Michael Withers

The pots are a bit crackly when unsettled, and there isnt really volume when you turn it up. Sometimes it doesnt work atall, and ive been informed that slamming your fist down hard on the top is enough to jar it back into life! If I manage to get it fixed (one step at a time!) I would also like to modify it for extra gain as this amp has less gain then I like to play with. Also any general tips on adjusting the voicing of an amp (i know there are many many factors) would be gratefully recieved! Cheers for the advice , Thanks again Mike

Basically ive been donated a marshall VS100RH (which is an older AVT with a ECC83 preamp valve) from a friend who has upgraded to a better amp and its currently in a semi working state. I know the preamp valve has never been changed and I figured this and cleaning the pots would be a good start in getting it in play worthy condition. My concern when doing anything to this amp is discharging the large hi voltage capacitors that exist in the power stage of the amp. I know voltages can go upto 600v so I know I have to be careful! Does anybody know if marshalls have bleed circuit that prevent these caps retaining their lethal charge or will I have to discharge them manually before I start to do anything to this amp? Or am I being paranoid?!?! Thanks Mike

Thanks mate - ill check it out!

Hey - I was wondering if anyone could recommend a pickup with a really good midrange. Ive looked at the seymor duncan custom custom but was just wondering if anyone had any other ideas of pickups that might achieve what iam looking for! Thanks Mike

The string is pretty much new - its an unused ernie ball super slinky thats been sitting in the packet for a couple of months. I have been long curious about the sound of old strings versus new ones, ive twiddled it aroundin the saddle and this hasnt really helped unfortunatley. As a word of note, I have a really cheap nasty tuneomatic bridge on my LP copy, would it be worth upgrading to a GOTOH model or something else maybe?? As I noticed the casting (Not CNC unfortunatley) on the bridge was poor...but of course ive never had problems in the past!!!!

Thanks guys - this has been a lot of help, I quite like the idea of a blender, I guess it kinda does the same thing , but it would be easier to control on the fly which is a bonus!

I have just ordered some new EMG active pickups for my Les Paul copy to replace the dreadful stock pickups that are supplied with the guitar. And whilst I have the guitar in pieces I would to modify the volume controls....... Something that has always annoyed me about les pauls is the fact the guitar has 2 volume knobs and when both pickups are selected you cant independantly adjust the volume of each pickup. This would be of great use to me because I think the neck pickup on the LP is far 2 a overpowering tone in contrast to the bridge pickup. However, I do like the sound of the neck pickup but think it would be better at 1/2 the volume. If I could lower the volume of the neck pickup independantly of the bridge then this would be a good thing. Ive played around with pickup heights and managed to take the edge off the neck pickup and I would like to go a step futher by modifying the circuit so I can independantly adjust the volume of each pickup. Iam have little idea of electronic theory but I can solder well and read circuit diagrams as long as they are well written and diagramed... Can anybody help with this?

lol, the noise gates works fine at bedroom volumes and stops feedback when your not playing. I have my GT6 wired in the FX loop and when you practice levels IE loud, the noise suppressor stops doing anything useful at all. I think its because the noise generated at the preamp stage obviously rolls straighty over the threshold. Iam going to try the 4 cable method , iam hoping I might be able to put the NS in series with the guitar and amp and the other FX in the FX loop this way. Correct as you are, it can still feedback when you are playing. The anti feedback fucntion is frankly S**T . Here is some info on the 4 cable method I found on the net - for the guy above, hopes it helps: THE FOUR CABLE METHOD The “Four Cable Method” (4CM) is something I ran across on www.bossgtcentral.com. The idea of the 4CM is that you essentially split the GT-8 into two effects chains such that some of the effects are before your amp’s preamp, whereas other effects are in the effects loop. This should effectively eliminate all the downsides of the previously described methods. For those not familiar with the GT-8 or GT-6, the unit has it’s own SEND and RETURN effects loop. Here is how the four cables would go: Cable 1 – guitar jack to the GT-8’s INPUT Cable 2 – GT-8’s SEND to the amp’s INPUT Cable 3 – amp’s effects SEND to the GT8’s RETURN Cable 4 – GT-8’s OUTPUT to the amp’s effects RETURN With this cable setup, you then configure the GT-8 such that some effects (wah, compression) are placed between it’s INPUT and SEND. Then you set it up such that other effects (delay, chorus, etc) are placed between it’s RETURN and OUTPUT. I have a number of observations on using the 4CM: Tone Loss. The GT-8 doesn’t substantially alter the guitar or amp’s original tone for clean tones. In fact, I’ve observed more tone loss through a series of analog stomp boxes. This is good. Noise. There is lots of noise using the 4CM, that is exacerbated when using the amp’s higher gain preamp channel. The noise is a steady and loud hiss. The noise suppressor will quiet the hissing when not playing, but it’s there when you play, and after a while you start to notice it. Again, the guitar’s original tone is there, but there’s that layer of hissing noise that blankets your sound. The source of the noise is the audio path in the GT-8 between the INPUT and the SEND – it’s just noisy. The audio path between the GT-8’s RETURN and OUTPUT are quiet. Under Boss’s recommended connection setups, one would never use the GT-8 going into an amp’s high gain channel – in fact Boss does not endorse the 4CM for that reason. So, you’d really only encounter this noise if using the GT-8 unconventionally in the 4CM. True Bypass. So, the noise using the 4CM was just unacceptable for high gain preamp settings. How do you fix this? Well, one idea that I tried was using two true bypass boxes, one to bypass the GT-8’s INPUT/SEND section, and the other to bypass the GT-8’s RETURN/OUTPUT section. The bypass boxes have switches that complete hard bypass the GT-8 from the signal chain, thus retaining the original signal. Do these work? Well…..sort of. With the two bypass boxes, you can bypass one or both sections effectively. For high gain amp settings you bypass the noise, unless you wanted to use compression or wah. The problem came up with the noise suppressor. The noise suppressor no longer worked effectively, once you bypassed the GT-8’s INPUT/SEND section – it appears that the noise suppressor takes signal throughout the signal chain to carry out it’s function. The bottom line is that you are then forced to choose between using bypass boxes and no noise suppressor…..or use the noise suppressor and no bypass boxes. From the previous discussion, you can see that neither option is acceptable. Summary of 4CM. The 4CM was a creative way that the bossgtcentral folks came up with to harness as many of the features of the GT-8 as possible while still allowing users to use their amps own preamp voicing. It certainly allows you to do this, however, in my opinion the noise levels introduced are just unacceptable unless you are willing to live with heavy noise suppression. True bypass of the GT-8 using external bypass boxes (e.g. Keeley, Looper, etc.) is possible, but you end up without noise suppression. //If anyone has problems with feedback try the behringer feedback destroyer pro , it looks quite promising

I dont actually get feedback when iam playing which is why I only wanted to supress when iam not playing. In a admission of guilt , I never realised until yesterday that the GT6 had a noise suppressor! Because it wasnt listed under the FX1 or FX2 in the manual I assumed you needed to use the antifeedback FX to kill it off. After reading the manual back to front I found the obscure NS/Name/Master button that pretty much does everything I want.... It does also kill of the nasty hiss when I turn my guitar down which is nice....As it turns out I dont need a NS-2 I already had one and didnt even realise... Thanks guys - been quite alot of help

That was part of the understanding I had for a while - but ive seen it work for other guitarists. I was thinking along the logic of that If I set the threshold right I could stop the feed back before it gathered too much volume, which is the way I would expect it too work. I just dont really want any unneccessary digital devices in my signal chain unless I have absolutely have to.

I could not agree more with you on the matter of the GT6 - I dont actually use it for anything anymore, other then tuning , in which case I have it on the side not actually connected to the amp in anyway... I was just hoping it would save me buying a noise gate - I running duncan designed humbuckers in a lespaul copy, but more to the point the EMGs in my seven string are just as bad. Iam kinda limited by how far I can stand away as our practice space is small, and I do need to have it that loud as our drummer is totally ballistic. I have spent an age screwing around with the anti feedback on the GT6 to no avail, so now iam considering a noise gate , I know the NS-2 from boss has some kind of signal buffering but I know the high/low cut in boss pedals is normally drastic compared to their analogue counter parts, has anybody else got any opinions or views on this that could help me out?

Ok I currently have a Hughes n' Kettner Warp X 120 watt valve head that has the most amazing tone, but as most valve amps that have super high gain - it wallows in immense feedback when played at gig volumes which it annoying and painful. I currently own a boss GT6 which alledgedly has a 'anti feedback' effect.....But I have been unable to get this to do anything of considerable mention when it comes to stopping feedback! Ive heard a Boss NS-2 Noise suppressor is what I need to stop this happening but iam concerned about 2 things: - A) The digital boss pedal will destroy my tone It wont be anymore effective with my amp then the GT6 Does anybody have any experiance or guidance they can offer me in this area? Much appreciated Michael

Well the bolt on neck guitar isnt playable to my own standards currently because of the fretting issues with it. Instead of having a fret drop off on the high frets, its actually ramps up slightly which makes the fret buzz in tolerable. Either that or the action is ballistically high, which is undesirable as its not worth playing! If iam looking to change the profile of the frets is hard to achieve this with a fret level or is it impossible........I dont mind lots of hard work I just want my guitar to be right

I basically have to guitars with uneven frets that require some work so that I can set the action correctly. The first guitar has wide and high frets that are uneven on a bolt on neck, and I have preferance for low/wide frets. Because I require to change the fret profile as well as giving it a general level, Am I better refretting the entire neck or perservering with a fret level. The second guitar is a les paul copy with a set neck that generally just has uneven frets. Iam worried about this because Ive not fret levelled a guitar with a set neck before and when I usually level a bolt on neck I remove it from the guitar. Basically iam worried about upsetting the set neck when I perform the fret level as I obvisouly dont want to damage the guitar Help anybody?

Different companies use different fretwire....it's just a matter of taste....I bet your frets are perfecly okay, but need a proper levelling....properly levelling frets is nealry considered an art form, but is not impossible if you are willing to put in the work and patience, however it's really no easy task. I recommend letting a pro do it....but did you try improving the action by adjusting the bridge yet? I have adjusted the bridge and I have levelled so the strings run parallel to the fret board, its just those damn frets - i have read a tutorial on levelling and it looks like a long job - but I think it may just be worth it.