TeiscosRock

In that case it's definitely an option, especially because of the low price tag on the Bay.

In that case, how well does the Deuce take distortion/overdrive pedals?

The Deuce looks nice, but I doubt I'll be needing a 120w tube amp any time soon o.O I'd imagine the house would explode before I got the best tone it has to offer.

I wouldn't mind going for a head unit, but I need a cheap but relatively good cab to go with it too. Like a 212 or 112 or something - I doubt I'd need a 412. . .

Though I'd love a nice tube head with a 410

Spazzyone, I'd absolutely love to take you up on that eBay offer, however, I simply don't have any money right now :D

Won't have any kind of money until about the 20th of next month. . . and even then I'm not sure exactly how much I'm getting. I may get enough for some kind of nice tube amp.

And I'm also real unsure now about what I actually want. . . I was ready to settle for something like a Spider or a normal SS amp, but this thread has got me thinking!

I see. For some reason I wasn't picturing 15 watts cutting through in a band situation. . . but I know absolutely nothing about tube amps. Thanks for the info!

Well for right now I just need something for band practice, something thats loud and powerful enough for me to hear myself over drums, the trumpets/trombone, and the other guitarist. I think by the time we're ready for any real gigging (local club downtown), I should be able to afford something a little bit more powerful. . . I'm not sure if there's a PA there or not, honestly :\

So I guess what i need for now is just something to cut through during band practice.

I want a fair bit of clean headroom - we're a ska-punk band, so there's a lot of clean regae-ish guitar in it, but we lean toward the heavy grinding punk more often. The clean doesn't necessarily have to be Fender-omg-*** clean, but I'd like cleanliness nonetheless - so I'm guessing I would need somewhere around the 30 mark.

And again, as far as headroom and loudness goes, would a single 12 be enough, or should I shoot for a 212 (the difference, say, between a Carvin Nomad and Belair)

Wow, lots of great things mentioned! Gives me alot to think about! Just a question, as it's really hard to find any real information on this - on average, how many watts of tube power do you need to cut through in a full band situation, punk rock and such? I know watts doesnt necesarily reflect the volume, as there are some VERY loud amps out there, but could anyone give me a general idea of what to shoot for? I don't want to pay for wattage that I'm really never going to need, lest i start demolishing houses with my playing!

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Also, is a 212 combo really a necesity, or can I get by with a single 12" speaker and still be able to cut thru my band?

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Hmm. . . looks like i need to find this guy and see what he has once i have the cash in my pocket.

Well I guess I could give eBay a shot. My main consern though is buying a TUBE amp thru eBay. . . If I were to spring for something like a vintage Music Man I would want to get the tubes rplaced and rebiased, yes? How much does this cost on average for you guys? I would do it myself, but I do NOT trust myself around tube amps quite yet.

However Peavey sounds nice, too, however all i can find are Stereo Choruses, not Super Choruses. . .

And just for kicks, any thoughts on SS?

Carvin has been on my mind for a while now, as I've been contemplating the SX212 - seems like a very good deal. I would definately shell out $400 for an MTS 3212, but I'm not sure I would be entirely comfortable purchasing something like that on eBay. . . lots of horror storeis. . .

So some friends and I are planning a band. All fine and dandy, but theres a catch - I'm still running through my first amp, a little 15w Behringer. This means I need to step it up or go home! What I'm asking for is some advice on an inexpensive amp to step up to from my little practice amp. I'll be playing a nice mix of heavy and light distortion, as well as clean ska-ish stuff.

What would also help is some personal experience - what was YOUR step up amp, when you finally got away from using a little low-powered practice amp of questionable quality?

BTW, I know its a tall order, but I'm also looking for somewhere between $300-$400 as far as price goes.

Thanks!

More questions, this time having to do with switching. . .

THe thing is, I'm operating on a tight budget here, and am also wanting to build a Bassman Ruby to use as a practice amp. Sooooo

Does the on/off switch for the sustainer circuit need to be DPDT (is true bypass necesary in an onboard circuit)?, or can I use a simpler, cheaper SPDT? Also, I'm thinking of taking the push-pull pot out of my Tele to use as the phase switch/volume control for guitar - there shouldn't be a problem with this, correct? I believe push-pulls are DPDT. . .

..for some reason, like TeiscosRock, I always seemed to have problems getting these things to work, go figure...

It's a conspiracy

Sweetness. . . I'll just set the thing to max gain all the time, but I think I might add an external control (the one between the fetzer and ruby) simply because I like bells n' whistles. That, and I want an excuse to change the wiring of my strat to master volume and tone

Thanks for the tips, Drak!

I should be able to get the job done using some of these techniques

Err. . my mistake, then, sorry.

Hmm. . . conflict of opinions!

I may use the razorblade idea in addition to using a quality bit, just to be on the safe side. . .

THats fine and dandy, but wouldnt the finish chip when i start drilling and routing?

Or if your ordering your parts from someone like SmallBear, you'd need the micro-farad (mF) value, which would be .022mF

Yeah someone directed me to a website where they had the conversion chart because I needed to convert it to micro-farads. I don't know anyone in the U.S. that sells caps in 'nano' values. It's usually either 'micro' or 'pico'.

It should be noted that mF caps are designated using the Greek letter Mu (µ). So, a 100mF cap will actually be labeled as 100µF.

Yes that's a good point. I hadn't remembered to mention that because I was surfing SmallBear at the time, and they use "mF" as opposed to "µF".

I've got this guitar I recently purchased, and plan on using it as my electronics 'guinea pig'. The only problem is, even with the swimming pool rout the thing has, I really have no room to put some of the stuff I'd like to put in it (DIY sustainer, some extra controls), so i need to rout a new cavity in the back of the instrument.

The conflict is: I don't want to have to refinish the whole guitar for one cavity. How would I go about routing a cavity without chipping massive amounts of finish off of the guitar? I'm honestly not all that worried about scratches and such, as this is my beater guitar, but I'd rather not have big chips of paint missing around the new rout.

Any ideas?

argh, another question from me. Im starting to annoy MYSELF with these!

I remember reading in one of the threads that only one of the controls from the fetzer ruby were necesary, or something to that effect - which one is it, and what do i do with the other control?

The perf board layouts are available and some circuits (like the ruby) have boards drawn up, but I don't see where you can buy them?!

You can purchase a premade PCB for the Ruby from www.GeneralGuitarGadgets.com

Using this would simplifiy the matter of building the power amp (again, it's probably just me being overly unlucky about building the amps), but they don't offer a board for the Fetzer-Ruby. I would need to modify it. Could I just tack on the fetzer ruby circuit somehow? (i would perf it out).

Question on the fetzer/ruby circuit. there are 2 caps on there that have values in 'n' what does this mean? I'm not familiar with 'n' as any kind of abbreviation for capacitance. Are they just really low value capacitors?

like say:

22n = 22pF ???

or something like that?

22n means 22 nanofarads. Therefore, a 22nF capacitor is equal to a 220pF capacitor.

Or if your ordering your parts from someone like SmallBear, you'd need the micro-farad (mF) value, which would be .022mF

Hm . . I may try out the EMG directly into a power amp circuit. . .

Anyway, another question: Might I possibly adapt an already constructed amp (say a small battery powered amplifier like the Fender Minis or Marshal MS2s) for the purposes of building a sustainer? Would these have built-in preamps? What controls would I need to remove?

And one more for now: Is the fetzer-ruby combo as such that I could buy the premade PCB for the Ruby, and just connect it to a perfed Fetzer Valve circuit? How would I connect the two? This seems like it would do me better, as I seem to have no problem making analog effects (like the Fetzer), but i catch hell with perfing amps!

Thanks again!