Clipping diode modification for heavy metal distortion

[mondogenerator]

why dont you just replace the diodes with LED's as some smart bloke pointed out? besides the fact youll have to nearly triple gain to get from the usual .6v of a silicon diode, to the 1.2-1.5v for a diode.

if you want to experiment get three diodes:

germanium-for the softest overdrive clipping
silicon- for mental odd harms

maybe try schottky diodes ???

just dont play 2 strings at the same time or the IMD may make your ears bleed!!!

personally id rather just try and make one using rectifier valves..old school tech, but some serious fuzz possible...

[mondogenerator]

Originally Posted by gain-wire

Solid-state devices will generate tons of harmonics all over the audible spectrum, and that makes up for all the buzzy, tinny, ziiziziziy sounds you hear that just break my ears. You know icicles? Well, it would be sort of like jamming those in your ears.

lol THAT and all the IMD products that hard clipping produces.......EQ doesnt shift them, but it may make up for the spectral imbalance; however, full on valve overdrive (or valve rectifiers) have a far better sound as it also took me a long time to realise.

LOL theres nothing like downtuning(double drop c) to CGDGBE cranking the quad el84's up nice and crunchy!

For my heavy sound i use my rackmount 120watt dean markely valvehead, along with hartke 4x10 bass cab!! growly, warm , bright enough yet not tizzy or over sharp

maybe not a logical choice , but truth is, its as dark as youd ever need and as bright as id ever want when fully OD, and at 120watt, damned loud too.

[powerflux]

Originally Posted by mondogenerator

why dont you just replace the diodes with LED's as some smart bloke pointed out? besides the fact youll have to nearly triple gain to get from the usual .6v of a silicon diode, to the 1.2-1.5v for a diode.

don't forget to put some resistor devider at the end to bring the level back to what the amplifier's built foor..

[gain-wire]

Originally Posted by mondogenerator

lol THAT and all the IMD products that hard clipping produces.......EQ doesnt shift them, but it may make up for the spectral imbalance; however, full on valve overdrive (or valve rectifiers) have a far better sound as it also took me a long time to realise.

LOL theres nothing like downtuning(double drop c) to CGDGBE cranking the quad el84's up nice and crunchy!

For my heavy sound i use my rackmount 120watt dean markely valvehead, along with hartke 4x10 bass cab!! growly, warm , bright enough yet not tizzy or over sharp

maybe not a logical choice , but truth is, its as dark as youd ever need and as bright as id ever want when fully OD, and at 120watt, damned loud too.

Well, if we don'T know what the guy's intentions are (lead or rythm) it's hard to suggest an appropriate circuit much less device.

As you said, IMD with either type of diode will be unsupportable if you do more than one note, meaning you can't get a good crunchy chord sound. Frankly I found the best results were obtained with LOW distortion setting, low mids and almost no treble. But turn the volume up. And have a 12 inch speaker because anything smaller will sound wimpy.

We need to know what he wants. Chords or soloing?they're simply not the same type of distortion.

[RnFR]

for the record, most of the IC based "metal" style pedals out there use clipping in the feedback loop and hard clipping. some also use diodes for crossover distortion. check out the Boss HM-2.

[Peckerwood]

The only point I disagree with is when you said diode clipping is the main thing about heavy metal sound. Diode clipping is not even a thing much less a main thing to as lot of us. In fact to me it is something I avoid whenever possible. I guess I could even say diode clipping is the most important thing NOT to have for me personally. I guess a solid state amp would be worse but then again with diode clipping you have a partially solid state amp. Depends where you draw the line between solid state and tube. I wouldn't consider an amp with a solid state rectifier a solid state amp but I suppose some people might.

I play pretty heavy stuff and I hate diode clipping. I have a Marshall JCM 900 50 watt head with that crap. I only use it for a spare because I can't stand it but I got it too cheap not to buy it and I didn't know I would hate it. I have never had to actually use it yet but I recorded enough with it to know for sure I will not be recording with it ever again and hopefully never have to use it live either. It does sound like a lot of popular "metal" bands though. It sucks. Solid state rigs have that similar "artificial" quality to their sound that diode clipping causes only worse.

I get what I consider a real good (but never as good as I know it can be) heavy big sound using my Marshall MK2 Superlead 100 watt or my Marshall 70s JMP 100 watt (JMPs now are rackmounts and totally different amps). The JMP has been "boogied". All I know is it has 4 pre-amp tubes instead of the 3 it was made with and the mod is supposedly called a "Langer" mod or something. It sounds like World War 3. It will distort a lot. Neither of those have that diode clipping crap. The MK2 is kind of clean but it is so punchy it still just blows anything with diode clipping away. It is really bright too. Diode clipping seems to muddle things up a little to me anyway. It sounds similar to an AC-DC kind of sound with 6550 output tubes in it (which it came with) but mine distorts a little more without loosing the punch because I have 6L6s in it.