Guitar Amps

[mwcontract]

Hi All .My question is can I just buy an old nonintegrated mono tube amp and plug my guitar in somehow?My marshall valve only sounds good when the windows are rattling and the neighbors are pissed off.I'm thinking make a little speaker cab with a good 8inch and solder a rca on the end of the guitar input???Thanks Mark Walls

[Zung]

It'll be still too loud: even a little single ended EL84 at full blast (5W) will make you extremely unpopular in your neighborhood.

For me, an output attenuator is a lot better, inspite of some change in your tone. A lot has been written on this subject: http://www.amptone.com/#poweratten.

I use a constant impedance attenuator, the kind of stuff used to set level on ceiling speakers, with a simple 2 resistors attenuator before it because I'm wary of the advertized "100W peak"

[privateer]

+1 on that. If you live in a semi-detached or terraced house, or a flat, 5W is too much. I have the same problem.

I'd just keep to the Marshall and use an attenuator to reduce the power output fed to the speaker cab. I've got a THD HotPlate, Weber MASS and a Marshall SE-100. All work OK, but I prefer the MASS.

There are other really smart solutions, too (take a look at the Guytron GT-100 amp for inspiration. Or even build an amp with Power Scaling.

If you're feeling really adventurous, you can make a dummy load for your Marshall, derive a line level feed from that and then run that signal through a cab simulator (to get the tone of a guitar cabinet), and run the output of that into an Aux input on your hi-fi. That will sound great at all room volume levels.

[john curl]

Back to tubes, Zung? Good for you!

[unclejed613]

actually it's very simple to build a "power sink".....
get some dummy load resistors (exact 8 ohm value is not critical, since you're not doing measurements). wire them across the output. then in parallel with the dummy load, build a series string of a 100 ohm 5w resistor and your speaker of choice. power out to the speaker will be between 1/10 and 1/8 of the amp output. if you wire the speaker to a 20 watt crossover potentiometer (usually 10 ohm 20 watt wirewound) you can make the speaker level adjustable.

like this:

[Zung]

Hi John, how zit doing? 3 cheers for bringing back the Vendetta!

(I've never been away from tubes as far as guitar amps are concerned)

[Bandersnatch]

hey-Hey!!!,
It won't be the simplest, but a low power amp would be the best solution. SE 71A perhaps? 750 mW isn't all that much if you don't get a super-effecient speaker. A SE 12B4 would also do the trick, adjust B+ voltage to deliver your required power.
cheers,
Douglas