Parading My Snazz: New 5C8 Ina Console Style

[Cantplay]

Very nice P2P.

Im stealing ideas.

John

[rp]

"La Pietá" of guitar amps!

Aaaw shucks now.

now I'm dying to hear the difference! Any chance of that? Even a semi-crappy phone recording would probably catch the contrast you are describing.

Possible, a bit difficult but I do intend to do it. I refuse to do clips with me doodling solo and with a horrid cell phone to top it off - couldn't do that to the world. I want to do clips of my Harvard and Lightning both of which sound so like the real thing that they are worth documenting. Dang cuz has a studio too, but him and wife kicked out the great music school that rented it out as home base and are selling off the recording gear. They think the future is voice lessons and she's a voice teacher, it all has to do with TV shit like X-Factor. So now I need to hook up with the guys from the music school who are a cool crowd and just opened their own studio. One guy there is a great country picker, that was a surprise. Clips may take a while but I'm on it.

Im stealing ideas. John

Please do, I'm a hippie, "everything for everybody."

[Milkmansound]

gorgeous!

[rp]

News bulletin, this just in: This amp is under-filtered. OK, not news to anyone, not even me, from the start I wanted to add an extra e-cap but held off as I a have a hard earned rule about building it straight up first then modding.

Anyway, it hummed a bit more than it should, and it was getting annoying, though I'm a bit familiar with older octal tweeds and knew it wasn't too far off for a neolithic design. I got G# so 50Hz / 100Hz heaters or filters hum. First I tried a humdinger, moved the CT off the chassis to the bus, Lord knows I rolled tubes, not that I have that many f'ing 6SC7s, nothing made a difference. The PT is a custom wind from a local company here so I wasn't sure about it's quality, but everything indicated the layout and wiring were ok so next was to try DC heaters. Before I messed w/ that though I wanted to try an extra filter cap for V1-V3.

Wasn't easy, f'ing me and my f'ing PTP fixation, and I forgot to plan ahead for it too. But I think I deserve credit for a fairly clean solution.

It made a big difference. Hum is now good for a primitive octal creature. Maybe a Tent Labs DC board in the future might make it almost modern quiet. The extra filter (16uF with a 100R dropping resistor) changed nothing that I could note in the tone or snap or dynamics. The voltages are hardly changed. All in all the mod made the amp a touch more there, a tiny touch more solid feeling. Absolutely positive with no negatives. If you build one just add the extra filtering from the start.

Also, since I built it I added 1.5K R grid stoppers to the output tubes and a 47pf cap across the PI. Just to try and stop the octal rubbish when turned up. Didn't notice any changes to the noise or tone.

BTW Does a noise suppression cap across a Paraphase PI work like across a LTP?

[David Root]

Nice work! A PTP build that doesn't look like a rat's nest. You must have done this style before, or been a sparky in WW2 or something!

[rp]

Last note for anyone who care. Playing it more today in the daytime, there is a change in tone and feel. Stock is more easy going - open sounding and loose in a really nice way especially for playing solo and at home (and you'll get even more of this and more bounce w/ the 6J5 for V3). Added filtering and w/ the 6SC7 is more typical like later tweed Fenders. Overall the tone and dynamics is much the same but the tone is a bit more congested, nasally, touch more rock, less blues. There is more bass.

I hate to loose some of the relaxed 3D openness but it's a minor trade-off and worth doing to get rid of the hum. Maybe when bored again, I'll try an 8uF instead of a 16uF.

So, if you really must have an early '50s build it with stock filtering but leave a place on your layout for an easy cap upgrade if it hums too much.

[kkregsg]

Just gorgeous. I want to grow up to build amps like that, too!

[kkregsg]

Just gorgeous. I want to grow up to build amps like that, too!

[rp]

Nice work! A PTP build that doesn't look like a rat's nest. You must have done this style before, or been a sparky in WW2 or something!

Thanks for the compliments but just loopy and bored. I don't want to do paint by numbers but don't know how to design so I find other creative outlets.

[Colossal]

Looks great RP. I always enjoy seeing your work.

[M Fowler]

Looks great and I'm a big fan of PTP builds like this.