Transformers are the most expensive parts of your amp. When you are first starting to build you may be lured into buying the cheapest thing you can find. I know I did.

Everything starts adding up and you want to hurry up and get it going. Patience is a virtue! To really get the tone your looking for, try not to skimp on your transformers. Just because the specs seem to match, doesn’t mean it will give you best tone possible.

A bigger transformer will give you a much better tone. Try to get one that is built specific to your needs. Universal transformers are cool, but unless you are going to change tube types you really want one  for your specific needs.

Take a single 6v6. You want a 5k primary. Using a transformer with multiple taps up 10k means you are not going to use all of the windings in the coil. Then if you have 4,8,16 ohm secondary taps and you are using a 4 ohm speaker, you are losing a lot of your secondary coil.

You will get a much bigger tone with better signal transfer if you are using the whole coil. If you have to get a universal transformer, try to get one that uses as much of the windings as possible  for your particular needs.  You can also go to a replacement transformer for like a Fender that uses the same tube type going to the same speaker impedance. These can be had for about the same price, but are made for a specific primary and secondary impedance.

It will be worth the effort and cost. So always pick your speaker and your output tube(s) before you spec out your transformer.

Searching for inspiration from your amp can really get addictive . It can really cost you when your going through the pedal phase where you feel the right combination of pedals is going to get it for you.  I went through that and don’t even know how many I gave away because they just weren’t cutting it.

Then, I realized after playing on a couple of  really great sounding amps that I had been going in the wrong direction. Sure, I still have a few pedals I like, analog delay , TS808 Tube screamer for that great blues and classic rock growl, and a Big Muff for sustain when I really get carried away. But I had missed the point of the quality of the amp sound itself.

There are some basics that may make you want to just play through your amp. Building on a budget I was using $5 speakers that though they had the right impedance for the output transformer just had no real tone. They were mostly old stereo speakers and a few really cheap amp speakers.

What really made this real for me was when I ordered a Weber Signature speaker directly from Weber. It was a 10 inch seamed cone Alnico magnet speaker and the speaker was only $40.00 before shipping($14). They are made in the US and are cheaper than the Chinese equivalent. You have to go to a ceramic speaker to get close. Ted Weber died last year and I feel his passing leaves an empty spot.

After all the tweaking on the amps circuit, the speaker made all the difference in the world. As a matter of fact, I ended up having to change the circuit and then amp was right on time. So if your amp ain’t cutting it, and you have fresh tubes and caps, look real hard at the speaker.  A good speaker can make a cheap amp sound way better. It’s what moves the air!

Also, don’t get too hooked on a bigger size. A 10 inch has a faster response than a 12 inch, and a 12 inch is more susceptible to cone cry, where you get a nagging buzz when your really driving it hard.

Component wise, another big difference can be made with your tube selection. There are a number(though relatively small) of different makers. Beware of some that will try to make you believe they have their own brand when in all actuality it is just a labeling thing.

Back in the day, tube makers would put the middle mans name on the tubes they ordered. So sellers were actually selling the same tubes and marking their price up according to customer loyalty. I saw not too long ago a 6V6 that the seller was trying to sell for $35 dollars. A new tube, in the picture you can’t see any markings. In the description they said it was made in the old Tesla plant in Slovakia.

Well, thats JJ tubes. They are using the old Tesla equipment to produce really great tubes(My favorite). I believe they are comparable to NOS which are really expensive. You can get them on line at Antique Electronic supply and others for like $13.95.!! This can really be irritating when your doing your hobby on a budget, you want the best tone you can get, and your significant other is wearing you out about the expense. You kinda feel violated!!

These are two really big tone shaping concerns. There are a lot of others, like the power and output transformers. Output transformers need to be matched well for the output tube and speaker . The power transformer has to be able to provide the current requirements for the circuit. So add up the plate voltages and heater elements and over design it a little. This is a work in progress and I am working on some tables for the mathematically challenged.  So check back often. And please, any and all input is greatly appreciated. My goal is to make a central information source for builders that want to try and build in an intuitive fashion. This should be a sharing environment.

Jack

Having made several guitars, my interest in tone chasing eventually took me to the point that I wanted to craft the second important part of guitar tone. The amplifier. Playing guitar is also playing the amp.

I really wanted a small low volume amp for practice. It also needed to be all tubes and wired point to point for ease of tweaking and repair. I really wanted to hear the tubes and not a lot of solid state circuitry.

After a lot of reading I was still not getting some of the principals and math. Not to be discouraged, I decided to copy a schematic and hope for the best. I was able to get a couple of used transformers that would work and scraped for the rest of the parts. I figured if I could get the cost down I could afford to burn some stuff up in the learning process.

I finally got down to two circuits that I think are a great start for someone interested in teaching themselves amp building. One was a Fender Champ and the other is a Gibson GA5. Both have a lot of simularities  and are really simple. I decided to use a solid state rectifier in place of tube rectification because it was cheaper and I didn’t have the winding for heater voltage on the transformer I had.

I will have more blogs on my journey, but the amp did work, after a lot of head scratching. It was the ugliest soldering job you ever saw, but it got me hooked. Several amps down the road the first will always be remembered as a great adventured. The hardest part was getting started.

More to follow Jack

When I first got into building guitars, I read a lot of books and articles on the Internet to get an idea of what I was getting onto. Some of the articles I read seemed to me to be disparaging of the true craftsman. I remember reading one author saying that the only legitimate way to cut fret slots was to use a CAD operated machine and then went on to ridicule people that made their own homespun process. Apparently this “Engineer” feels all of the instruments made before the advent of the personal computer was a piece of junk. This kinda irritated me.

You don’t have to go buy ten thousand dollars worth of equipment to make $3,000 instruments. That guy wasn’t a Luthier. While it is great to have tools made for the particular part of the process you are in, ingenuity is  the most important tool that you must have. So, Like Son House said, Don’t You Mind People Grinning In Your Face.

So this will be a developing subject and any ideas by others are greatly appreciated.

My first guitar was made with general carpentry tools, the ones I had.

I used a skill saw, hand drills, a small belt sander, a sawsall etc.. To get the neck straight I got a flat piece of 5/8’s plywood and bolted to a flat mechanics table I had, I glued sand paper on it with spray on contact cement. The area was longer than the neck. This is a great tool for straighting, You just put your neck on it and start sanding.Don’t let it rock and it has to get  flat. You can use it to get the fret board flat or any other part. I have some radius sanders now, but on the first one I roughed in the radius after the board was glued on the neck with the belt sander and with a little patience I used the table to get it true. You have to be careful with the belt sander because it is really agressive. The radius was eyeballed to what I wanted to feel.

I used the belt sander as a shaping tool for the body and neck. I also used an old wood rasp that I had and some flat steel as a scraper. If you find a flat piece of steel with a real square edge, no burs, you can take off alot of material and get a better finish then sandpaper and much faster.

More coming soon, so check back often. I will also get some pictures and videos also.

Happy Building

Building guitars can become an expensive endeavour. Tools, parts and shipping can add up pretty fast. I like to use as many local materials that I can find.

Bone nut blanks are kinda pricey for what they really are. If your building your dream guitar, your not to going to want to put a plastic nut on it. Bone transfers vibrations alot better.  Even if your changing a plastic nut on a cheap guitar, why not go ahead and up grade it.

A good thick steak bone works great. You will want to let it dry outside for a season. I have used deer bone also, I will stick a good leg bone in an ant bed and let the ants clean it up for me. Then I put it on the roof of my little shop and forget it for awhile. Once  it is ready, I rough cut it with a small band saw and flip my belt sander upside down and shape my blank. Files take it the rest of the way. Once you have shaped and polished it , you’ll wonder why you ever paid anything plus shipping.

I have also used deer horn which I have a steady supply of here and have recently started using a horn off a cow skull I have had on the side of the house for several years.  I should get a whole bunch then from one horn. They are also really cool because instead of being white, they are black once you cut into them. I used one on a resonator a customer brought me. He had a big plastic nut on it and was wanting to improve the tone and set up. It looked much better than white, improved the tone, and shined up to almost look like black marble.

I plan to use this horn for alot of future projects. It just seems satisfying to use materials that are found. So keep an eye out, there are treasures every where.

Handmade custom guitars lets you get an instrument that is designed with your hands and tone in mind, instead of  something engineered for a generic player.

Though I can’t deny that there is a place for an inexpensive guitar that you purchase from a large center, it allows a starting point for a beginner that really doesn’t know if they will stick to the time consuming effort of learning to play. There are alot of young guys thinking it is a great way to get a girl friend

For the people that stick with it though, once you’ve learned three cords and some scales, you begin to start chasing tone and inspiration. Handmades allow you to sculpt to your individual specifications instead of deciding on which compromises you are going to make by purchasing a production instrument.

Face it, you buy a $300 instrument made in Asia, the center probably marked it up 2 or 3 times, the production company made a profit over the materials and then there’s shipping and engineering. There is a good probability that it wasn’t even setup in a traditional sense. They used the cheapest materials on the planet. Take it back to center and try to get them to buy it back. They will tell you at purchase they will, but you will be surprised, if you are not buying another one you won’t get but a tiny fraction of the price back if anything at all. Even if it is in an unplayed condition, which is doubtful because it was probably played with by a stream of  13 year olds that don’t understand the concept of a standby switch on an tube amp.

They are good as a starting point, but a custom can be like a fitted suit, anything off the shelf doesn’t quite fit.

Handmades can increase in value. But if you spec it out right, you won’t be trying to get rid of it. Your guitar should inspire you to play.