Rickresource Rickenbacker Forum

the more headroom you have, will be cleaner at normal playing levels, example...ampeg V4B cranking at 100 w , very dirty !
an SVT idling at 100w ...very clean, but if you want to go to "11" you have extra power captain ! more is better although , i agree the weight factor sucks...but i choose to live with my demons !

s4001 wrote:Somewhere there's a guitarist quaking in fear.....

Good one Scott!

Hey my congrats !!

If i were you i'd buyed another svt head to have two full rigs and go in a totally-ampeg-powered rick-o-sound mode !!

^ Not a bad idea!

Gil could save on the second one as he should only need one cabinet for the bridge pickup, especially, if he has the .0047µf cap in place.

I actually thought about buying another head and keep 1 SVT at home and 1 at the rehearsal room, however - I am still trying to solve the fact that my existing head doesn't work

Did you talk to Nir's guy? Or Uzi Levi? I'll probably stop by his shop later today (to check on my '66 Mustang pickup he's rewinding), do you want me to ask him?

have someone pull the power amp out of the box and pull all the tubes out of it. using the schematic, start from the begining of the circuit and go thru every part of the amp with a dvm to make sure there are no dead parts. could be a dead power tube , but the amp would still work. make sure none of the large cement power resistors are blown..they usually explode, so you can tell by pieces of debris and scorch marks ! diodes too are "gates" that allow current to pass only one way, and if there is back flow, this can cause problems. best to check the whole circuit out before putting new tubes in it. could also be any of the three transfornmers, but let's hope not. also good to have a scope so you can "see" what's going on.

Very nice, Gil! Congratulations!

Nice rig Gil !!!

Are you looking to kill the neighborhood

To me, this is a dream's rig you got yourself. Enjoy !!!!

Hey guys,
An update - I just came back from the tech guy, he looked at our conversion work and at the schematics and said that we did everything right and that there is no need to change anything,
The problem was that the 6th power tube looked dead, however - it was only the contacts!! the tech disassembled everything, cleaned everything (there was a thick layer of dust), sprayed with a contact spray on the tubes sockets, pots, switches, toggles, etc... placed everything back, biased it according to the specs at the front of the amp and the amp worked like a charm!
The tubes are the original magnavox (RCA) tubes!!! the tech says they still have plenty of life left!

When I came back home I could still hear some hum when the amp's volume was at 0, but it is nothing in comparison to what it was before...
It was too late to plug in my rick, I'll do it tomorrow

Well that has to be a great relief Gil. It sounds like you have a great amp tech at your disposal. This was your lucky day. Tomorrow will be even better.

winston wrote:Well that has to be a great relief Gil. It sounds like you have a great amp tech at your disposal. This was your lucky day. Tomorrow will be even better.

+1 - Great news indeed. As for hum, you might have an aging power capacitor in there somewhere. Next time you have it in the shop have him check for that.

So what if it was late!!! You have very good self control.

Yesterday I finally played it with my Rick and a single cabinet.
The thing sounds spectacular!
I really tried to put aside my obvious "cognitive dissonance" as a buyer (we all tend to think that what we have is the best and if it's not - we convince ourselves it is...) and searched for flaws in the sound.
The only flaw I could find was that it was simply too ***king detailed!!!
I heared nueances in my Rick that I did not hear before, I noticed that it doesn't matter what EQ I choose - the details were still there, putting high bases and high midrange in low settings, etc... - provided a full deep low sound - with the same details! no more muddy uninterpretable sound! AMAZING.
I could not crank it to more than 1/4 power as my parents house (where it is currently stored, our house is too small...) had all the stoves and closets rattle, and when for a moment I tried playing at almost 1/2 I am sure I heard the foundations of the house shifting

And Ronbo - we don't have Flintstones houses in Israel don't let the location misguide you - Israel is one of the most technologically advanced countries out there, we have the same things that you have up in Canada but with less or no snow... I don't ride a camel to work as I prefer my Audi and I don't use fires to communicate as I rather enjoy having my Iphone with full 3g coverage (seriously, even in the *riggin desert!) we have lots of Computers, very advanced high-tech industry (do you run an Intel chip? doesn't matter which one, ever since the Pentium MMX - they were all designed in Israel) Laptops, highways, electronic toll roads, pubs, gig clubs, a city that never stops (Tel Aviv), high towers...
Sorry, had to defend my country for a second

gibsonlp wrote:Yesterday I finally played it with my Rick and a single cabinet.
The thing sounds spectacular!

I could not crank it to more than 1/4 power as my parents house (where it is currently stored, our house is too small...) had all the stoves and closets rattle, and when for a moment I tried playing at almost 1/2 I am sure I heard the foundations of the house shifting

Now with all the new clarity, PRACTICE!!