended amps that can sound big in a recording.

The Fender 5E3 Deluxe is a popular first amp, sounds great and Deluxe combo amp is a great grab and go amp.

Good luck and ask questions when you can't find the answer.

Cheers!
Tom

[Bob S]

Welcome Rob.
Wise words from Tom - Safety First.
You should also know that building amps is highly addictive.
Highly, highly addictive.
The sickness continues...
Have Fun.
Bob

[Rob64]

thanks guys, going to look into a kit of some type....will definately put safety first......I have a highly addictive personalilty...so maybe this will be a good thing....in a bad way? lol

any good DIY kit sites that sells everything I need I could start with? like a champ kit or princeton

I seriously have my mind set on building a Dr Z Stang Ray clone knowing i'll probably never be able to afford a real one lol

[martin manning]

Recent relevant discussion: https://tubeamparchive.com/viewtopic.ph ... kit+source

[pinkphiloyd]

Get a copy of Merlin Blencowe's books.

[Jack Hester]

Rob -

Find the topic 'Old Chassis Builder' for a really good source for custom chassis'.

I built a couple of Watts' amp kits in Epiphone Valve Jr. chassis', back 3 or so years ago. Just to get my feet wet, on my return to tubes after being away from them for a few decades. Got my learning curve up fast by building something that worked and sounded good. Then, I moved on to building from scratch, with a custom chassis (no cab). Later, I took a totally trashed antique PA amplifier and built a point-to-point amplifier that turned out way better than I expected. Had some really good help on that one, from really exceptional people. Things that turned out to be small, but had me stumped.

But, as stated by the others, safety is a must when putting your hands in and around the high voltages of these type amps. I have a pair of thin rubberized work gloves that I put on when I'm testing and recording voltage readings. They are not rated for high voltages. But, you'll get a tingle instead of much pain, if you do accidentally come come into contact with a bare component. Chop sticks are a must, for probing.

Anyway, soak up all that young brain can and enjoy the addiction.

Jack

[MCK]

Get a copy of Merlin Blencowe's books.

I think Merlin's books are a little deep for a 1st read (no offense intended to OP or Merlin). I would start with Dave Hunter's book. (http://www.amazon.com/Tube-Amp-Book-Rev ... 0879307676)

To OP, Ahh to be 24 again. How I wish I was as enlightened as you are now simply by setting foot here if nothing else... You are in a good place at a great age. You'll go far. Enjoy the process.

[Cliff Schecht]

I'm only 25...

Luckily I grew up with a tube-aholic and had a love of electronics forced onto me early. I still remember driving to see my grandma and getting the lecture on heterodyne and superhet receivers when I was 7 or 8..

The others are right too about the addiction. Building amps and chasing whatever tones you are after will become an obsession. But there is a difference between somebody who can build a good sounding amp and somebody who can design one. The former takes a lot of building to get the general "rules" to follow to make a good sounding amp. The latter, somebody who actually designs with any active devices, will understand what rules to follow and break in order to enhance/modify the sound. This takes a lot longer to develop and is something that you must learn in order to truly develop your own sound (and/or know what the F#*% you are talking about ).


To me a good amp builder is somebody who understands the circuits and how the differences between various designs contribute to the sound. They know the rules of circuit design and what rules to break (exploit?) in order to achieve the desired effects.

You don't need a EE degree to be a good amp designer but having a firm understanding of some basic and more advanced EE topics will put you way ahead of 90% of builders (no offense to anyone here, love you guys!). Aside from knowing all forms of Ohm's law, I find that understanding some AC analysis and feedback theory will take most people a long way. Also learning about power supplies (continuous and switching power), component parameters (parasitics, different construction methods) and understanding some two port noise theory will really put you ahead of the crowd. This is about 2 years worth of college courses but IME that was a waste of time, everything I really know I learned from a book!

www.tubebooks.org is a good place to start. Ask lots of questions and don't be afraid to look dumb, that's part of the learning process!