It concerns me a bit that Elliott complains about valves introducing additional noise and distortion, and more or less dismisses their use as a silly superstition by clueless musicians.
The bit about additional noise and distortion from valves is perfectly true, of course. But Elliott also manages to completely miss the point. The additional distortion is precisely what makes the valve a good thing, from the musician's point of view. The "excessive" distortion makes a bass guitar sound better, more interesting, more musical. The valve adds harmonics that are lacking from the instrument itself.
This certainly won't be the first time an electronics engineer has failed to understand the difference between Hi-Fi (accurate reproduction), and musical instrument amplification (where the goal is to create a desirable sound, not to accurately re-create a signal.)
But all this doesn't particularly make me think Elliott is the right engineer to design a musical instrument amplifier. If he thinks zero distortion sounds best, he certainly isn't the guy to design a bass amp for my tastes.
Elliott's bass amp is quite a complex project, too, so I would want to know for sure that it actually sounds good, before I started building it. It would be nice if there were a dozen clips on Youtube or Soundcloud or something.
-Gnobuddy
The bit about additional noise and distortion from valves is perfectly true, of course. But Elliott also manages to completely miss the point. The additional distortion is precisely what makes the valve a good thing, from the musician's point of view. The "excessive" distortion makes a bass guitar sound better, more interesting, more musical. The valve adds harmonics that are lacking from the instrument itself.
This certainly won't be the first time an electronics engineer has failed to understand the difference between Hi-Fi (accurate reproduction), and musical instrument amplification (where the goal is to create a desirable sound, not to accurately re-create a signal.)
But all this doesn't particularly make me think Elliott is the right engineer to design a musical instrument amplifier. If he thinks zero distortion sounds best, he certainly isn't the guy to design a bass amp for my tastes.
Elliott's bass amp is quite a complex project, too, so I would want to know for sure that it actually sounds good, before I started building it. It would be nice if there were a dozen clips on Youtube or Soundcloud or something.
-Gnobuddy
For the sake of accuracy and completeness, this what you said;
This is what Rod Elliott actually said;
You;
What the amp includes;
This is what Rod Elliott actually said;
Perhaps not, but one opinion only and only supported by conjecture.
You;
What the amp includes;
Could you explain how a clip on YouTube or SoundCloud can give any indication of the sound quality of anything?
I'm not sure what the kerfluffle is about, Elliott's website is available to anyone on the 'Net, anyone can read exactly what he said; I don't see the point of quoting bits of his website here.
That said, let's continue the exercise you started. This is what Rod Elliott actually said, straight off his website (I added the colour for emphasis):
Note also that there is no mention of even the possibility that additional valve distortion might produce any improvement to the sound. Either Elliott doesn't believe this to be the case, or he is ignorant on the issue, or it never occurred to him to mention it. In any case, as I said, he appears to have completely missed the entire point of using a valve in a (bass) guitar preamp.
Elliott also believes "few (if any)" musicians could hear a difference. That means he believes that most, if not all, of those who think the valve produces an improvement in sound are wrong, deluded, or lying.
Rather curiously, the claim that "few, if any" musicians could hear a difference, also implies that the additional distortion isn't actually a negative, because nobody can actually hear it anyway! But clearly he's speaking from the typical engineers viewpoint: additional distortion is bad, even if you can't actually hear it.
All this is pretty much exactly what I said in my previous post. So I don't really know what it was that upset you?
The GRE is a requirement for admission to most graduate programs in the USA, and hundreds of thousands of students take that exam each year; as an example, almost 584,677 students took it in the year between July 2015 and June 2016, according to Educational Testing Services, who runs the exam. To place in the top 1 percentile that year, one would have to do better than 578,830 of the 584,677 students.
The number of examinees (July 2015 - June 2016) is listed on page 5 of this PDF published by ETS: https://www.ets.org/s/gre/pdf/snapshot_test_taker_data_2016.pdf
All this nit-picking is really not necessary; it does not take an extraordinary ability with the English language to understand what Elliott was saying. He (Elliott) was not being particularly subtle about his beliefs about valves in his write-up.
And how, in your opinion, is a complete lack of audio clips an improvement over having some high-quality clips available online to listen to?
Perhaps you are a fan of Elliott's, and that's fine. In a way, I am, too. I don't know the man myself, but I have a great deal of respect for the huge body of work he's created, and I applaud him for publishing it on his website. If I ever met him, I would thank him for the wonderful resource he's created for all those interested in DIY audio electronics. He did a wonderful thing.
But that doesn't mean I blindly and automatically think every one of Elliott's designs is a great one. In the case of this particular design, I personally find Elliott's publicly expressed opinions a matter of concern. Without audible evidence to convince me otherwise, I would not build this amp for myself.
All this is the same thing I said in my previous post, and I see no reason to change my opinion.
You, of course, are welcome to your own opinion, whether or not it agrees with my own.
-Gnobuddy
That said, let's continue the exercise you started. This is what Rod Elliott actually said, straight off his website (I added the colour for emphasis):
So, according to Rod Elliot:Rod Elliott said:
- Adding a valve is pointless
- Few if any musicians could hear a difference
- The only things the valve actually adds are noise, distortion, and reduced reliability.
Note also that there is no mention of even the possibility that additional valve distortion might produce any improvement to the sound. Either Elliott doesn't believe this to be the case, or he is ignorant on the issue, or it never occurred to him to mention it. In any case, as I said, he appears to have completely missed the entire point of using a valve in a (bass) guitar preamp.
Elliott also believes "few (if any)" musicians could hear a difference. That means he believes that most, if not all, of those who think the valve produces an improvement in sound are wrong, deluded, or lying.
Rather curiously, the claim that "few, if any" musicians could hear a difference, also implies that the additional distortion isn't actually a negative, because nobody can actually hear it anyway! But clearly he's speaking from the typical engineers viewpoint: additional distortion is bad, even if you can't actually hear it.
All this is pretty much exactly what I said in my previous post. So I don't really know what it was that upset you?
Of course. I never said otherwise. In fact, I made it quite clear that it was my opinion only. Please re-read the following section of my previous post:Tromperie said:
See the words "me" and "my" there? I made it very clear that I was speaking for myself, and no-one else.Gnobuddy said:
Actually, supported by a lifetime of understanding the English language. My mother was an English Lit. college professor, and she taught me English starting as a baby. I read voraciously most of my life. I placed in the 99th percentile of the Verbal section of the Graduate Record Examination (GRE) back in my college days, meaning that, at the time, my reading and writing ability in the English language was in the top 1% of all college graduates - worldwide - who attempted that international exam that year.Tromperie said:
The GRE is a requirement for admission to most graduate programs in the USA, and hundreds of thousands of students take that exam each year; as an example, almost 584,677 students took it in the year between July 2015 and June 2016, according to Educational Testing Services, who runs the exam. To place in the top 1 percentile that year, one would have to do better than 578,830 of the 584,677 students.
The number of examinees (July 2015 - June 2016) is listed on page 5 of this PDF published by ETS: https://www.ets.org/s/gre/pdf/snapshot_test_taker_data_2016.pdf
All this nit-picking is really not necessary; it does not take an extraordinary ability with the English language to understand what Elliott was saying. He (Elliott) was not being particularly subtle about his beliefs about valves in his write-up.
Let's try the other side of that argument: could you explain how the lack of any online clips can give any indication of the sound quality of anything?Tromperie said:
And how, in your opinion, is a complete lack of audio clips an improvement over having some high-quality clips available online to listen to?
Perhaps you are a fan of Elliott's, and that's fine. In a way, I am, too. I don't know the man myself, but I have a great deal of respect for the huge body of work he's created, and I applaud him for publishing it on his website. If I ever met him, I would thank him for the wonderful resource he's created for all those interested in DIY audio electronics. He did a wonderful thing.
But that doesn't mean I blindly and automatically think every one of Elliott's designs is a great one. In the case of this particular design, I personally find Elliott's publicly expressed opinions a matter of concern. Without audible evidence to convince me otherwise, I would not build this amp for myself.
All this is the same thing I said in my previous post, and I see no reason to change my opinion.
You, of course, are welcome to your own opinion, whether or not it agrees with my own.
-Gnobuddy
I've built a few bass preamps using Rod's guitar amp front end and also the Universal Mixer board. Both worked and measured very well and I played hundreds of gigs with them perfectly happily. I've since moved on to doing my own designs, but Rod's EQ scheme for the bass amp project is pretty standard "cookbook" stuff IMHO and it should work just fine. He does have that particular engineer's mindset that wants to optimize for low distortion and low noise, but I personally would prefer to shoot for about an order of magnitude more push in that direction, which I've pursued in my own more recent builds. I do build tube bass preamps occasionally too, but I have never really bonded with them all that much for my own playing situations, which are more jazz than rock oriented, and only use fretless instruments that already have all the harmonic content and general character I'd ever want, even unamplified. Vive la difference!
Rod Elliott has a deserved reputation of designing properly woking no nonsense stuff, so even without building it, I alreadytrust it.
Tht said, it looks complex for a first design, I´d build first the so called "guitar preamp", basically an SS version of classic Fender preamps and which in fact works quite well gor a MI preamp, even if usd with Bass.
Build and test one, you´ll like it.
then if you are comfortable, build ethe full featured one.
As of tubes, as used in most Bass preamps they don´t do much.
Many are plain cathode followers which do nothing to sound, others are low gain stages, which again do little if anything at all, a few use them as distortion devices.
The real place where tubes shine is in overdriven power stages, but few choose that route for economic reasons.
Tht said, it looks complex for a first design, I´d build first the so called "guitar preamp", basically an SS version of classic Fender preamps and which in fact works quite well gor a MI preamp, even if usd with Bass.
Build and test one, you´ll like it.
then if you are comfortable, build ethe full featured one.
As of tubes, as used in most Bass preamps they don´t do much.
Many are plain cathode followers which do nothing to sound, others are low gain stages, which again do little if anything at all, a few use them as distortion devices.
The real place where tubes shine is in overdriven power stages, but few choose that route for economic reasons.
So a little more back ground - I have built several (more than 10) preamps for bass, mostly all tube, but a couple hybrid - tube front end with opamps for some tone control and output. I have implemented an all-tube Fdeck style HPF. Have also done one with an opamp. Both work great. (24db per octave F3 at 35Hz.) Current power amps are all based on Hypex modules - old guy trying to keep weight down. I am currently playing through a GB Fearful 15/6 (no tweeter).
I am a fretless player (5-string) trying to sound fretted (I just can't play frets - I am an old upright player). Keith Roscoe built my last two basses trying to get them to sound fretted and they works really well (absolutely love his necks).
So part of my goals at looking at different EQ controls is to be able to focus on my sound goals.
I did build a variable (freq) mid control similar to the EWS mid pedals and Traynor YBA300 mid control. It works pretty well - using an LM4562 opamp to do the dirty work. Any one tried this with tubes?
I was interested in Rod's design for the EQ, but just looking for practical experience with semi-parametric controls - mid controls in particular.
I have played through GK heads and the mid-controls do not line up well for me and my style. I know that these are not semi-parametric. Any others that I should look at schematics?
Just looking for ideas. Charlie has inspired me several times with his builds!
I am a fretless player (5-string) trying to sound fretted (I just can't play frets - I am an old upright player). Keith Roscoe built my last two basses trying to get them to sound fretted and they works really well (absolutely love his necks).
So part of my goals at looking at different EQ controls is to be able to focus on my sound goals.
I did build a variable (freq) mid control similar to the EWS mid pedals and Traynor YBA300 mid control. It works pretty well - using an LM4562 opamp to do the dirty work. Any one tried this with tubes?
I was interested in Rod's design for the EQ, but just looking for practical experience with semi-parametric controls - mid controls in particular.
I have played through GK heads and the mid-controls do not line up well for me and my style. I know that these are not semi-parametric. Any others that I should look at schematics?
Just looking for ideas. Charlie has inspired me several times with his builds!
Wow, I am just blown away! Honoured to have the intellectual elite like yourself and danielwritesbac on this forum. Cheers!
A few ideas, which you may have already tried.
First, use two pickups out of phase (and fiddle the volume/gap). It's creates some rather different "thinner" sounds depending on pickup type and location.
Second, I'm presuming you've had a look at Fred Nachbaur's Dogzilla. Lots of ideas there, even if you decide to leave the output stage alone.
Finally, a set of EQ pedals either side of something doing a little 2nd or 3rd harmonic gets a world of tone. (You've got a bass eq pedal, I presume)
I am a career electronics engineer, and also a regularly live giggng bss guitarist, and I will say straight away that I prefer playing through a valve amplifier, no question. i like the big warm presence these amps have. Perhaps Rodd Elliott considered theat to be a form of distortion, and of so, I really don't care. With regard to his statements on reliabilty, it's a well-proven fact that a properly desiged and built valve amplifier as as more reliable than an equivalent solid state one. I speak of having to change the output transistors of a Trace Elliott bass amp I once owned, after a particularly heavy gig. That would have never happened with decent valve bass amp.
One of my friends who was giging with a Mesa guitar amp, which used Solid state devices for channel switching, suddenly had all those devices all blow up when there was a powers surge the building all the valves remained intact. We also know how Russian MIG29s were found to use valves instead of solid state devices, because of their intrinsic resistance to EMP Basically, PN junctions are inherently more fragile.
Sent from my phone with Tapatalk. Please excuse any typpos.
One of my friends who was giging with a Mesa guitar amp, which used Solid state devices for channel switching, suddenly had all those devices all blow up when there was a powers surge the building all the valves remained intact. We also know how Russian MIG29s were found to use valves instead of solid state devices, because of their intrinsic resistance to EMP Basically, PN junctions are inherently more fragile.
Sent from my phone with Tapatalk. Please excuse any typpos.
Speaking strictly of large Bass amplifiers, SS ones work as just built forever, until (a few) die for whatever reason.
An Ampeg SVT , "the" standard against which all other Bass amps are compared, eats its tubes in a year, faster if heavily gigged/toured, may be as soon as 3 months, and needs retubing or else.
We are talking U$240 + shipping for the raw tubes (6 x 6550) plus U$60/100 for the Tech who will replace and rebias them.
I can hardly call "reliable" something which self destructs (in a way) once a year.
Self destructs in this case meaning it *needs* a Tech intervention and U$250 worth of parts to keep running as intended.
There must be a reason Tubes were always made "plug in" and *easily* replaceable, while transistors are soldered in place
EMP resistant?
IF you are close enough to a detonating Nuclear device to have your SS Bass amp destroyed, I guess you (and the World) are in a far deeper trouble than what will you play your Bass through.
Hey, not dissing Bass Tube amps either, I like the way they distort and colour the sound.
So much so that I added such coloration in my own SS Bass line, apparently with success, because the best Bass players in Argentina *sold* their Ampeg SVT and bought mine instead, go figure.
The reason?
"Yours are more reliable, last forever (20/30 years or more) and during brownouts keep working flawlessly, while tubed Ampegs hit the floor if mains voltage drops 20% or more."
This particular (very popular here) Singer/Bass player sold his SVT Classic, bought one of my B300 SS heads, liked it, bought another, now he has 4 of them.
You can see 3 of them to the right of his head, each driving an 8x10" Ampeg "fridge" (which he kept), they are the white panel bright red Led heads:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ur0Q15V4CnA
An Ampeg SVT , "the" standard against which all other Bass amps are compared, eats its tubes in a year, faster if heavily gigged/toured, may be as soon as 3 months, and needs retubing or else.
We are talking U$240 + shipping for the raw tubes (6 x 6550) plus U$60/100 for the Tech who will replace and rebias them.
I can hardly call "reliable" something which self destructs (in a way) once a year.
Self destructs in this case meaning it *needs* a Tech intervention and U$250 worth of parts to keep running as intended.
There must be a reason Tubes were always made "plug in" and *easily* replaceable, while transistors are soldered in place
EMP resistant?
IF you are close enough to a detonating Nuclear device to have your SS Bass amp destroyed, I guess you (and the World) are in a far deeper trouble than what will you play your Bass through.
Hey, not dissing Bass Tube amps either, I like the way they distort and colour the sound.
So much so that I added such coloration in my own SS Bass line, apparently with success, because the best Bass players in Argentina *sold* their Ampeg SVT and bought mine instead, go figure.
The reason?
"Yours are more reliable, last forever (20/30 years or more) and during brownouts keep working flawlessly, while tubed Ampegs hit the floor if mains voltage drops 20% or more."
This particular (very popular here) Singer/Bass player sold his SVT Classic, bought one of my B300 SS heads, liked it, bought another, now he has 4 of them.
You can see 3 of them to the right of his head, each driving an 8x10" Ampeg "fridge" (which he kept), they are the white panel bright red Led heads:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ur0Q15V4CnA
I play a little bass, my hartke 3500 head has an option for tube input on the pre amp side.
Solid state has more attack but the tube's mellower sound has its moments.
Finding tubes that can handle sitting on a 4-10 cabinet has been my biggest challenge.
The new tubes that are not harmonic don't have that sweet sound but when your playing on stage in a noisy bar no one is listening to tone
Solid state has more attack but the tube's mellower sound has its moments.
Finding tubes that can handle sitting on a 4-10 cabinet has been my biggest challenge.
The new tubes that are not harmonic don't have that sweet sound but when your playing on stage in a noisy bar no one is listening to tone
That was just speculation and basically doesn't make much sense since that famous tube was reputedly located in the power supply of an otherwise solid-state radio. It was originally a regulator tube. That MIG wasn't an "all-tube" jet fighter.
I have a hunch that Soviets used tubes for few reasons: Their transistor technology was far behind, so for them tubes were still the only choice in some cases. Also acknowledge this didn't happen yesterday so solid-state tech was still largely just developing to its current state. Secondly, Soviets had a large stock of tubes and other replacement parts for the electronics. This stock didn't exist insame scale for newer transistorized stuff, so they were likely pondering about what happens when stuff needs servicing. Thirdly, vacuum tubes did not have temperature coefficiencies of solid-state devices, which is a big factor when things need to operate in cold conditions (e.g. high altititude).
No, I'm pretty sure EMP didn't have anything to do with choosing that tube as the regulator device. Soviets did tests you know, they sure must have been aware about the actual scale of catastrophy caused by an EMP attack. IMO, test results of the high-altitutude EMP detonation in Kazakhstan in 1964 are much more interesting reading than the worn out self-repeating myth about vacuum tubes surviving an EMP blast. If a plain test destroyed miles and miles of power lines, set a power plant in fire, destroyed (tube) radios far away from the detonation site, and destroyed practically all phone line repeater amplifiers (they were tube amps back then) of Karanga town I'm pretty convinced that Soviets knew that chances of vacuum tube surviving a EMP are slim, and most likely nothing else in that piece of equipment survives anyway.
Some excerpts: (Electromagnetic Pulse - Soviet Test 184 - EMP)
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What EXACTLY did you do to achieve this "coloration"? Curious minds need to know!
Lots of things, none revolutionary by itself, but each is a small brick in the building, all together give me a good "Rock" sound.
Standard SS amps are either squeaky clean or buzzy distorting, jumping back and forth either side of the fence even within a single chord, because there are no time constants involved, they either slam against a rail or not.
And regular limiters fully avoid power amp clipping, not bad but sound is "boring".
My amps "growl" which is very different from plain clipping, musicians say "Fahey amps get "angry" " .... what tube amps do (Ampeg, Sunn, etc. ) and different from regular SS ones which either buzz/clip (old ones such as Acoustic) or never ever clip or distort more than, say, 1% , which is what all modern ones do (Peavey , Fender, Ampeg, Marshall, Hartke, Laney, etc.)
Standard SS amps are either squeaky clean or buzzy distorting, jumping back and forth either side of the fence even within a single chord, because there are no time constants involved, they either slam against a rail or not.
And regular limiters fully avoid power amp clipping, not bad but sound is "boring".
My amps "growl" which is very different from plain clipping, musicians say "Fahey amps get "angry" " .... what tube amps do (Ampeg, Sunn, etc. ) and different from regular SS ones which either buzz/clip (old ones such as Acoustic) or never ever clip or distort more than, say, 1% , which is what all modern ones do (Peavey , Fender, Ampeg, Marshall, Hartke, Laney, etc.)
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