NAD: Peavey 3120

Dave Sloven

Dave Sloven

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I bought this yesterday and gave it a clean but it was too late to fire it up.

It took me a while to get to it today but around dinner time I finally plugged in a footswitch and a guitar and played it for twenty minutes

Holy :poo: this amp has some gain!

I am going to have to install a lower output input tube and possibly phase inverter to get a decent clean out of this amp. I'm just getting too much gain into the front and that's without even using one of my higher output guitars. I used the Impulse-loaded Schecter, which is pretty mild compared to some others and still it was coming in too hot. So I will install a 12AT7 or 5751 tube in the input and see how that goes. It's kind of difficult to get at the preamp valves though due to the design of the front of the amp, which makes it very difficult to do without removing the chassis.

Other than the issues with the passive clean channel the two active gain channels sound massive. The rhythm channel sounds like the Ultra channel on my JSX (the Ultra channel on the JSX was based on the Crunch channel on the Triple XXX, so that makes sense) and the lead channel has at least as much gain as my 6534+

On the damping control on the back I definitely prefer the mid position

I am still experimenting with volume levels, master volume, and the send and return effects levels.

This amp works with the MS-3 using the cables I made for the JSX.

An awesome buy at $700 AUD

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Contrary to this bloke, I preferred it on the mid damping setting, rather than loose. I didn't like the tight setting at all, just too honky

 
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I've ordered the following JJ tubes to install:

V1: 5751
V4: ECC81 (balanced)
V5-V8: KT77

I already have a pair of new balanced JJ ECC83S tubes left over from the JSX retube, I'll get Frank to put those in V2 & V3.

Not sure when I will get around to having these installed, but I wanted to have them on hand here just in case. I suspect I will get a bit more out of these tubes yet but I will eventually take it to FM Audio for a full service. Using the lower gain tubes in V1 and V4 was recommended by a few people, and I seem to be finding the gain to be a bit much for the clean channel, so it seems worth following that advice.

As far as the power tubes go, I wanted something a bit different from the 6L6GC-STR quad in the JSX and the EL34B-STR quad in the 6534+ ... hopefully this has the aggression of the latter on the gain channels combined with the smoothness of the clean on the former ... that's the hype anyway ... I expect it to be more of a compromise between the two, but the description is appealing and the videos I've heard of Triple XXX and JSX amps with KT77s have appealed to me.
 
Adjusting the master volume versus channel volumes I was able to get a better clean sound but it made the gain sounds more fizzy. I hope the solution is just to reduce the gain at V1 (input) and V4 (phase inverter), allowing me to run the channel volumes higher on the gain channels versus the master volume while allowing me to still get a good clean sound
 
I will also try copying this guy's settings, not sure if I will be able to get a good clean tone from there though. This dude doesn't seem to worried about cleans. I also tend to think he likes more bass than I would.

 
Dave Sloven said:
Adjusting the master volume versus channel volumes I was able to get a better clean sound but it made the gain sounds more fizzy. I hope the solution is just to reduce the gain at V1 (input) and V4 (phase inverter), allowing me to run the channel volumes higher on the gain channels versus the master volume while allowing me to still get a good clean sound
Click to expand...

Need to look at the schematic. Usually just changing the tube is really not enough to get it cleaned up...
It's still going to be gritty instead of really clean.
 
Dave Sloven said:
This guy did a couple of comparison videos.



They also compared the Dual Recto to a JSX

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Every time a Rec passes through or use 1 in a studio..always end up on Peavey then marshall with it. Kinda blown away on the 5150 & sheffields..not doing the brootz but it jumped right in there in the hard rock. I liked the 5150 3 but ended up thinking it was super poished..sorta like the friedmans i tried. great on their own but put in the mix..just favored the brash older circuits
 
I got our lead guitarist Josh to use it at band practice today while I played my JSX as per usual. The amps blended very well together, and suited the differences in roles between Josh and I in that he needs a more aggressive sounding amp.

I will have to play it through my PPC412 like before to really be able to tell the difference that the valve change and bias have made.

Frank said that all of the pots were loose inside and had to be tightened, and he also flushed the pots to get rid of the crackling when you turn them

Valves ended up being the following:

V1: JJ 5751
V2: JJ EEC83S
V3: JJ EEC93S
V4: Sovtek 12AX7 LPS
V5-V8: JJ KT 77

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I was going to recommend the Sovtek LPS for your phase inverter, but I see you ended up there anyway. The JJ ECC803 is another I would recommend in the PI for similar results. Balanced of coarse. On some amps a Tung Sol 12AX7 in V1 will do the trick for improvement in one's clean tone. I like the JJ KT77s also. I have a pair in a 50watt Epiphone SoCal.
 
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