Natural overdrive question

[gitrguy87]

I have a 1963 twin twelve tube amp. Since its that old (and a tube) it naturally overdrives whrn you turn it up. The thing is, I need to turn it up at least half way, and thats when it starts to overdrive. Any advice on what i can do about this? An effects pedal perhaps?

 

[Zona Mona]

You could try to turn down the volume on the guitar and see if that gives you more headroom

 

[gitrguy87]

Ive tried that and I have to turn it down to 1/4 of the way to get rid of the distortion. The main problem is that the natural distortion sounds awesome, but if I need a good clean sound, im out of luck.

 

[faderbug]

a second amp ?

 

[Harvey Gerst]

Ive tried that and I have to turn it down to 1/4 of the way to get rid of the distortion. The main problem is that the natural distortion sounds awesome, but if I need a good clean sound, im out of luck.

I use to manufacture a box that had a footswitch and volume pot in it. I think Morley and DOD still make one. You set the box volume control for your clean level and then hit the footswitch to bypass the pot for distorted sounds.

 

[stethedrumgeek]

I had this problem with an old bassman head, before I sold it, I was thinking of buying a second amp to do the clean thing. I was going to use an old Roland stereo Jazz Chorus, it was a keyboard amp as far as I remember. You could do that and A/B the guitar signal between the two amps. At a cost, mind you...

 

[Track Rat]

How about a Power Soak?

 

[sile2001]

How about a Power Soak?

I can't count the number of stories I've heard on the Peavey guitar amp forums about these things killing amps. Especially on tube amps, they can wreak havoc with the output transformer if something goes wrong.

 

[EleKtriKaz]

How about a Power Soak?

I would agree with this. As far as it messing up the amp...I think the THD Hot Plate Attenuator is supposed to be very safe to use on the amp, though it's kind of pricy. I could be wrong though.

 

[spoonie g]

I've seen guys use eq's and distortion pedals to give a clean sound to a dirty amp to lower the signal hitting the front end of the amp.

 

[Track Rat]

Or pick up a smaller amp for tracking. That's what I did. I got a Rivera Pubster, 25 watts, all tube into a 10". Rivera designed the Super Champ. The Pubster is like a Super Champ on steroids.