Dr Z Carmen Ghia

[straycat]

Offered one in a trade any one have one?
18 watt 2X10 combo.Blonde tolex/salt and pepper grill.
The guy wants my Sovtek Mig 60 head even trade.
What do you think? should I?

[straycat]

Brought it home today extremely sweet sounding amp. Smooth buttery tone, nice break up too. 2X10's do a great job nice and tight sounding.
A few other trinkets from today's trade deals.

[jacksonaxes]

Love the Japanese Strat.

[VitaminG]

very nice, man. I've only heard good things about Dr Z amps

[Cygnus X1]

Ya done goot!



Dr. Z....to me, is like Matchless Spitfire in tone.
Nice, clear tone (bell like) but just not my style on the breakup.
That being said, the Spitfire is my favorite circuit when
playing around with EL84 designs.

[straycat]

The Z is pretty good not my real flavor of amp but its nice to have an 18 watt combo.
Cyg it has a 4 and 8 ohm speaker input would it be OK to run the internal speakers on 4 ohm? I want to see if there is much difference.
I'm sure its OK why would it be there.
Oh and how about tying a 4X12 with it? most of my cabs are 16 ohm.

[Hellbat]

Well, when an amp only has 2 knobs on it, you know if you can dial in a tone or not in about 14 seconds.

[roodyrocker]

Congrats, I have a Dr Z Maz 18 with reverb. My combo is the same color as your Carmen Ghia. They're nice amps and although I don't have a Carmen Ghia I'm sure resale on it is better than a Sovtek. My Maz Jr, as they're called, is a bit different than my usual high gain amps. It has nice cleans and with pedals can get some good distortion tones although different than my usual Marshall, Soldano, Bogner, etc...

[straycat]

The Weber attenuator on the DrZ works really well you can crank the amp harder and the over drive tone is nice.
The amp does not like the Alpha dog much but my OCD or BB pre amp pedals work just fine.
It is a great amp but very different than what I am used to.
I can flip it for more than the Sovtek if I choose to do that, so not a bad deal for me and the guy got something he wanted so a good deal for both parties.

[jgcable]

Ya done goot!



Dr. Z....to me, is like Matchless Spitfire in tone.
Nice, clear tone (bell like) but just not my style on the breakup.
That being said, the Spitfire is my favorite circuit when
playing around with EL84 designs.

There you go.. you had to mention the Spitfire again!!

[Cygnus X1]

The Z is pretty good not my real flavor of amp but its nice to have an 18 watt combo.
Cyg it has a 4 and 8 ohm speaker input would it be OK to run the internal speakers on 4 ohm? I want to see if there is much difference.
I'm sure its OK why would it be there.
Oh and how about tying a 4X12 with it? most of my cabs are 16 ohm.

Stay within spec.
A lot of people argue whether mismatches are safe or not.
I prefer to stay out of the argument and just stay within spec.
The 4 ohm is there for an external cab IIRC.

There you go.. you had to mention the Spitfire again!!

I have a Spitfire of mine that I fit in a Magnavox 1x12" console.
If we get our ducks in a row I could adapt that into a head cab for you.
Or we could work on buying an actual Spitfire cab from Mojotone (or Sourmash)
and then fitting that Spitfire into it.
Speaker choice is key with the Spitfire builds.
I'd say same with the Ghia.

Either way...both are badass amps.
Just not great for tight heavy metal style distortion.

[jgcable]

Stay within spec.
A lot of people argue whether mismatches are safe or not.
I prefer to stay out of the argument and just stay within spec.
The 4 ohm is there for an external cab IIRC.



I have a Spitfire of mine that I fit in a Magnavox 1x12" console.
If we get our ducks in a row I could adapt that into a head cab for you.
Or we could work on buying an actual Spitfire cab from Mojotone (or Sourmash)
and then fitting that Spitfire into it.
Speaker choice is key with the Spitfire builds.
I'd say same with the Ghia.

Either way...both are badass amps.
Just not great for tight heavy metal style distortion.

I hear you Kevin, The Spitfire would be for my living room. Been gassing for that amp since 1992.

[lefty]

Offered one in a trade any one have one?
18 watt 2X10 combo.Blonde tolex/salt and pepper grill.
The guy wants my Sovtek Mig 60 head even trade.
What do you think? should I?

I think you did great! I've got a Dr. Z Monza. Not typical for me as I like
high gain amps, but the sound of the Monza is something else. It's too freakin'
loud to use without an attenuator, but I see you've got that covered! I run the
Monza clean and use Wampler Pinnacle to slam the input. Instant Brown Sound!
Dr. z amps are built like tanks...

[straycat]

I'm assuming you unplug the internal speakers and plug the 16 ohm 4X12 in the 4 ohm jack.
I had a BBE AM 64 od pedal laying around and tried it and wow sounds nice.I never cared for the AM 64 on any of my other amps.

[Cygnus X1]

16 into a 4?

???

NO!

You might be able to rewire the cab to four ohms total.
I'd use it as the combo it's designed for.
What kind of speakers are in it now?