peterbright Posted February 3, 2014 Share Posted February 3, 2014 Got sent home from work by my wife after throwing up for the 3rd time (medication changes by the VA most likely culprit) and after starting to feel better decided to finally make changes to my Fender DRRI. Change 1: Celestion Vintage 30 Speaker for the stock Jensen. (The Jensen wasn't bad.) Change 2: New JJ Tubes in all Preamp Positions V1 - V6 with a 5751 in V1 and 12 AY7's in place of the 12AT7's Higher headroom on Channel 1, more control over the reverb and tremelo was the final result. The Celestion needs to be broken in before I'm able to assess the speaker change but no worse than the Jensen already. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RJLII Posted February 3, 2014 Share Posted February 3, 2014 First off, feel better soon! The Jensens sound great after they've been broken in. After a year or so mine was fine. After 10 years it was very sweet. My beef was lack of headroom and farty bottom end at higher volumes. Tubes are a matter of taste. Preamp tubes have no effect on clean headroom. The only thing that changes is what number the knob points at when breakup starts. It has no effect on the power section with respect to tube distortion versus volume. In a DRRI it's all about the power section. I needed more juice. I got a Carr Rambler and never looked back. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rockabilly69 Posted February 3, 2014 Share Posted February 3, 2014 Calling Yoslate... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
yoslate Posted February 3, 2014 Share Posted February 3, 2014 Calling Yoslate... Call me...what? Call me a cab? I've been called worse.... I'll be here all week. Try the meatloaf! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rockabilly69 Posted February 3, 2014 Share Posted February 3, 2014 Call me...what? Call me a cab? I've been called worse.... I'll be here all week. Try the meatloaf! give that man a rimshot! C'mon Roberto give the guy some helpful DRRI tips! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
peterbright Posted February 3, 2014 Author Share Posted February 3, 2014 It sounds great to me, but the Celestion needs to be broken in. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gitfiddler Posted February 3, 2014 Share Posted February 3, 2014 Your DRRI will definitely sound better after the speaker is broken in. In the meantime, try lowering the bass. These amps are really sensitive and tend to 'fart out' as bass is raised. Set the volume where you want it, THEN raise the bass. Season to taste! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
peterbright Posted February 4, 2014 Author Share Posted February 4, 2014 No farting allowed...have the bass fairly low at 3.5 anyway. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tulk1 Posted February 4, 2014 Share Posted February 4, 2014 If I recall .. what Dan'l is alluding to for Mr Robbo's input is that he and Kuz did some comparisons to a DRRI and a vintage DR this past summer, just before PSP. I believe the results were that with vintage tubes vs modern tubes the DRRI got very very close to the DR. I think that was even with using one amp to power the other cab, etc. Gives hope that the RI's can be great alternatives to finding a vintage DR. Those have to got to be getting harder and harder to find. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
yoslate Posted February 4, 2014 Share Posted February 4, 2014 If I recall .. what Dan'l is alluding to for Mr Robbo's input is that he and Kuz did some comparisons to a DRRI and a vintage DR this past summer, just before PSP. I believe the results were that with vintage tubes vs modern tubes the DRRI got very very close to the DR. I think that was even with using one amp to power the other cab, etc. Gives hope that the RI's can be great alternatives to finding a vintage DR. Those have to got to be getting harder and harder to find. Well.... Given the caveat about the subjectivity of tone, yeah. Kenny has it about right. Backstory redux: Bought the DRRI from knopfler 74 (Matt). Great deal, so I thought I'd flip it. After playing it, though, I thought it might do well for a couple of the blues bands I play with. Had little enough invested in it that, with mods, I still wouldn't be anywhere near underwater if I wanted to let it go. And John was kind enough to do an A/B with his vintage Deluxe, a fine, fine specimen. The re-ish doesn't sound like the real thing. But, that having been said, there is a tonality, a character the re-ish's have that can certainly be traced to the originals. They're not that far removed. So, I replaced the original speaker with an Eminence Tonker (I like British voicing, so-called), which had already been "tenderized." The bright cap was clipped out, and we checked the tubes for quality and the biasing was set to spec. I think the power tubes were all quality new stuff (TAD), but, after switching the V2 at John's, trying his vintage tube, I was convinced that was, outside of the speaker, but not far outside, the most significant tone adjustment I could make. After switching out maybe ten 12AX7's, I settled on a vintage Sylvania. Also, a mid-boost pot was installed in the extension speaker jack, at the rear of the chassis. It's a great sounding amp, which I gig all of the time, and I still have under a grand in it. More experiments will be forthcoming, as my amp guy is a genius, and nuts, and still wants to play with it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
H Posted February 4, 2014 Share Posted February 4, 2014 More experiments will be forthcoming, as my amp guy is a genius, and nuts, and still wants to play with it. Rob, try the 'push/pull (on/off) pot on the Intensity knob' mod. Best thing I did on my Vibrolux outside the switchable OT by far. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
slider313 Posted February 4, 2014 Share Posted February 4, 2014 Rob, try the 'push/pull (on/off) pot on the Intensity knob' mod. Best thing I did on my Vibrolux outside the switchable OT by far. That's a great little mod but......the pots on the reissue are pcb mounted and finding a 50k switchpot to mount to the board will be...............a stretch. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
H Posted February 4, 2014 Share Posted February 4, 2014 That's a great little mod but......the pots on the reissue are pcb mounted and finding a 50k switchpot to mount to the board will be...............a stretch. Ah, the limitations of PCBs again.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
peterbright Posted February 5, 2014 Author Share Posted February 5, 2014 Certainly true Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rockabilly69 Posted February 5, 2014 Share Posted February 5, 2014 That's a great little mod but......the pots on the reissue are pcb mounted and finding a 50k switchpot to mount to the board will be...............a stretch. Why not replace the circuit mounted pot with a flying lead mounted pot, and fix the problem of a cracked solder joint down the road! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
slider313 Posted February 5, 2014 Share Posted February 5, 2014 Why not replace the circuit mounted pot with a flying lead mounted pot, and fix the problem of a cracked solder joint down the road! Sure.........if you want to do it to all the pots. They're all on that one long board. Also, look at those nice "ribbon connectors" going from the control board to the main board. You could always snap the end off, where the intensity pot is mounted, and hope you don't crack any trace. ;-) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rockabilly69 Posted February 5, 2014 Share Posted February 5, 2014 Good one Slider, forget that idea:) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MrB Posted February 6, 2014 Share Posted February 6, 2014 Rather than using a pot with a switch in it, why not just run a lead to a toggle switch mounted on the rear panel? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
slider313 Posted February 6, 2014 Share Posted February 6, 2014 Rather than using a pot with a switch in it, why not just run a lead to a toggle switch mounted on the rear panel? That can be done. Actually, you can use the non functional ground switch. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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