My guitar amp history is pretty abysmal. I started with a Peavey Bandit combo, which exploded one night while jamming. I heard a loud pop and the amp went dead. From there I went to a Crate GX-30M, which was my main amp for quite some time. Then I used, and still actually miss, a small red B.C. Rich combo amp that came in a pack with a Warlock I used to own. My first amp head was a used Crate G600XL, followed by my Line 6 Flextone HD. The Kalamazoo Model 1 was my first tube amp, and by far the oldest. I later bought my Fender Mustang Mini and used the hell out of it, until it died. Losing the Mustang Mini caused me to build Buddy, my Noisy Cricket. There are other amps that I'm forgetting or just not mentioning because they're more a novelty than a serious guitar amp, but you get the idea.
Almost all of my amps were solid state or modelling, which I'm ok with. Once I found my Kalamazoo Model 1, and restored her to working condition, I did start noticing how much I like tube amps. No, I'm not going to go on and on about how superior tubes are, but there does seem to be a difference in the feel. With my Kalamazoo Model 1, even though it's a just a small wattage combo from the late 60s, things feel different compared to my other amps. I can't explain it, I just know that whatever it is that I'm feeling is there with Kali and not with my other amps.
As I've been building pedals for the past five years I think it's time to take the leap and build something a bit more complicated. I've decided to build a pair of tube amps: the Ruby Tuby and a Fender 5F1 Champ clone. The Ruby Tuby is essentially the same as my Noisy Cricket, except it has a tube. While not a traditional tube amp, it does get in on a technicality. I wanted to build it to see if there was any hint of tube feel in the circuit. The build came together really quick, but I was extremely nervous I would ruin something when it came to testing. This requires 12v and my only 12v adapters are reverse polarity to the normal pedal PSU, so I had to wire the test box differently. Also my cheap and dirty wiring for the tube had me scared I would ruin my 12ax7s. Once it was all set it came to life. Oddly the ancient RCA 12ax7a I pulled from Kali is much louder than the modern JJ. Neither of them sound too pleasing, but it works. I'll go from here to make it sound better.
The 5F1 clone is going to be a bit more exciting, as I'm pretty sure the Kalamazoo Model 1 is really close to the 5F1 already. And since I love my Model 1, hopefully the 5F1 will give me a bit more of that, but with less concern about the amp's ever aging condition. I don't want to retire Kali, I just want something to take some of the work burden off of her. A nice little tweed amp cranked to the max, screaming with one of the overdrive pedals I built in front of it would be an amazing thing to me.
The 5F1 clone is going to take a bit of time as I thought I had the wire required for it, but it turns out I sorely underestimated what was required. Lesson learned! Another issue is the high voltage, that's going to take me a while to feel comfortable messing with. I also need both the power and output transformers. The more I think about it, the more I need for this build. All in due time, all in due time. In the meantime the Ruby Tuby is where I'll focus my time and see what I like and dislike about it. I know it needs a better tube, and I might experiment with which 12a_7 sounds best. I also think I might need to build an EQ of some sort for it. Maybe just a basic gyrator EQ with bass, mid and treble to give it a bit more tonal capability. For now it's functional and that's all I wanted from it.
Additional Information: While testing the Ruby Tuby I had a few issues that I didn't like. Using my guitar's volume seemed like it was a bias control, ala the Z'Vex SHO "Crackle Ok", which was not ok with me in this circumstance. Also the pickup selector switch made a loud pop while switching, which again was not ok. I like the glassy sparkle of the amp with no gain, and I like the crunch of the amp with the gain cranked all the way up, but the middle ground tones aren't really very useful to me. That was until I introduced the TS9 I repaired a while back. Not only did this pedal make the circuit sound amazing, (I'm assuming) the buffer also eliminates the crackle from the volume control and the popping of the selector switch. The EQing of the TS9 made this circuit much more interesting and useable. I'm thinking now instead of an EQ I'll build a[nother] TS9 circuit to make a channel two when put this amp in a head cabinet.
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