jensenmann

Some day when my SVT needed some TLC I took my El. Blue with me and played it into the SVT 8x10". The band didn´t believe what was coming out of the cab. SWR did some magic to their poweramps to make them work with these 8x10"s perfectly. My former SM400s was another favourite of mine together with the Ampeg cab.

The neck has all signs for being original, though the date stamp needs to be checked. The body, though, looks like a 80s gold (anniversary) model. If the ashtray is removed there should be four holes visible which have been used tomount the damperbridge (included with all 62s). What puzzles me most is that the pickguard screws are not bent. Tortoise pickguards of this vintage all have shrunk and hence bent the screws. Certainly the instrument isn´t a player. It shows not enough wear for an instrument that age. Usually there´s reason that it´s not played excessively, soundquality might be on of them.

For crazy stuff I´d go for an Eventide Eclipse or TC Fireworx

Did you ever try the Radial Phazer or Little Labs IBP? Both are adjustable allpassfilters. You can exactly dial in the phaseshift you want instead of using the 180deg button of the desk in the hope that it helps. I have a bunch of these IBPs in our studio and I love them. They work great for snare and the above mentioned bass DI + mic adjustment.

The Ebow is not powerful enough to move basstrings. But it´s longtime ago that I checked that, maybe it has changed, who knows. For crating rectangular shaped signals a fuzzbox in extreme settings works fine.

You´re right, RE20s are expensive. But the best is always the enemy of anything good. What the soundguy really needs at the end of the days might be totally different from what comes out of the cab, anyway. Hence other mikes may work well - or not so well. It´s a matter of all the other sounds delivered. For all gigs I played and thought it´s important to hear the sound of my rig through the PA I always refused to use a DI and carried my Sennheiser MD441 with me. Another great mike, but even more expensive these days. Most engineers hated me for that, but who cares. If NMA means New Model Army and you´re theis FoH techy then we probably met at the M´era Luna Festival some years ago.

All above mentioned mikes do alter the sound. They are all made for bassdrums and have built in presence or treble boosts. If you want to hear exactly what comes out of your cab get an RE20. The mike sound sometims gives good results, sometims is crap. With the same amp/cab/bass/player. Unfortunately we´re depending on the room we play in because room modes delete or boost lowend depending on where your ears, your cap and your mike is positioned in a room. You´re only free of the problem when you use a DI exclusively. But then your PA doesn´t get the sound of your rig. The only solution is to use the mike sound for frequencies >300Hz and let the lowend be done by the DI. Now you only need to find a PA guy who believes what you say. Usually they all know everything better. I know that, too, I´m one of them ;-)

Look at how a Taurus creates his sounds. You´d need two oscillators which are summed, then run the signal through an VCF (MF101) followed by an ADSR envelope shaper. One of the secrets is that one of the oscillators needs to be out of tune to produce the fat sound . I´d start with splitting the bass signal into two paths. You can do the detuning in one path with a Whammy pedal. Creating sine signals like oscillators do can easily be achieved with an Boss OC2 by turning off the direct signal. Other waveforms are a bit hard to achieve. Both signalpaths need then to be summed somehow (small mixer or two input bassamp). Then run through a MF101 followed by a compressor/expander (A Klark DN500 or Drawmer M500 give you all the parameters you need). There´s a lot of space for creativity to expand the possibilities. Wire phaser/chorus/flanger pedals everywhere into the path and you get heaps of new possibilities. Now the fun begins.

well done, mate!

I´m using A TC2290 delay which is 19" rackmount or a TC SCF pedal or a Ibanez BC9 bi chorus for chorus sounds. The 2290 needs to get tweaked for chorus sounds but it sounds spectacular.

Here´s my latest acquisition: 1978 Fender Bassman 135 enjoy

I´d love to trade my flyer with your MkII Midi nice collection, congrats!

or an SVT 8x10

I´d always check microphonics when swapping tubes. Especially when the amp is exposed to vibrations like being placed on cabs. Put the new tube in it´s place, give the amp a minute to warm up and carefully knock with the rear of a screwdriver on the bulb. Compare what you hear from different tubes and use the one with the lowest noise. Microphonic tubes will smear the sound in a very unpleasant way.

[quote name='spiritchaser' post='1208992' date='Apr 23 2011, 10:29 AM']Great decision to have it converted to a fretted, Al! How does it alter the sound? I guess it now kills every speaker around? What about its weight now - still comfortable to play? I'm asking since I've been pondering on having mine fretted, too, but being afraid of the weight the Wal will gain by that. It's still my heaviest bass ... Anyway - enjoy your beauty! Oliver[/quote] Oliver, good to see that you still enjoy it.

Waynepunkdude, what piece is the second Drawmer below the 1960? Is it the old version of the 1960 or something else? Here´s some guts from the place I´m working at. The controlroom pictures were taken when the installation was not completed, though. There´s quite some more stuff added in the meantime.

[quote name='jogi' post='1126151' date='Feb 13 2011, 06:26 PM']In its current form this may not be the most beautiful of Wals - but it´s mine and has a bit of a story to go with it... Bought it in 2000 along with a single pickup fretless MK I (I think it´s the one in the back row [url="http://basschat.co.uk/uploads/monthly_08_2008/post-45-1217955384_thumb.jpg"]here[/url] at the Wall of Wals). I left the fretted MK I on stage at an outdoor gig in May 2001, at an enclosed area, guarded by security with dogs. And - you guessed it - it was gone the next day. Some other gear had been stolen, too, but this one really hurt the most. I always kept an eye open in case it might turn up again, so imagine my surprise when I found a video of the bass on a German forum last summer. I wasn´t 100% sure, but after I had seen a link to the ebay auction where it had been sold with BIN accidentally instead of auctioning it off I knew this was my Wal! Turned out it had never been far from where it had been stolen - just a couple of miles from here... Now it´s back with me and I´m having it refinished - or rather finished, as it had been sanded, spray-painted blue, then sanded again, so it came back to me as bare wood... More pics here: [url="https://picasaweb.google.com/112925724378685434489/WalW2328#"]Wal W2328[/url] By the way, all the little screws for the back cover have gone and the neck bolts have been damaged from not using proper tools. Being non-metric they are impossible to come by over here - would those be available from a hardware store in the UK or are these extra-special???[/quote] try this: [url="http://www.walbasses.co.uk/"]http://www.walbasses.co.uk/[/url] I had the same problem with some imperial-sized screws for my mixing console, a 1980 Amek M2500. After having visited every hardwareshop in my area I found out that I was living two streets away from a wholesale dealer for these screws..... I paid 75€ for 100 screws of which I needed three. Hopefully this won´t happen to you. Better you contact walbasses first. good to see that your darling found her way back to you :-)

Have you tried to put your ear very near to the cab and locate the source of distortion? Maybe your problem can be cured with little mechanic work. I´ve expierience similar things in the post which turned out in one case that the speaker grille was resonating and in another case the reflex port was too small with sharp edges and hence created this type of "distortion" (think flute).

[quote name='joegarcia' post='1091049' date='Jan 16 2011, 03:05 AM']Also, does anyone know if the first SVT's had black or silver grilles? Mine has a black grille and it doesn't look right. Sure I've seen others from that period with black ones but could be wrong. Mate of mine has given me a 70's silver one to stick on but not sure which is right.[/quote] Mine is said to be from 70 and came with a silver grille. Silver fits to my cab dated the same year with original CTS/horseshoe speakers. This seems to be a good sign that silver cloth has been used at these models. I´ve seen black grilles from older than late 70s blackface series amps only. But I could be wrong with that.

For gigging I´m using a TC electronic SCF pedal, which I truly like. I have some more chorus pedals but they are sitting in the corner waiting for better days. Mostly I don´t like them because they cut off or muddy the lowend.

I went the other route from an SM400S (which I liked more than my previous SM400 non-S because of the additional treble control) to a Trace SMX600. If you are used to how a Trace cuts through in your band then you will be disappointed from the SWR. OTOS I´d alway prefer the SM400S for recording. It´s go the perfect tone to exactly fit in a mix, but on stage it doesn´t cut through well. The Trace in my book doesn´t sound nice but gives you accurate control, even when two distorted guitars try to destroy your ears.

[quote name='Shockwave' post='934790' date='Aug 24 2010, 02:10 PM']I think i now have the best rig. End thread. [/quote] Nope, here´s the end of thread: [attachment=57626:Ampeg.jpg] [attachment=57627:04082010118.jpg]