1x12 combo options

rsvmark · August 2023

I am looking for suggestions for a 1x12 combo.

I run a wet dry rig with a TR custom v3 head and a 2x12 as the wet amp. Currently I run a Marshall Jtm60 head and a Marshall 4x10 cab as the dry. I usually have about 75% wet and about 25% dry just to give it that immediacy. Love the sound, that’s not the issue. I am bloody fed up with the volume of kit so I am looking to downsize the Marshall to a combo 1x12 of some description.

I do like a vox sound so was erring towards a new Bad cat black cat but was a bit alarmed around the reports of transformers blowing in the initial batches. Not ruling it out though but what other options are worth looking at? I want to preserve clean headroom- the songs require clean cleans so I because I get dirt off pedals, I think that rules out some gear as it needs to complement the TR. so it needs to be loud and avoid break up when cranked.

Gonna sell the Marshalls but budget say £2k tops. So I found a second hand /13 for c£1800 or maybe some sh boutiquey amps…. Or maybe new bad cats or similar. What suggestions might you have and why?

Moe_Zambeek · August 2023

Bad cat is not going to be clean-clean when cranked, I wouldn’t say. Matchless-Vox cleans are always a bit hairy I think. I guess it depends what cranked means?

Maybe solid state is the way to go? Jazz Chorus / JC40?

Failing that, how about a TR combo of some sort? Studio sig? Compact and clean as well as loudish. The ultimate answer would be a twin but they’re big and heavy so fail on your physical downsizing requirement.

ICBM · August 2023

Peavey Transtube Bandit.

Small, light, loud, clean, sounds great, totally reliable and within your budget.

… by about £1400.

ditchboy · August 2023

Deluxe Reverb. Cos I’m selling one in the classifieds.

rsvmark · August 2023

Thanks for the suggestions so far. @Moe_Zambeek cranked means robust gig levels. We mic everything up and I set the TR level first. Then I slowly increase the Marshall so it’s perceptible as the second amp and it’s ‘there’. A touch of hair in the dry won’t faze me because the TR is doing the heavy lifting.

jhumber · August 2023

1x12 combo with clean headroom to act as a pedal platform? Hope it’s ok to point at the Carr Rambler I have for sale in the classifieds (well under your budget too). In terms of clean tone it’s the best I’ve had.

ChrisCox1994 · August 2023

Badcat cub 15 has an amazing amount of clean headroom considering the stated wattage with the master volume at around 3 o'clock (it overdrives the power amp separate from the preamp beyond there) but it's better as a slightly hairy edge of breakup pedal platform than a crystal clean thing

Gassage · August 2023

If you want to go Voxy, a Matchless is...well Matchless.

Otherwise, the J40 is incredible- you're welcome to try mine.

HoraceB · August 2023

I'd certainly be wary of the Bad Cats, although they sound fantastic unfortunately in the last six weeks I've had two Black Cats, after the second one died I went for a Hot Cat which was also faulty and am currently waiting for a replacement (hopefully with the initial shipment of faulty transformers and wrong component issues sorted) for that from the States! The brief time I had with one of the Black Cats (the second one didn't last two days) I think the head room would be an issue for you.

CarpeDiem · August 2023

I agree with @ChrisCox1994 that a Bad Cat Cub 3 has an amazing amount of clean headroom.

rsvmark · August 2023

So thanks all. We have our contenders:
/13 SJT 10/20
Badcat….
Matchless….
LazyJ @gassage you are a bad man
Carr
Deluxe reverb
Peavey

And having spent too much time today on the internet, Hamstead Artist RT60….

guitargeek62 · August 2023

Don’t forget Morgan too, they’re rather lovely.

Also, how about the Victory Copper series? They’re meant to be decent, though I’ve not tried one yet

Teyeplayer · August 2023

Orange tremlord does exactly what you describe.

p90fool · August 2023

ICBM said:

Peavey Transtube Bandit.

Small, light, loud, clean, sounds great, totally reliable and within your budget.

… by about £1400.

£1300 as you'll need a decent Celestion in there, but apart from that I totally agree.

I know we both bang on about Bandits a bit and I still love my Fender and Marshall valve amps, but as a lifelong valve amp tinkerer and snob I'm constantly pleasantly surprised by my Bandit.

I used mine as a monitor for my Pod Go for last night's gig and it sounded great instantly, and it felt great too, which is far more elusive and surprising for a modeller/solid state amp pairing.

ICBM · August 2023

p90fool said:

£1300 as you'll need a decent Celestion in there, but apart from that I totally agree.

I know we both bang on about Bandits a bit and I still love my Fender and Marshall valve amps, but as a lifelong valve amp tinkerer and snob I'm constantly pleasantly surprised by my Bandit.

I used mine as a monitor for my Pod Go for last night's gig and it sounded great instantly, and it felt great too, which is far more elusive and surprising for a modeller/solid state amp pairing.

I’ve actually got an Eminence Li’l Texas is my Studio Pro now, which if anything is even better than the Celestion. But your point stands, the speaker is the only weak point.

I keep banging on about this too, but I’m more convinced than ever that output stage damping is the key to the ‘feel’ - valve amps naturally (accidentally) have low damping, solid-state ones naturally have high damping… except when they’re purposely designed not to have, which is what the Transtube circuit does. Some other solid-state amp ranges have something similar, but less effectively.

pt22 · August 2023

If you can up the budget a bit you could look at Magnatones. The Varsity Reverb is an American-voiced beauty, or if you want to stick with the more-British mid-pushed sound you could look at the Super Fifteen combo. Both at £2499 new, but I just picked up my Super Fifteen at £1800 used. None on reverb atm but they probably pop up from time to time.

Spectacular things.

Greatape · August 2023

jhumber said:

1x12 combo with clean headroom to act as a pedal platform? Hope it’s ok to point at the Carr Rambler I have for sale in the classifieds (well under your budget too). In terms of clean tone it’s the best I’ve had.

Amazing amps. All the Carr stuff is.

Greatape · August 2023

ICBM said:

p90fool said:

£1300 as you'll need a decent Celestion in there, but apart from that I totally agree.

I know we both bang on about Bandits a bit and I still love my Fender and Marshall valve amps, but as a lifelong valve amp tinkerer and snob I'm constantly pleasantly surprised by my Bandit.

I used mine as a monitor for my Pod Go for last night's gig and it sounded great instantly, and it felt great too, which is far more elusive and surprising for a modeller/solid state amp pairing.

I’ve actually got an Eminence Li’l Texas is my Studio Pro now, which if anything is even better than the Celestion. But your point stands, the speaker is the only weak point.

I keep banging on about this too, but I’m more convinced than ever that output stage damping is the key to the ‘feel’ - valve amps naturally (accidentally) have low damping, solid-state ones naturally have high damping… except when they’re purposely designed not to have, which is what the Transtube circuit does. Some other solid-state amp ranges have something similar, but less effectively.

Do you mean that feel of a speaker really travelling? Friend of mine has a 90's Vibroverb that does that beautifully. It's like being punched.

Agree about the Texas Heat. I replaced a 70/80 in my Traynor with one and it completely transformed the amp.

ICBM · August 2023

Greatape said:

Do you mean that feel of a speaker really travelling? Friend of mine has a 90's Vibroverb that does that beautifully. It's like being punched.

Yes, that looseness is a big part of it. Traditional solid-state amps control the speaker movement much more tightly, and so can feel stiff and unresponsive.

Greatape said:

Agree about the Texas Heat. I replaced a 70/80 in my Traynor with one and it completely transformed the amp.

Interestingly the speaker it replaced was a Line 6 custom G12P-80 - a revoiced Seventy/80, although it sounds quite a bit different from the standard one. The Eminence has more bottom end and a really nice upper-mid chime that the Celestion doesn’t.

thomasw88 · August 2023

HoraceB said:

I'd certainly be wary of the Bad Cats, although they sound fantastic unfortunately in the last six weeks I've had two Black Cats, after the second one died I went for a Hot Cat which was also faulty and am currently waiting for a replacement (hopefully with the initial shipment of faulty transformers and wrong component issues sorted) for that from the States! The brief time I had with one of the Black Cats (the second one didn't last two days) I think the head room would be an issue for you.

Conversely my Hotcat has been reliable so far, done about 10-12 gigs with it and was playing it daily for two months as I like it so much.

Appreciate Horace has has a mare with it and really hope the next one works fine. But its the best amp I've ever had, and Ive had a lot..

tomajoha · August 2023

thomasw88 said:

HoraceB said:

I'd certainly be wary of the Bad Cats, although they sound fantastic unfortunately in the last six weeks I've had two Black Cats, after the second one died I went for a Hot Cat which was also faulty and am currently waiting for a replacement (hopefully with the initial shipment of faulty transformers and wrong component issues sorted) for that from the States! The brief time I had with one of the Black Cats (the second one didn't last two days) I think the head room would be an issue for you.

Conversely my Hotcat has been reliable so far, done about 10-12 gigs with it and was playing it daily for two months as I like it so much.

Appreciate Horace has has a mare with it and really hope the next one works fine. But its the best amp I've ever had, and Ive had a lot..

Agreed and the older ones are also bombproof

HoraceB · August 2023

tomajoha said:

thomasw88 said:

HoraceB said:

I'd certainly be wary of the Bad Cats, although they sound fantastic unfortunately in the last six weeks I've had two Black Cats, after the second one died I went for a Hot Cat which was also faulty and am currently waiting for a replacement (hopefully with the initial shipment of faulty transformers and wrong component issues sorted) for that from the States! The brief time I had with one of the Black Cats (the second one didn't last two days) I think the head room would be an issue for you.

Conversely my Hotcat has been reliable so far, done about 10-12 gigs with it and was playing it daily for two months as I like it so much.

Appreciate Horace has has a mare with it and really hope the next one works fine. But its the best amp I've ever had, and Ive had a lot..

Agreed and the older ones are also bombproof

Might be worth mentioning that all my Bad Cats were heads, maybe the heads were the ones with the dodgy transformers and wrong components. I think I just got unlucky and basically got the whole shipment!

Having said all that I liked the amps so much that I am willing to give them another go and hoping the next shipment will have had all the issues dealt with. The time I had with them I did prefer the Hot Cat and as previously mentioned I think this would suit Mr Rsvmark needs better. I see Morgans mentioned ,I also have a Morgan Dual 20 Combo(currently for sale) which could fit the bill but again may be an issue with the headroom although it is a very loud 20 watts the 40 watt version may be better if you can find one.

chris78 · August 2023

If you can find a tone king majesty, they are the best Marshall style I've heard in your price range and wonderfully flexible.
There was one on eBay recently and I think the seller resides in this parish.

If you could find more pennies, the Marshall setting on a Bartel is a thing of beauty. @fretfinder is selling his for some strange reason, but the beauty of the Bartel is that you'll have Marshall, tweed, Vox and blackface settings in one amp. That means you can use it as a pedal platform or as I do, with the guitar set the drive the amp and roll back the volume to clean up. If you get to grips with a bartel, you don't need pedals, other than maybe delay, chorus type.

tomajoha · August 2023

HoraceB said:

tomajoha said:

thomasw88 said:

HoraceB said:

I'd certainly be wary of the Bad Cats, although they sound fantastic unfortunately in the last six weeks I've had two Black Cats, after the second one died I went for a Hot Cat which was also faulty and am currently waiting for a replacement (hopefully with the initial shipment of faulty transformers and wrong component issues sorted) for that from the States! The brief time I had with one of the Black Cats (the second one didn't last two days) I think the head room would be an issue for you.

Conversely my Hotcat has been reliable so far, done about 10-12 gigs with it and was playing it daily for two months as I like it so much.

Appreciate Horace has has a mare with it and really hope the next one works fine. But its the best amp I've ever had, and Ive had a lot..

Agreed and the older ones are also bombproof

Might be worth mentioning that all my Bad Cats were heads, maybe the heads were the ones with the dodgy transformers and wrong components. I think I just got unlucky and basically got the whole shipment! Having said all that I liked the amps so much that I am willing to give them another go and hoping the next shipment will have had all the issues dealt with. The time I had with them I did prefer the Hot Cat and as previously mentioned I think this would suit Mr Rsvmark needs better. I see Morgans mentioned ,I also have a Morgan Dual 20 Combo(currently for sale) which could fit the bill but again may be an issue with the headroom although it is a very loud 20 watts the 40 watt version may be better if you can find one.

Have you tried one of the hand wired ones that predate the recent update? If the tone suits maybe that would be a safer bet?

Dumodal · September 2023

You can try my Hamstead 60RT, plenty of headroom, some mix of British and American sounds, kinda its own thing!

rsvmark · September 2023

And after Much internetting, Googling and consideration, we have a winner. Trigger pulled and I am off to collect tomorrow………….

one of these…….

https://www.matchlessamplifiers.com/amplifiers-and-cabinets/lightning

I bloody hope I like it!

Nikc · September 2023

Nice !

DrCornelius · September 2023

Bloody lovely

rsvmark · September 2023

@Nikc @DrCornelius I will let you know tomorrow. The manual on line suggests cranking the master to the max and then pre amp should be adjusted to taste….. oh go on then

ICBM · September 2023

That's my favourite Matchless.

Hopefully yours isn't brown

.

tomajoha · September 2023

Bravo

Howdy, Stranger!

Categories

In this Discussion

Become a Subscriber!

1x12 combo options

Comments