New Amp Day

[KuruPrionz]

Any other thrift store buzzards here?

 

Today I was shopping at Value Village and there was a Roland Cube 40gx amp that looked almost new. I'd call it near mint. Clean and pretty, no signs of wear or use.

Price tag said $49.95. I've shopped there enough to have a bonus 20% discount. I had a coupon for 20% off too. Didn't need it, got the amp for $39.95 and tax.

 

Not only does everything work with zero issues, it sounds really good too. The manual shows that it uses either the same GA-FC footswitch that I have for my Boss Katana amp, but also can do channel switching with the Boss FS-5U footswitch. Somehow, I have two of those.

 

I've been wanting to put together a small "stereo" rig and now I have the stuff to easily do that. Despite the TC Electronics hate thread, I have a Flashback X4 and so far it's been a great pedal. It does left and right outputs and I have used a Tone Print to add a lush chorus and saved a milder chorus and a long delay that I dialed in myself.

 

So, one lead to the Cube and one to my Peavey Transtube 258 EFX. One pedal, two compact foot switches.

Up to 3 modulation effects, 3 tap tempo delay effects, 2 reverbs and a great variety of clean, dirty and blended tones would all be on tap.

Something to mess around with anyway. Someday I may just show up at a gig and get all freaky!

[Winston Psmith]

Great find! Let us know how the dual-Amp rig works out.

 

Pawn shops and yard sales have been good to me, but I also find some really stupid prices on used gear at the local Guitar Centers. Local thrift stores tend to have real junk, except for the occasional surprise Synth.

 

Must be Amp week, I just grabbed a nice Laney LX65R for $120, myself. Enjoy!

[desertbluesman]

@KuruPrionz Great find and fabulous price, good luck with the new gear.

[Larryz]

@ Kuru and Winston, Congrats on the amp finds and savings!

[Scott Fraser]

I once found a mint condition Neumann KM84 (price at that time around $750) in a pawn shop for $90, which they immediately knocked down to $75 when I expressed interest. This was the start of a collection of now around 2 dozen Neumann mics. I have never since (over 40 years) found what I consider a decent price on any music gear in any pawn shop.

 

[KuruPrionz]

Thanks all and congrats Winston on your Laney. I saw one recently but it was trashed, filthy, convered in stickers, missing knobs and beat up. Probably sounded good but I ran away!!

 

Plugged in my Katana foot switch today and dialed in a clean tone, a lead tone using a Deluxe and a fair amount of gain, and the one preset channel is now a mildly dirty tone based on a Deluxe with a bit of chorus.

 

Taking it to the gig tonight - shakedown cruise. Have my trusty Tech 21 Tri-AC and a direct box in the event there is a problem. I doubt there will be, I've had consistently great results with Roland and Boss regarding reliabitlity.

 

Cheers, Kuru

[Dannyalcatraz]

The only time I ever found a good amp in a pawn shop or the like, it was an old Ampeg Bass amp with a cab taller than I am.

 

It was in good condition, and the price was ridiculously low. But I had no place to put it in my living area, and no way to get it home even if I did! (Plus, at the time, I didn"t even have a bass, but that"s not a deal breaker...)

[KuruPrionz]

I gigged it tonight, it sounded great mic'ed up.

The three channel idea is cool but not as versatile as it sounds. It's fine for gigging in this situation though.

According to the manual, I can switch any selected effect, delay or reverb off but I then must turn that knob to 0 and reset it before I can turn it off again.

 

That is an absurd idea for gigging, there simply isn't enough memory to do what needs done. I need a clean and a lead and I like a clean with modulation. This provides those. I was pretty used to turning the delay up and tapping in the tempo at the amp with the Peavey, we don't need that sound often. I can do it on the Cube too, not a problem.

 

So, in conjunction with another amp it would have a purpose.

The chorus in the Peavey amp is far lusher and not nasal sounding like the Cube chorus. The Cube has a good tremolo and an Octaver that might be nice. The "plate" reverb in the Cube is good.

Overall I like the tones I get from both amps and they are different which is what I want.

 

In one of my scenarios I could have up to 3 tap tempo delays but how often do you really nead that? Most of the time, one is plenty in a two guitar band.

 

The tones are nice, the cabinet is bigger than the Peavey and the open area on the back is smaller so it has a nice full bass response.

The distortiion channels are better matched to the clean, important with only one EQ.

 

I will proceed to experiement with the two amps together.

 

I have a Boss Katana 100 combo and a Peavey Vypyr VIP 3 if I decide I can deal with a much larger space occupation for the floorboards and a larger overall rig. The Katana would need to be on the top since the knobs face upwards although both of those amps have enough memory to not need to touch the knobs at all. The direct out on the Katana is excellent as well so that is easier.

 

Still - 2 1-12 combos is a bit much, even though I run the Katana at 1/2 watt and the Vypyr at 1 watt.

 

I am efficient (means lazy!) so I'll see what I can get out of the little amps first.

[p90jr]

score!

[p90jr]

I once found a mint condition Neumann KM84 (price at that time around $750) in a pawn shop for $90, which they immediately knocked down to $75 when I expressed interest. This was the start of a collection of now around 2 dozen Neumann mics. I have never since (over 40 years) found what I consider a decent price on any music gear in any pawn shop.

 

There were tons of great deals in pawn shops here when I was a kid with no money... then the internet came around... if anything, they seem to mistake cheap things for expensive things. But, anyway, they have been wined and dined by people who own stores or flip things for a living so anything good is picked off... I was killing time and looking at guitars - the usual Squiers and Epiphones - at one and a salesman said "we just had a Les Paul Custom and a cool old Telecaster cleared the other day but there's a guy in Texas the owner of the shop gives first crack at the good stuff and he bought them both." Gee, thanks.

 

 

 

 

 

[KuruPrionz]

I once found a mint condition Neumann KM84 (price at that time around $750) in a pawn shop for $90, which they immediately knocked down to $75 when I expressed interest. This was the start of a collection of now around 2 dozen Neumann mics. I have never since (over 40 years) found what I consider a decent price on any music gear in any pawn shop.

 

There were tons of great deals in pawn shops here when I was a kid with no money... then the internet came around... if anything, they seem to mistake cheap things for expensive things. But, anyway, they have been wined and dined by people who own stores or flip things for a living so anything good is picked off... I was killing time and looking at guitars - the usual Squiers and Epiphones - at one and a salesman said "we just had a Les Paul Custom and a cool old Telecaster cleared the other day but there's a guy in Texas the owner of the shop gives first crack at the good stuff and he bought them both." Gee, thanks.

One of our local pawnshops has a 50% off all guitars and amps sale every year to clear things out. This year I bought a dusty but otherwise newish Peavey Envoy for $50, the latest Chinese version with the third iteration of Transtube. Great sounding amp, great bang for the buck. In the process of stuffing a Peavey Scorpion 12" speaker into it, then it will be a little monster.

 

They had a black Gibson Les Paul Custom Lite in the shop last year, wanted $1,250 for it which is reasonable but not a steal. I let somebody else get it but at least it was a pretty cool guitar.

[Bluesape]

Awesome price on a great amp! My 30x is my rescue amp for when the PTP ones go down, but I can happily play gigs with it. Fully confident it will outlive me and its next few owners. Congrats!