212Mavguy Posted June 30, 2014 Posted June 30, 2014 Got to stay away from the "Make offer" button on eBay…got bit again. This one's a 50w take on #102, Robben Ford's amp. It came to life at Rocknrollamps.com, and Jack does know s__t there. I'm the third owner. Have no interest in chasing RF's tones, they're great, but I like mine too. Ordered a pair of cryoed JJ 6l6's, and yanked the sputtering gld pin JJ and gold pin Russian Tungsols, stuck in some old US and Euro class in the preamp. Got to stay away from that "Buy it now" button on eBay…got bit again. Ended up that a hand made in USA Quadstage BiasPro MQ13 thingie at my front door a day after the tubes hit. Yanked that chassis out and socketed the two test socket adapters, then plugged the tubes into the adapter sockets. On this amp, there is a bias pot for each of the two output tubes, so it was really easy to just rotate the switch on the thingie and see the current draw read out in half inch tall numbers for each tube. Mr. Magoo would like this one! A minute later, bias was set and balanced. Then four hours runtime later, the bias had dropped 20% lower due to the normal burn in process, at conservative for guitar amp bias settings burn in takes longer and tube life is longer. easy just to leave the tubes in the adapters and play the amp with the thingie turned off, then turned on every hour to monitor changes with brand-new tubes. The Quadstage accepts up to four socket adapter probes. 100 waters are as easy to monitor for tube current draw/bias as 50's. Great, I mean great, tool. Basically ended up with a wonderful sounding D-clone (my 4th) with it's own awesome, incredibly focused voice. I was quite surprised and pleased to see a big fat spendy Solen cap in the presence circuit, all the resistors were top rate and the power supply filtering was both robust and easy to service come recap time in this hyper-rugged well dressed turret board build. This is the kind of parts that you might see in a $5000 Two Rock, but in this case the price was cost of parts plus a smidgen more, around 1100 delivered. The original 102 is worth easily 150 grand if it ever came up for sale. This ain't no real 102, but it is original and has more uber- quality inspirational sounds and versatility in a knob-turner/switch flipper tube amp than almost any other I've had. There ARE great deals out there if you know how to shop. I'd be delighted to own another Rocknrollamps build in the future after seeing the kind of thought and care that went into the build. Having that bias thingie made it easy to have a great NAD!
schundog Posted June 30, 2014 Posted June 30, 2014 Not just a NAD, a HIGH END NAD! Congratulations, man! We'd love some clips.
fxdx99 Posted June 30, 2014 Posted June 30, 2014 Had not heard of that amp builder. The li'l bastard and deluxe that he has both read like nice combos - light, good features/components, low price. Allen amps have the rear panel bias jacks, too and yeh, really make tube swaps simple. Congrats on the new amp!
tulk1 Posted June 30, 2014 Posted June 30, 2014 New amp day! Always a cause for celebration. Sounds like you scored big time. Now, put the credit card down and step away from the computer ..... for a while.
Gitfiddler Posted June 30, 2014 Posted June 30, 2014 I have absolutely no idea what 212Mavguy just bought or what cryo'd tubes are. But it sounds awesome!
tulk1 Posted June 30, 2014 Posted June 30, 2014 I have absolutely no idea what 212Mavguy just bought or what cryo'd tubes are. But it sounds awesome! Toobcicles. They've been frozen. Like Cryogenic strings. Exposed to sudden, extremely low temperatures. What does cryogenically treated mean? Cryogenic treatment is a process by which a product is cooled down to a temperature below -190 Fahrenheit / -123 Celsius. The BLACK SABLE process descends all the way down to -300 Fahrenheit / -184 Celsius.
JeffB Posted June 30, 2014 Posted June 30, 2014 I have absolutely no idea what 212Mavguy just bought or what cryo'd tubes are. But it sounds awesome! Ha! That was my take on it after 1st read as well. RFD-Clone W/Cryo'd 6L6's. Optimum Robben. Hapy new amp day. Congrats.
smokedtires Posted July 1, 2014 Posted July 1, 2014 Never heard of these guys but the specs look good, enjoy!
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