Sunday night the entire band said my guitar tone stunk!

[jazzrat]

Whoa. I was a little freaked out. Same gear and settings I have used for months. Either my tubes are going or it was just the setup of the band.
Usually I am on the right side of the drums so I can see the whole band at once for downbeats and endings.
This week I show up at pre-service rehersal and the drums are on risers 15 feet to the right and all the guitars are on a stage to the left with singers on a runway in front. Too Weird! I could not get away from the sound.
Normally I position myself in a bit of a dead area between the monitor and my amp so a simple step in either direction gives me more of what I need.
No real point here but I was amazed at how the band dynamic changed with the move, not to mention it was blacklight night. No stand lights at all. At the last minute somebody realized that a yellow highlighter made the chord symbols on the charts glow. I will rememeber that trick!

[refin]

Uh oh........drum risers in church. :ROFL
What's next.....lasers?
It really shakes things up when a stage is moved around.You ears seem to shake hands with a familiar setup,and tune themselves.Risers are good in the sense that they get you out of the line of fire of crash cymbals,but I'm used to the drummer being in the middle.Anything away from that, unless you have a great monitor system,the punch is misplaced.
Your tone probably IS the same---the room is possibly reading it differently,and/or people are hearing it differently than before.

[jazzrat]

Actually lasers are not too far from the truth at this particular church.
Lots of multimedia stuff happening. The reason for risers is that this service is in a multi purpose building/gym so the entire stage is stored each night.
Pretty slick setup but we are at the mercy of the pastor when he gets...um..creative. ;)

[stephen]

....... we are at the mercy of the pastor when he gets...um..creative. ;)

:rofl:

I love my pastor, and his creativeness sometimes, well, I love my pastor!

[jazzrat]

Yeah a couple weeks ago he was talking about Peter getting out of the boat. He had an actual boat and bunch of folks with buckets of water to drench the poor guy playing Peter. I made dadburn sure they were nowhere near the stage!

[dmw]

The change of location/of position of your setup obviously gave you a whole new set of acoustics to deal with. You said you used the same amp settings, but maybe you should have experimented with some different settings. Hindsight's always 20-20 though.

[kewlpack]

There may be some soundwave cancelation or phasing happening because of the new arrangement too... :dunno

Bummer.

[Micter]

There may be some soundwave cancelation or phasing happening because of the new arrangement too... :dunno

Bummer.

That's what I was thinkin'

[stephen]

There may be some soundwave cancelation or phasing happening because of the new arrangement too... :dunno

Bummer.

That's what I was thinkin'

That makes three of us, plus what dmw said too!

[jazzrat]

Thanks guys...good thoughts. If we had more time I might have experimented a little or even gotten my other amp from the sanctuary but as it was we had ten tunes to get ready and not much time.

[Crunchyriff]

Check the voltage at the outlet where you were plugged in...

[refin]

There may be some soundwave cancelation or phasing happening because of the new arrangement too... :dunno

Bummer.

That's what I was thinkin'

That makes three of us, plus what dmw said too!

Uh...make that 4......

[MrMike]

I would have to ask about the experience level of the other musicians, especially with reference to playing with a band. Has your guitar sound really changed, or are they perceiving it as "worse" when really they're just hearing it differently due to changes in placement?

[jazzrat]

I'm guessing placement may be the big factor. They are all, other than the drummer, church musicians used to less volume and more gentile surroundings.

[TheViking]

---- you don't have a laser show in your church???? I am shocked hehe

[jazzrat]

Laser show....Not Yet! ;)
And yes I know how it sounds. This type of church is much different than
I am used to but there is no compromise in the message and people's lives are being changed by the power of the Lord.

[stephen]

Hmmm, they say your guitar tone "stunk", and except for the drummer, they're all church players, hmmmmmm?

:idea:

Tell em you were doin your best "Skunk" Baxter impersonation!

:rofl: :dance:

Hey, it made me laugh!

[jazzrat]

We'll see this Sunday. We will be set up outside for a baptismal service.
We play 10 or 11 songs between each set of baptisms(18 so far) so
should be a good workout.
Band setup will be our normal one so it will be interesting to see if anyone says anything.

[Barry]

Uh oh........drum risers in church. :ROFL
What's next.....lasers?
It really shakes things up when a stage is moved around.

Years ago, when I was touring with a Gospel choir in Florida, a church on one of our stops was arranged with risers that went several feet up. The drummer and I (on bass) sat about 8 feet (? it's hard to remember the exact height) above and on the left side of the platform. The piano (our music pastor & choir director) was about 10 feet in front of and below us and the choir (40 voices) was center platform. We used the equipment (drums, amps, mics, monitors) that the regulars of that church used during their own services. We somehow broke into a smooth jazz kind of instrumental thing while the Altar call was wrapping up, everyone started joining in and choir and all crescendoed into a medley of lively P&W songs. It sounded great! Even our own sound guy, who was in a booth at the back of the church and about as high up as us, said all the songs sounded fantastic. \:D/

Ah, memories... :-)

No laser show, though. :cry: Bummer.

They moved things around on us a couple of times at our home church. It didn't always sound good. I hope y'all get everything squared away, jazzrat.

[still4given]

Maybe your tone has always stunk but no one could hear you. Now that they can, you should go ahead and upgrade your equipment. That's what I'd tell my wife. :lol:

Blessings, Terry

[jazzrat]

Well, Sunday night my Hot Rod Dlx got a work out. I think a tube is going.
It is distorting at any kind of volume and gets worse if I play aggressively.
Power tube or preamp tube? Any ideas?
I wound up running using my 100 watt Carvin SX-100. I sounded terrific.
I've never used it in a louder setting since it is my sanctuary amp. Nice to know it can cut the mustard.

[Micter]

Jazzrat

I would think power tube more than a preamp tube. You never know with tubes until you dig around. Is any of the power tubes glowing different compared to the others?

[jazzrat]

Thanks Mic, I need to spend some time with it this week. I do have a pair of Svets if I need to change power tubes. Only bad thing is I don't know how to bias and the only yokel in town that works on tube amps swears that the Hod Rod amps have no bias control. My manual says they do.
The Svetlanas I bought are tested and supposed to be direct replacements for Groove Tubes. We'll see after I crank it up in the garage.

[Micter]

Thanks Mic, I need to spend some time with it this week. I do have a pair of Svets if I need to change power tubes. Only bad thing is I don't know how to bias and the only yokel in town that works on tube amps swears that the Hod Rod amps have no bias control. My manual says they do.
The Svetlanas I bought are tested and supposed to be direct replacements for Groove Tubes. We'll see after I crank it up in the garage.

If you are using a simular tube I would try them first to see if the problem goes away. It isn't that hard to bias an amp. HRD might be fixed bias. Let me look at some stuff......

[Micter]

I stole this from Fender's site.

The world standard for a portable, powerful, full-featured tube amp!

• 40 watts
• 1 x 12” 8 Ohm Fender Special Design Eminence speaker
• 18.75” H x 23.5” W x 10.5” D
• 45 lbs.

All Hot Rod Deluxe and Hot Rod Deville amps feature:
• Three selectable channels (Normal, Drive and More Drive)
• Gain and Master controls in Drive channel
• Bright switch in Normal channel
• FX loop
• Fender long spring Reverb
• Two 6L6 Groove Tube output tubes
• Three 12AX7 preamp tubes
• External speaker jack
• Two-button Three-function footswitch for Channel select, Drive/More Drive select
• Chrome panel with vintage pointer knobs
• Internal Variable Bias control
• Black textured vinyl with silver grille cloth
• Cover included

So it says there is an internal variable bias control. That is a small (variable resistor) somewhere inside the amp. With a multimeter set to mA measure the voltage across the standby. Take the reading and divide it by the number of power tubes. In this case 2. You should be somewhere around 30ma per tube on the low end and about 45 on the high end. That is a ballpark for 6L6's.

[jazzrat]

Sorry to be so dense Mic but i will have to look at a schematic or something. Not sure what "across the standby means" I guess i'm also a little nervous about discharging some stored up voltage too.

[prscustom24]

I have no idea what "across the standby" means either, but it's not what you do. You measure across the 1-ohm cathode resistor R66. This is a low voltage, relatively safe area of the chassis if you don't stray:

http://www.fender.com/support/amp_schematics/pdfs/Hot_Rod_Deluxe_Schematic.pdf

On both chassis (Deluxe & DeVille) the bias pot is R82 I believe, and pay attention to note 5.

HTH

[Micter]

Sorry to be so dense Mic but i will have to look at a schematic or something. Not sure what "across the standby means" I guess i'm also a little nervous about discharging some stored up voltage too.

Don't you use the standby switch when you turn the amp on? Power and Standby? The standby switch on the front of the amp has two wires going to it. Measuring the current draw acrossed those two wires is what I mean. Anyway I wouldn't worry about getting shocked especially if you are carefull. I use a screwdriver with heat shrink around the shaft. Wear some latex gloves. \:D/ As far as locating the bias pot goes, that might be fun. Pop the chassis out and take a few pics. I point it out to ya!

[prscustom24]

Afraid not. As you will see when you check the schematic, the standby switch is a spst switch on the ac secondary of the PT, upstream of the rectifier bridge. Anything you could measure there will tell you nothing about the DC bias current on the power tubes.

The bias pot is the one-turn pot with the screwdriver slot down and to the left of the power tube sockets on the parts layout drawing, same url as above, p.2.

[Micter]

Afraid not. As you will see when you check the schematic, the standby switch is a spst switch on the ac secondary of the PT, upstream of the rectifier bridge. Anything you could measure there will tell you nothing about the DC bias current on the power tubes.

The bias pot is the one-turn pot with the screwdriver slot down and to the left of the power tube sockets on the parts layout drawing, same url as above, p.2.

Hmmm That is what I've always done and I have been instructed by some very good amp techs. My friend Richard Hassebrock (The Hasserl Mods) always does it by the standby switch. But I'm not an amp guru by any means. I know just enough to get by (or get me in trouble)

[TheBigKevDogg]

this thread has officially flown over my head

[stephen]

this thread has officially flown over my head

Dont feel bad: every post after jazzratts original post, seems like greek too me!

[jazzrat]

Thanks guys,
I did a little testing tonight. I warmed up the amp, played loud, shut it down put some Svetlanas in that are supposed to be replacments for the
Groove Tubes. Now I don't know what to think. Even if the bias was off for the new tubes, seems like i would have heard some difference....none.
Last night as a replacement I used my 100 watt Carvin SX-100. It was way loud with no breakup at all. The HRDx is known as a loud amp but it does not seem to have the headroom it used to.

[jazzrat]

Update guys....two words...preamp tube. From what little I know and from other online suggestions I thought it had to be a power amp tube.
Just for fun i swapped out the #3 Groove Tube 12AX7 for an E.H. tube.
There it is...the headroom and clean tone I remember.
Thanks for all suggestions. I won't get a full work out until next Sunday but I will push it a couple times this week so no surprises come Sunday.
Thanks again

[Micter]

Good!

[Micter]

Good!

[Micter]

Afraid not. As you will see when you check the schematic, the standby switch is a spst switch on the ac secondary of the PT, upstream of the rectifier bridge. Anything you could measure there will tell you nothing about the DC bias current on the power tubes.

The bias pot is the one-turn pot with the screwdriver slot down and to the left of the power tube sockets on the parts layout drawing, same url as above, p.2.

I've been thinking about this a lot. The standby switch's function is directly inline with the power tubes. Reading current draw at the switch should give the total current draw from all power tubes.

Whatever, I am no electrical genious so........... :banghead

[prscustom24]

Coupla comments on this:

Amp designs over the years have had standby switches show up in different locations in the circuit. In the days of tube rectifiers, it made sense to have them downstream of the rectifier and therefore on the DC side of the power supply, otherwise, it wasn't gonna be "instant-on". My guess is, your friend, working on such an amp, used the switch lug as a convenient attach point for one lead of the meter, set to read current, not voltage, in what is known as the "transformer shunt" method of biasing. However this "floats" the meter at a high DC voltage, nominally around 500 volts or whatever B+ is for the amp, and this is as dangerous a bias method as you'll find. I do not recommend this method for novices, and I avoid it myself unless there's no other way. Remember, you're working on a live circuit. This is not about some capacitor discharging (where the energy is limited), and it's not about getting yourself across the wall plug. AC will knock you across the room. DC will grab you and hold on until.you're.dead.

Virtually all modern amp designs provide a 1-ohm cathode resistor, across which 1 ma of cathode current produces 1 mv of dc voltage. For all practical purposes, the no-signal cathode current is equal to the quiescent plate current, and since you're applying a voltmeter probe to a point less than a volt above ground, it's as safe a spot as you can poke into a live circuit and live to talk about it. All of the plug-in bias aids on the market provide this function for older amps that don't have it.

On the Hot Rod Deluxe & Deville, the standby switch is unquestionably on the ac side of the secondary winding of the power transformer. When open, this switch inhibits current to the rectifier diodes and therefore to all devices downstream, filter caps and all. Check the schematics at the link I provided.

[Micter]

OK! I gotcha.