Lets look at our guitars thread

[singlecoil]

JLC25 said:

singlecoil said:

There's a good chance it doesnt need refretting, a decent fret dress might be sufficient depending on the original fret height and how bad the notching. If that's the case then £60 plus strings, refret would be £185 plus strings, though PH discount would apply to that

I was advised a refret when I was in the studio last - I use quite heavy strings (generally 12s - Roto Purples) with a wound G, and its left a dent on every fret down the neck on the G string. I know you're diagnosing based on a post - but the only equipment I know about was more pedals and amps etc. rather than frets! But if it only needs a dress money saved isn't a bad thing!

Seeing as you use such butch strings, you'll be wanting stainless steel frets, which, being that much harder, will last longer. Somewhat more expensive though. That's assuming you need a refret at all, the frets on the Mexican Strats I've just done started at about .045", if yours were the same then 10 thou off would take out some pretty bad notching, and leave you with the same height frets as on my demonstrator. Although I expect being as it's strung with girly/ghey 9s you would find it quite strange to play anyway.

[JLC25]

Eddie Strohacker said:

One of mine. About twenty kilos of seventies beast. It's got the lot, bullet truss rod, three bolt neck, all those well loved CBS money saving features. More or less retired now, but still plays & sounds just like it should. It's a good guitar & belies the reputation they had in that era.

How are you finding the Tuning stability? Always heard 70's was a very big mixed bag. the few I've played were fairly nice though! They're probably the best way into affordable real vintage guitar ownership as well.

[Eddie Strohacker]

That one is a 1974 or '76. '74 I think, I'd have to look it up. There is a negative narrative around 70's Fenders centred on CBS's ownership. Lots of it is true, certainly towards the end of their tenure when they were churning out disco strats with glitter paint jobs & it's also true they started work on a new factory the day after Leo signed the deal, quickly turning the taps on production in a big way.

All I can say is I own a pre CBS strat this one & a 2008 one which I use for gigging. They're very different guitars. The pre CBS one is considerably more delicate & balanced than the other two. The 70's one is heavy, very stable in tuning & a perfectly acceptable guitar. The 2008n is just butter, all those lessons over the decades distilled into a modern guitar.

I think the reality of CBS guitars lies somewhere in the middle of the continuum. Some will be awful, most OK & some very good. Mine is good, I've never felt it suffers because a neck bolt is missing. If you're thinking of one, the answer as ever is to try it out & it will either fit with your idea of a good guitar or it won't but I wouldn't be put off just because it might be a CBS guitar.

I think I paid £350 for it in 1994 from ABC in St Albans.

[Eddie Strohacker]

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Feels like it! It is a heavy old bugger for a strat, not far off my Les Paul.

[Eddie Strohacker]

1976, I just looked it up & a view of the three bolt neck.

[singlecoil]

I've heard many times over the years people express disapproval of the three bolt system, but really can't see why, as long as everything in the system is functioning correctly.

[Evangelion]

Had to be a '76, as the black scratchplate didn't appear until '75.

If whoever bought it new had waited a year, he could have had black covers and knobs to match it. Looks much nicer.

(IMHO anyway - who knows others may differ.)

[Eddie Strohacker]

It's probably a bit of a mongrel with the pickups anyway. I've not had the lid off for years, so can't remember if there's anything out of the ordinary under the bonnet, but I don't think so.

[Escapegoat]

Bit of a tangent, but if any of you guys has a pair of original vintage Gibson PAFs, let me know.

[singlecoil]

Kavanagh Maxwell by Elliott and Nolan, on Flickr

[FreeLitres]

I posted on here a while ago about getting my first small valve amp.

I just managed to get a Blackstar HT-5 combo last night! It's 2nd hand from Gumtree and doesn't come with instructions.

A couple of initial questions that I hope you can help me with...

I have a Zoom G3x multi effects - How do I connect this up to the amp? Do I connect it to the effects loop jack sockets on the back of the HT-5? I've never used an effect loop so I don't know what the send/return sockets are supposed to connect to!

Also, the amp has 2 main switches - Standby and Power. What order am I supposed to switch these on? Whats the point of the standby?

Thanks

[Ekona]

Manual for the amp is available on line

You could run the fx in the signal chain, it defends what you're using it for. Distortion should be in line, but chorus/reverb stuff should go through the loop.

With valve amps you need to let them warm up and cool down when using them, so turn it onto standby about 2 mins before you actually want to use it, them put it back into standby for 1 min before you turn it off.

[Eddie Strohacker]

If it's an FX board, I would go: guitar-board in-board out-amp input.

[FreeLitres]

Ekona said:

Manual for the amp is available on line

You could run the fx in the signal chain, it defends what you're using it for. Distortion should be in line, but chorus/reverb stuff should go through the loop.

With valve amps you need to let them warm up and cool down when using them, so turn it onto standby about 2 mins before you actually want to use it, them put it back into standby for 1 min before you turn it off.

I thought it might be something to do with warming/cooling the tubes. Just to be clear-

So for powering up-
From both switches off - Switch Standby on - wait 2 mins - Switch power on while leaving standby on

For switching off-
From both switches on - Switch power off - wait 2 mins - Switch standby off

Is that right?

[FreeLitres]

Regarding the multi effects, I tend to use a combination of distortion, compression, amp simulation*, delay, reverb, etc.

So feeding this into the main input jack is best? It's what I have been doing with my old Marshall "Valvestate" (not true valve) but that didn't have an effects loop function.

Should I ditch the artificial amp simulator and run the effects into the distortion channel of the HT-5? I would always use the clean channel of the Marshall as the noise/hum was excessive on the overdrive channel. Might the higher output of the multi effects prematurely wear out the tubes or anything?

I don't want to knack this amp just from messing around so I'm keen to learn the boundaries before I blow something.

[Eddie Strohacker]

FreeLitres said:

Regarding the multi effects, I tend to use a combination of distortion, compression, amp simulation*, delay, reverb, etc.

So feeding this into the main input jack is best? It's what I have been doing with my old Marshall "Valvestate" (not true valve) but that didn't have an effects loop function.

Should I ditch the artificial amp simulator and run the effects into the distortion channel of the HT-5? I would always use the clean channel of the Marshall as the noise/hum was excessive on the overdrive channel. Might the higher output of the multi effects prematurely wear out the tubes or anything?

I don't want to knack this amp just from messing around so I'm keen to learn the boundaries before I blow something.

There's a bit to using effects loops, but nothing you can't get your head around. This is ok for the big points:

http://proguitarshop.com/andyscorner/fx-loops-expl...

[Escapegoat]

FreeLitres said:

I thought it might be something to do with warming/cooling the tubes. Just to be clear-

So for powering up-
From both switches off - Switch Standby on - wait 2 mins - Switch power on while leaving standby on

For switching off-
From both switches on - Switch power off - wait 2 mins - Switch standby off

Is that right?

No, but the reality is that it doesn't matter. Standby switches might have been useful on valve-powered radio transmitters that used >1000V but are a daft idea on guitar amps.

Some guitar amp manuals (and many "experts") tell you to switch the power on and then wait a few minutes before switching the Standby to on and starting to play. But the benefits are a myth. See here for a tech explanation: http://www.valvewizard.co.uk/standby.html

[Ekona]

This is very true, but it's a good habit to get into rather than just firing everything up and going hell for leather on a cold tube, then switch it straight off when it's red hot. That's a very quick way to kill tubes, no?

I do it out of habit, to force myself to allow cool down time. But yeah, each to their own.

[Escapegoat]

Ekona said:

This is very true, but it's a good habit to get into rather than just firing everything up and going hell for leather on a cold tube, then switch it straight off when it's red hot. That's a very quick way to kill tubes, no?

No.

The only useful purpose of a Standby switch is to act as a between-set 'mute' for live, or studio recording.

Worse still, almost all Standby switches are general purpose mains switches, designed for switching a few amps of 110-240V AC, and not the very high DC voltages that they experience in their (typical) position in a valve amp circuit. So they frequently die from internal arcing, because people use them as instructed above. Better to leave it set to "On" and use only the amplifier's Power switch.

[Ekona]

Nearly bought a Blackstar HT head, good little things

Depends on what sounds you want from the setup. I use a Digitech RP1000 for mine, so I'm used to the limitations of multiFX units. I run mine into the main signal path, but that's because I run it into two separate amps via an A/B box. This means that any modulation effects aren't as good as they should be, indeed the reverb is useless, but I can still use the distortion pedals in the FX which is really what I use it for.

Personally I would be running it into the loop on your HT5, and simply using the distortion on the amp itself. I'm assuming you like higher gain as you picked the Blackstar, not saying it can't do crunch it's just better at high gain I really like the overdrive channel on the HT, especially with the ISF, so that's how I would approach it. Does the amp have reverb built in? I have to run a separate box on my amp into the loop as recommended by people on here (which works perfectly, thanks folks). That said, if you don't ever use modulation effects then you might as well leave the unit in the signal path.

With regards to the amp simulator stuff, personally I'd stop using it. It's okay on solid state stuff (I have an old red stripe Bandit and it's ace on that), but on valve stuff I've found it to be next to useless. The point of a valve amp is to drive it hard, to get the smooth tone from that way, and once you do you'll never want to go back. All that sim stuff is okay up to a point, and good for DI recording, but I think you're past that now.

Above all though, just have a fiddle and see what sounds best to you. You won't break anything either way, so just have a play