Solid State Guitar amps worthwhile??

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AuroraB

AuroraB

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Joined 2001
#1
My son is into guitars, - he most certainly have an ear for it, so all good and well for him, - I'm a woodwind guy myself, sax'es and clarinets.

He has access to several amps on loan, - some good and other s not so good.
Being an old geezer of an EE and long time AudioPhool myself, I suggested that we build something together.

And now for the magical qustion- are SS guitar amps really worth the effort? As far as I can tell from my friends, at's all about tubes when it comes to guitars......
Can someone point at any SS guitar amps, heads or combos, that are concidered good?

I've been working with tube stuff for ages, so building a Fender ,Vox or Marshall clone is no problem as such, except for the work involved, but if SS is useable, I most probably have all the parts I need!
 
#5
You can also hear that amp (and its distinctive chorus sound) on Metallica’s Master of Puppets so it’s not just a jazz amp. The linked schematic is for the head version and for the record; there are at least 8 different versions of that amp - some very different from the other. Schematics for at least two other versions can be found from the Internet as well. I personally prefer the older version with current feedback and short circuit protected output stage.

Other good solid-state amps are for example, Randall amplifiers (namely Warhead and RG series), Award Session amps, Pritchard amps, Peavey Bandits, Lab Series amps, some newer Fenders and Vox Valvetronix series. Gibson, Standel, Kustom, Sunn, Vox and Gallien-Krueger made some fine solid-state amps too. However, the older solid-state amplifiers do not really shine with their reliability.

It’s definitely not “all about tubes” – I’d rather say it’s all about design and build quality (and how much effort and/or money is put into it). If you have better skills with tube technology then stick to that: Solid-state amps are different beasts and have to be designed with that in mind. They are definitely worth the effort (if made properly) but you likely need to learn a bunch of new tricks before you can design something that performs well. If you don’t want to start a “practicing project” I suggest you stick to the technology you know already.

:2c:
 
#9
tschrama said:
don't we just love the much anticipated " no it's not" responses... but seriously.. it IS all about tubes.. and the short awnser still is stick to Tubes...
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Again, that's only YOUR personal opinion, and much of the music industry disagrees with you. For some uses valve amplifiers are essential, for the specific sound you're looking for, for for other sounds transistor amps are essential. By blindly following the incorrect premise that only valve amps are any good for guitar, you're crippling your potential.
 
#10
As others have said, it's up to you as to what you want. Yes there have been many successful SS guitar amps over the years. Here's a link to a project site that you might find interesting:

http://sound.westhost.com/projects.htm

In particular, look at the musical instrument page for a couple of SS guitar amp projects (especially 27 and 27B):

http://sound.westhost.com/projects-5.htm

The preamp portion there looks interesting and is not too complex. The power amp looks a bit complex, if you're up to it. There are also a number of other simpler power amp schematics there on the power amp page that you could substitute as well.

Sounds like a fun project for you and your son.
 
#11
I must disagree: The power amp is not complex at all, on a contrary: It’s about as simple as a decent solid-state power amplifier can be. There are bunch of things that could (and should) be improved even when the main circuit topology is left unchanged: The potentiometer in bias servo requires a series resistor to prevent “zero” resistance, the current limiter is rather simple and poor as is; on top of that, if the output shorts there is no means for limiting VAS current. I see no DC protection, soft start or delay to prevent the "start up thump" (granted that Rod Elliott has these circuits as individual projects). Slew rate with 220pF Cdom is likely not something you should write home about either.

The preamp is indeed simple but that is also the main problem of it: It’s likely only good for clean sounds, distortion acquired from such a simple clipping configuration will likely sound disappointing, there is no channel switching, (in my opinion) the typical tone control configuration is very limited and has too “interactive” controls, etc. Unfortunately I must say that I have a totally different view about this preamp – and ones that are similar to it: I have seen dozens of preamplifiers that are ten times more inspiring than this one.

I hope you don’t take my comments as a personal attack, gerryc. This is just my impression about this particular design.

AuroraB, bunch of people will likely tell you that they prefer this and that. I still feel the best practice is finding out what amps YOU (and/or your son) like and - more importantly - WHY you like them: Is it because of their tone, weight, price, features, etc. Make a list of those things and study how the amps you like realize that stuff: Do they use specific speaker configurations, what kind of circuitry they have inside etc. After researching this kind of stuff for a while you will have a lot better idea about your needs.
 
#12
teemuk said:
I must disagree: The power amp is not complex at all, on a contrary: It’s about as simple as a decent solid-state power amplifier can be. There are bunch of things that could (and should) be improved even when the main circuit topology is left unchanged: The potentiometer in bias servo requires a series resistor to prevent “zero” resistance, the current limiter is rather simple and poor as is; on top of that, if the output shorts there is no means for limiting VAS current. I see no DC protection, soft start or delay to prevent the "start up thump" (granted that Rod Elliott has these circuits as individual projects). Slew rate with 220pF Cdom is likely not something you should write home about either.

The preamp is indeed simple but that is also the main problem of it: It’s likely only good for clean sounds, distortion acquired from such a simple clipping configuration will likely sound disappointing, there is no channel switching, (in my opinion) the typical tone control configuration is very limited and has too “interactive” controls, etc. Unfortunately I must say that I have a totally different view about this preamp – and ones that are similar to it: I have seen dozens of preamplifiers that are ten times more inspiring than this one.

I hope you don’t take my comments as a personal attack, gerryc. This is just my impression about this particular design.

AuroraB, bunch of people will likely tell you that they prefer this and that. I still feel the best practice is finding out what amps YOU (and/or your son) like and - more importantly - WHY you like them: Is it because of their tone, weight, price, features, etc. Make a list of those things and study how the amps you like realize that stuff: Do they use specific speaker configurations, what kind of circuitry they have inside etc. After researching this kind of stuff for a while you will have a lot better idea about your needs.
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No offense taken. I would agree that this design is lacking for a professional gigging musician, but for a young person learning and as a father and son project, it makes sense to something a little basic, and relatively inexpensive to help guarantee success and to have some fun if I understood the OP's intent. It doesn't make sense to do if it is intended as a substitute for a commercial amp with more features and capability, but for a learning experience, it might. Then if the person is so inclined he/she could embark on a more advanced project as you suggest.

Actually, to address your point about the simplicity of the preamp, it's not much different architecturally than many classic tube guitar preamps (a la' Marshall, Fender, Hiwatt, etc) and uses a similar tone stack. But I don't intend to debate any of that here, just wanted to give a suggestion that may or may not be of interest.
 
#13
They can be good, but it's usually the exception and not the rule. If a solid state guitar amp is designed in a 'hi-fi' sense it will likely come out sterile sounding and rather boring. If a tube guitar amp is designed in a hi-fi sense, it will come out as a Hiwatt 😀

The vast majority of amplifier sounds which many guitarists want are made by tube amplifiers but often using solid state effects pedals. Not all SS amps are bad, I really love the Roland JC series and would pounce on a JC-160 if I ever found one(imagine a 4x10" 160 watt JC-120). The problem is that the response and subjective 'feel' of a tube amp are hard to replicate using solid state amplifiers, and if you are looking for distortion/overdrive as many guitarists are, you may end up with some very ugly sounding distortion. SS amps tend not to take heavily boosted signals very nicely, and the signal boost is a key part of the effect of a distortion pedal.
 
#14
I have only owned 4 real amps in my life and 2 were Tube (Marshall JMC900 and a Garnet Gnome) and 2 were solid state (an Old Traynor 150w and my LM3886 Based DIY guitar amp) and I can tell you that the worst of the 4 was the Marshall JMC900 (What a piece of Crap ,Sounded Thin and had no punch, Gave it away 6 months after I bought it) then next worse was my old Traynor but it was damn loud and was good for gigging as it was nearly indestructable.....

The best sounding is definately the Garnet Gnome (Simular to a Fender Champ, has a 12ax7 and a 6l6gt) but it only really sounds really good when crancked up to max which isn"t allways the best idea when playing in yer room at 2 am.....

the amp I use most which for me anyways gives the best tradeoff between haveing a Good crunchy guitar gound and being able to play at low levels (Or really damn Loud) is my DIY LM3886 Guitar amp and it has to be one of the best SS amps I have heard for guitar but it took over a year of major tweaking the preamp section to get it to sound the way it does and haveing a Good speaker really helps a lot too.....
 
#15
Minion said:
... I can tell you that the worst of the 4 was the Marshall JMC900 (What a piece of Crap ,Sounded Thin and had no punch, Gave it away 6 months after I bought it)...
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Wow, you couldda made $$$ on one of the guitar boards - I read about n00b guitarists selling their soul ('cause they have no money :clown: ) for those.
 
#16
Geek said:



Wow, you couldda made $$$ on one of the guitar boards - I read about n00b guitarists selling their soul ('cause they have no money :clown: ) for those.
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I"m sure I could have but this was back in the Early 90"s before the net....I didn"t really want to sell it as I thought there was something wrong with it, But after takeing to a shop and haveing it checked out they said it was working correctly....

Eventually the fuse compartment broke so I gave it to a Friend of mine....

the amp was a display model at Long & Mc Quade which I got for $400 back in the early 90"s......


Cheers

PS: how are things up in the Frazer Valley? greetings from the Island....

😀
 
#18
Geek said:
Hi,

There's a few 2-tube simple circuits being R&D's here:
http://tonegeeks.sicomm.us/ToneGeeks/index.php?topic=56

Maybe it would be of interest to you?

Cheers!
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Cool. I've been wanting to add some sort of mini poweramp and load to emulate a tube powerstage and cab for bass. Not interested in humping around a heap of weight for something like an SVT or V8 when I recon this sort of approach should be able to get close enough. My plan was to use a 12AU7 as they're not much use to me except distortion generators or something to shoot.
 
#20
Iam sure that building a good preamp section is the key to getting a great sound from SS. With something like a LM3886 you have a stunning sounding power amp for very little effort it just seems to me finding decent schematic or even advice on building a ss pre is very thin on the ground on the net. I have been askign advice over at SSguitar.com but even there the preamp side is just plain weak. Does anyone have any project other than the ESP 100 watt one which could be of use is my project.

The only site that really has grabbed my attention is the stuff runofgroove.com post but i havent fired up my english channel yet.

Any adive on preamps very gratefully recieved. Oh the project is battery power so please no tube.

fil
 
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