Sound City amp

[markD]

dude, i am SOOOOOOOO jealous!!!!!!!!!! hahahaha, that is a killer rig!

[straycat]

Got a good going over by Brad my amp guy and now its back to stock condition.
New filter caps,replaced a few other components that had gone below spec.Fixed a lot of previous mods that weren't done right that were causing some noise issues.
One 12AX7 swapped to a 12AT7 (his recommendation).
Active tone circuit works like it should now.
90% of the hiss and noise are gone now but still bit of noise which is normal from what I have read.A good noise gate should eliminate all of it.
Glad to have it back and spend some time with it.
One good clean sounding vintage amp and it loves any kind of OD pedal.
Any opinions on a good noise gate let me know.

[Hellbat]

One of the best players I knew when I was a teenager had a Hiwatt 100 watt head and used a Boss SD-1 and he had just killer tone. They are awesome amps for sure, especially if you like to get your dirt from stompboxes.

[straycat]

I have a BB/MB pre-amp,Keely modded DS-1 and OCD on the pedal board right now so have some drive choices.
BBE sonic stomp and EH memory boy and this amp sounds great with all of them.
This amp and the Cyg radio amp are the only amps I have had that like all pedals so far.

[roodyrocker]

I've moved away from any noise gates for the most part. I do still own my favorite gate though, the older Hush The Pedal. Unlike the new ones these older units are all metal and have two channels. I typically used to set one channel with a higher threshold than the other. That way if I ran a multi channel amp I could switch to the second channel if I was using a lower gain setting thereby killing the noise but not cutting off my notes/sustain. If I was on a high gain channel I switched the Hush to the other channel to match. The last few years though I have not had much noise issues so I did away with the noise gate. I use good cables to/from the amp, interconnects between pedals, an ESP AC cord, and a Furman Power Factor Pro into which both the amp and pedalboard get plugged into. When I say no noise issues I don't mean bedroom levels. I'm talking about gigging out with amps such as Bogner Uberschall, Soldano SLO, Bad Cat Hot Cat 30, and of course the non master volume Marshall RR amp

[straycat]

I have a spare power conditioner (rack mount) I could run the amp and pedal board thru that and see if it helps.
Good idea roody.

[roodyrocker]

Running both the amp and pedalboard through the same conditioner does eliminate some noise. If you go into different outlets sometimes you get hum. Not all Furman conditioners are the same though, the lower end stuff is nothing more than a rack mounted power strip. Still, you are better off plugging your power to the amp and pedalboard from the same source. Cables make a difference too. My pedals are connected using George L's and the cables to and from the amp, guitar, etc... are Zaolla although other high end brands will work too. The cheap generic music store guitar cables tend to be noisier and of course fail more often. Some people buy good Neutrik, G and H, what have you ends, then solder their own cables which works too. Another factor is if you're playing with neon or fluorescent lighting in the room that gives you buzzing too.
Good luck with the Sound City amp, a friend of mine just got done re-tubing and cleaning up one for a customer. He said it sounded fantastic! this one was around a 1968 build I believe and still had the original tubes in it when it came in to his shop!

[jgcable]

Got a good going over by Brad my amp guy and now its back to stock condition.
New filter caps,replaced a few other components that had gone below spec.Fixed a lot of previous mods that weren't done right that were causing some noise issues.
One 12AX7 swapped to a 12AT7 (his recommendation).
Active tone circuit works like it should now.
90% of the hiss and noise are gone now but still bit of noise which is normal from what I have read.A good noise gate should eliminate all of it.
Glad to have it back and spend some time with it.
One good clean sounding vintage amp and it loves any kind of OD pedal.
Any opinions on a good noise gate let me know.

Mine was hissy too. I used a stock NS2 and it worked great.

[straycat]

Thanks jg.

[straycat]

The Furman did take some of it out thanks for the tip.
I do need a noise gate anyway so will probably get one soon.
I do have an Rocktron OD rack unit that has the hush built in so not sure if could run my pedal board into that then into the front of the amp. Most of my amps have an FX loop but this one does not so not sure if this would work.

[roodyrocker]

I have not owned one of those preamp units but my guess is you'll run into mismatched levels if the pedalboard is instrument level and the rack one is line level. Cool amp you got there regardless

[straycat]

There is a level control on the rack unit but maybe I need to do some research I would hate to mess something up.