Any guitar amp experts here?

[mmb]

I'm partial to the http://www.AX84.com/ forum for information on building tube amps.

P1 and High Octane amp are great point to point amps for beginners.

 

[SpanishCastleAle]

Thanks for the compliments on the amp.

The site mmb posted is good. Somebody asked about the Weber kits and they are OK but I'd prob go with Ceriatone. Metropoulos Amps is good if you're a Marshall nut. Start with a simple amp and go from there. Usually these amp kit sites have a forum where you can get help if you run into trouble.

I do my amps 'all-grain'; pretty much 'build from scratch' amps. I design the layout, cut that green Garolite with a dremel, drill the eyelets with a hand drill, stake the eyelets with a hammer, you get the idea.

Here's a 30W Rocket clone (very much like the Treble-Boost channel of an AC30). This would be a good starter amp (single channel, no FX loop, no master volume):

Here's a 50W Dumble ODS clone built in a Fender Bandmaster chassis (I think I got the chassis from Weber). This would NOT be a good starter amp (high gain, channel switching, FX loop, dual master volumes, etc.):

 

[menschmaschine]

Here's a 30W Rocket clone (very much like the Treble-Boost channel of an AC30).

That's the best channel on the AC-30! Does the Rocket sound very similar the AC-30? Is it Class A?

 

[SpanishCastleAle]

That's the best channel on the AC-30! Does the Rocket sound very similar the AC-30? Is it Class A?

Yes it sounds very similar to the Top Boost channel, it's a great amp. That one I built has a 'Woden' clone output transformer (Woden was the brand of one of the old output trannies in AC30s).

The 'Class A' thing is a hot topic of debate (sort of). Truth is, the AC30 is NOT class A. It's cathode-biased and it's usually run hot but it's still a class AB amp. Generally speaking, the only true class A guitar amps are the ones that only have one power tube. But lots of class AB amps are advertised/sold as class A amps even though they're not. Doesn't matter, good tone is good tone.:rockin: