Jason Tong / Headfirst Amplification

la szum said:
Do you have to eat with these or something?

Sunglasses Nadia GIF by Redbrick
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It's a recipe!
 
DrewJD82 said:
@Burger, what were some of your biggest challenges learning how to work on amps? Going back to the early days before you had much experience. And I suppose a follow up would be, is there an order you would have learned things differently that you think would be beneficial to you now?
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Finding good info I suppose. The reality is that you only learn by doing, so you have to build amps and then learn how to make them work properly. Finding and fixing the isues one by one. Switching, pops, buzz, hiss, grounding issues the list is long. If you start building beyond getting a kit delivered in a box with a wiring diagram, pretty soon you'll hit all these things. Probabaly the best thing I did was to NOT post every issue I encountered in a Facebook group or forum and wait for the answer to be served up. Maybe stupid pride, but instead I perservered until I solved it and understood it myself. Then that knowledge is carried with you forever. When someone just serves an answer up for me, I rarely remember it. The challenge is still there, there are many things I want to push into that I haven't yet tackled!

I think the order was ok, I can't think of anything I'd change.
 
I always look at the PCB’s on your site and think “How awesome would it be to build your own multi channel Jose modded 800” but I can never find the courage to start. lol

How hard do you rate a complete build for the average dude with no background with this stuff?
 
Burger said:
Finding good info I suppose. The reality is that you only learn by doing, so you have to build amps and then learn how to make them work properly. Finding and fixing the isues one by one. Switching, pops, buzz, hiss, grounding issues the list is long. If you start building beyond getting a kit delivered in a box with a wiring diagram, pretty soon you'll hit all these things. Probabaly the best thing I did was to NOT post every issue I encountered in a Facebook group or forum and wait for the answer to be served up. Maybe stupid pride, but instead I perservered until I solved it and understood it myself. Then that knowledge is carried with you forever. When someone just serves an answer up for me, I rarely remember it. The challenge is still there, there are many things I want to push into that I haven't yet tackled!

I think the order was ok, I can't think of anything I'd change.
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Man, I can HEAVILY relate to that when it comes to mixing. I'm hellbent on ignoring so much information that's out there or doing anything to make things easier for myself for that exact reasoning.

My company is going to be putting me in school for electrical work, they had some different trades in mind but I pushed for this because I want to start getting my hands dirty on amps and pedals. Thanks for the reply and for doing the AMA!!!
 
Whizzinby said:
I always look at the PCB’s on your site and think “How awesome would it be to build your own multi channel Jose modded 800” but I can never find the courage to start. lol

How hard do you rate a complete build for the average dude with no background with this stuff?
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Plenty of guys have comeplted first builds with my PCBs. A 2204 is a pretty great place to start, get the stock amp working and then mod it. There is tons of help here at our DIY Group https://www.facebook.com/groups/moderntubeampevolvediy

Once you get the stock amp working, I'd help you mod it!
 
James Freeman said:
Great to have you here!

What's your take on higher (and lower) heater voltage above/below 6.3vAC, and its effect on tone and longevity of the tube?
@santiall chime in too.
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technically +/-10% is in the tubes design tolerance. That's more or less from 5.6V to 7V, higher than 7 you'll probably shorten the tube life, much higher you'll burn it but heaters themselves are quite forgiving in my experience.
Running it colder is probably safe from the tube point of view but their characteristics will change (the mentioned "brown sound"), if too low the tubes just won't work.
My personal experience with tube life is that people that worry about it, change tubes MUCH earlier than tube life starts to be an issue, people that don't worry don't change tubes ever :D
 
Hey Jason!

What are your top 5 recorded guitar tones? Maybe you could post them as youtube links?

and maybe as an aside - has there been any amps or guitar tones that you love the sound of from others, but you couldn’t really get on with the real amp?

Ed
 
Hey Jason

Awesome to see you here
Love your channel and loved your demos
One question , I know that you have an AX3
You did a vid voltage conversion mod of the XTC 101b on the channel and it sounded great , My question is with all your knowledge of the circuits and probably all the advanced settings in the Axe
Is there a set of tweaks to the current 20th model you could recommend to get closer or match the 101b?
 
nicolasrivera said:
@Burger Hey Jason! Question, will there be a video showing the mods done to the Suhr SL amp?

Thanks.
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Hey Nicolas, I saw your thread over on TGP - you did the mods with some input from John himself?

I didn’t film the after because I didn’t want to cause any stir with Suhr about open sourcing the mods, even though they are widely known….with the exception of the master volume.
 

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GTR37 said:
Hey Jason

Awesome to see you here
Love your channel and loved your demos
One question , I know that you have an AX3
You did a vid voltage conversion mod of the XTC 101b on the channel and it sounded great , My question is with all your knowledge of the circuits and probably all the advanced settings in the Axe
Is there a set of tweaks to the current 20th model you could recommend to get closer or match the 101b?
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Hey, I’m not sure to be honest. I’ve not really gone down the axe3 parameter rabbit hole too deeply, I mainly use the device for pre and post fx with an actual outboard tube amp.
 
MirrorProfiles said:
Hey Jason!

What are your top 5 recorded guitar tones? Maybe you could post them as youtube links?

and maybe as an aside - has there been any amps or guitar tones that you love the sound of from others, but you couldn’t really get on with the real amp?

Ed
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Hey Ed,

Every Bogner amp I’ve ever played myself. Want to love them, do love the brand and everything that they’ve done for the boutique amp industry….but I can’t bond with the amps in real life.

Top 5 tones…gee that’s hard and would change from day to day. Here are some classics,

Anything early EVH, VHII a standout


Anything from early days Malcolm, I'm all about Malcolm. His brother is ok too, but Mal was the MVP in AC/DC imho.


Always loved the tones on this album, incredible.


Anything that Adam has laid down sits in my head as references tones


Sick tones from Dave Leslie on their debut


Would be a different list on any given day, and honestly probably more about the overall playing and song rather than just pure tone!!
 
Burger said:
Hey Ed,

Every Bogner amp I’ve ever played myself. Want to love them, do love the brand and everything that they’ve done for the boutique amp industry….but I can’t bond with the amps in real life.

Top 5 tones…gee that’s hard and would change from day to day. Here are some classics,

Anything early EVH, VHII a standout


Anything from early days Malcolm, I'm all about Malcolm. His brother is ok too, but Mal was the MVP in AC/DC imho.


Always loved the tones on this album, incredible.


Anything that Adam has laid down sits in my head as references tones


Sick tones from Dave Leslie on their debut


Would be a different list on any given day, and honestly probably more about the overall playing and song rather than just pure tone!!
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Love that these are some deeper cuts. They're a different generation to me, and (criminal as it sounds) AC/DC and Van Halen's music doesn't really mean much to me. I have to say though, that I love these tones, and probably more than the more famous songs I associate with these bands. Its awesome to be able to hear how these tones will have influenced how you fine tune an amp and what you're looking to achieve.

The Bogner thing is something I think I can relate to too, although I do love the Uberschall (maybe because its a bit more of its own thing). I feel similarly with Diezels, where I want to love them, and love some tones others get with them but I just cant get it happening.

Great post man, thanks!
 
@Burger so cool to see you on the forum! Love your channel! I hope one day I'll own an Alta :D

Some time ago you did a vid on loadboxes; any plans to do a Headfirst Reactive Load ?
 
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