Members strathound Posted March 12, 2010 Members Share Posted March 12, 2010 A buddy of mine suggested doing one of the Mike Moyer amp mods on my 2003 Fender Vibrolux. I was so-so happy with the tone. But I was looking for something that had a little extra. When I described what I was looking for (better vintage tone with more bite, more headroom and a touch of vintage grit and edge reminiscent of old Hollywood Fats recordings), he told me about this mod and said he had heard good things. So I let him give it a try. When he was done with the mods, I could not believe the difference in tone. I was shocked. The reverb sounded better. The trem sounded better. I had more headroom and the tone was just balls out Fender classic tone. I love it. Here's the blog post he wrote up on the mods if anyone is interested. If you own a Vibrolux and want a more vintage tone for about $20 in parts, check this out: http://www.texasbluesroadhouse.com/group/gear_central/forum/topics/michaels-custom-vibrolux Peace (and I don't post here often, so forgive me if I've broken any laws), Michael Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members BadRonald Posted March 12, 2010 Members Share Posted March 12, 2010 Cool. I had one of the Custom Vibrolux Reverbs and had to let it go because it was terribly noisy without the neg. feedback loop. Wasn't even useable.I had my tech add one and it was still noisy. Not as bad, but...Really wanted to like that amp. Tone was great, but not great enough for me to keep it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members strathound Posted March 12, 2010 Author Members Share Posted March 12, 2010 Cool. I had one of the Custom Vibrolux Reverbs and had to let it go because it was terribly noisy without the neg. feedback loop. Wasn't even useable.I had my tech add one and it was still noisy. Not as bad, but...Really wanted to like that amp. Tone was great, but not great enough for me to keep it. Yeah, that's kind of how I felt about it before we did the mod. Same thing. Now I'm pretty happy with it. We let about 5 people play through it last Friday at a blues jam, ranging from touring pros to schmuck's like myself. Everybody liked the new sound. It really projects a lot better now. The first channel retains the brown tone amp circuit, but with better components and sounds great. The second channel (the bright channel) now has a classic blackface super reverb circuit. And man, that thing can cut through anything. I might just have to get a Tele and learn to chicken-pick, cause that would be magnificent. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members BadRonald Posted March 12, 2010 Members Share Posted March 12, 2010 Like I said, the tone was great. Beautiful amp. I think, besides the noise, the thing I disliked the most was the 10" speakers. They just don't do it for me like 12's. I recently had a beautiful Bassman and loved the tone, but just couldn't get on with the 10's. Now if I had a Bassman and had a custom baffle built for 2-12's I'd be in heaven. I think I can make that happen. Hmmmm.......GAS! Badronald is headed to the Mojotone website! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members nathanlux Posted March 12, 2010 Members Share Posted March 12, 2010 some tweaking can really turn an average blackface fender into a glorious thing. congrats! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members strathound Posted March 15, 2010 Author Members Share Posted March 15, 2010 some tweaking can really turn an average blackface fender into a glorious thing. congrats! Yeah, the thing that puzzles me is why they ever went away from this sound. I mean heck, Fender invented it back in the 50's. How does making an amp sound worse sell more amps? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members moonpieface Posted March 15, 2010 Members Share Posted March 15, 2010 i've been looking at a stu-daddy amps vibrolux clone , after checking out the prices on the vintage stuff. the reissue is a dog by all accounts. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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