I like the blue most, but the others could work for a change of pace, or a festive holiday gig!
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Official Ampeg Portaflex Club
- Thread starter JimmyM
- Start date
One red and one blue for purple. I wonder if they blend? If not, red and green for the holidays.
Purple would be amazing! And good for Fat Tuesday gigs!
Good idea. Try a different color in each of the two sockets.
I like them all. Clear and blue top the list.
That one’s really nice.
The issue is the holes for the lights are offset to the left, so the right side is more dim. I don’t see any real way to move the board over.
It’s kind of indigo, pretty and unique. Other than that I like green or the clear/white.
I wonder if a clear and one blue would be a faint blue?
A resistor could be added to the bright side to balance the two. I’ve never seen a BA9 bulb socket extender.
Hope I'm doing this right and not interrupting a convo...I had started a new thread but someone suggested posting here.
I'm building a small project home studio and have so far acquired a newer Ampeg PF112HE cab. Now looking at a vintage SB12 head (there's a few out there without cabs) or a newer PF20T. I'm a tube amp junkie and can service my own so the SB12 appeals to me but the PF20T might be an easier acquisition overall and is well reviewed. However, I'm having a hard time finding comparisons between these two. Anyone had a chance to play them side by side?
Thanks!
Luca
I'm building a small project home studio and have so far acquired a newer Ampeg PF112HE cab. Now looking at a vintage SB12 head (there's a few out there without cabs) or a newer PF20T. I'm a tube amp junkie and can service my own so the SB12 appeals to me but the PF20T might be an easier acquisition overall and is well reviewed. However, I'm having a hard time finding comparisons between these two. Anyone had a chance to play them side by side?
Thanks!
Luca
Answered in the other thread.
I’ll add…It isn’t an easy question to answer. The problem with comparisons is that the SB-12 components drift with time and may be out of spec. Unless the SB-12 is carefully gone through and brought up to spec, you won’t have a stable baseline for comparison. Even the SB-12 had power amp revisions with different power tubes.
Old amps all sound a little different. So do new amps. Component tolerances make it that way. If you got an SB12 head and used it with a modern cab, it won’t sound the same as an optimally set up SB-12 through an SB-12 cab.
I can't speak to the SB12, but I've taken the PF-20T through its paces - at gigs, in the studio, and at a lot of jams - and I think it's a fantastic amp! For a small home studio, I think you'd be very happy with it. I'm always after a vintage sound, and I've been able to get some honey-butter tones out of that thing.
Excellent points. I'm now indeed inclined to stick with the modern cab I ordered and try it out -- as AMPEG intended -- with the pf20-t and if I want a SB12 I'll get the full combo as AMPEG also intended...
This is great to hear. Thanks for chiming in. I finally stumbled on some decent demo vids on Instagram by using a hashtag search for #ampegpf20t and there's some excellent clips. Somehow YouTube came short for this amp
Yeah, I couldn't find much when I was first looking into the PF-20T, either. Someone ended up bringing one to a jam I went to and I was so impressed with it that I immediately started looking for a decent used one. I used it on my band's recent album and have gotten a lot of positive feedback on the bass tone!
Nuance in sound when you are chasing tone for recording is important. Variation from one amp to another does occur. When they were designing the V4B reissue for example, they tried several amps and found one that was the gold standard that they based the new design on.. The blueprinted it, taking measurements of everything. A lot of work went into designing the output transformer. There were iterations to tweak it.
Using the whatever cab is recommended to go with the amp will provide a good match.
Using the whatever cab is recommended to go with the amp will provide a good match.
I have a PF20 and 112HLF, and I can say it is a sweet sounding little setup, I couldn’t be happier with it. Mine is in my living room and is solely used for low to medium volume practice. I highly recommend it.
I'm looking into picking up an Oliver B120. For those with experience with these amps, how similar-sounding are they to a B15? I'm playing with a band that's relatively low volume and would hope to use this with them. As a reference, I'm currently playing an Ampeg Micro VR running 200 watts @ 4 ohms and not pushing the amp hard. The gain is at 2:00, volume is at 8:00. The B120 is rated at 35 watts.
Is there anything I should know about potential problem areas with these amps? I'm aware of general care and feeding of tube amps as I had an SVT in the past.
Is there anything I should know about potential problem areas with these amps? I'm aware of general care and feeding of tube amps as I had an SVT in the past.
Our Friday night jam at the RV campground ended for the season and we moved to the VFW for the winter (where I use my Ampeg RB112). On the way home, my wife, who knows nothing about bass amps, other than I have to many (small combos), asked me why my bass didn't sound so good that night. I told her it was because I was no longer using my B15S, which I had used (and she liked) the previous two weeks.
I took her observation as approval to improve my amp situation. To that end, I bought a new PF350 online from a small music store. I chose it because of its 250W @ 8 ohms, simplicity, predominantly good comments (vs the PF 500) from the TB community, and approximate compatibility with my B15S cab. (The tech I bought my B15S from said the speaker was re-coned as an EVM15B and was at least the 200 watt version.)
I also bought a "looks like new" PF112HLF. I listened to JimmyM's 2018 comparison of the PF-112hlf and SVT210av sound clips and thought the 210 sounded a little warmer. But I chose the PF112 because of its size and weight (compared to a PF115), predominantly good comments from the TB community, and often mentioned companion of choice for the PF50T.
Together they should be a nice gigable rig and mix and match components to learn more about the "B15 sound" i like. (I have played the PF350 with the B15 cab already. The Pf112 is arriving tomorrow.)
I am still planning to build a 115 cab and would like to thank all for their comments on the Thiele cab design. My design is taking shape but more questions to follow.
I took her observation as approval to improve my amp situation. To that end, I bought a new PF350 online from a small music store. I chose it because of its 250W @ 8 ohms, simplicity, predominantly good comments (vs the PF 500) from the TB community, and approximate compatibility with my B15S cab. (The tech I bought my B15S from said the speaker was re-coned as an EVM15B and was at least the 200 watt version.)
I also bought a "looks like new" PF112HLF. I listened to JimmyM's 2018 comparison of the PF-112hlf and SVT210av sound clips and thought the 210 sounded a little warmer. But I chose the PF112 because of its size and weight (compared to a PF115), predominantly good comments from the TB community, and often mentioned companion of choice for the PF50T.
Together they should be a nice gigable rig and mix and match components to learn more about the "B15 sound" i like. (I have played the PF350 with the B15 cab already. The Pf112 is arriving tomorrow.)
I am still planning to build a 115 cab and would like to thank all for their comments on the Thiele cab design. My design is taking shape but more questions to follow.
My Portaflex PF 50t went down. There’s no sound coming from the bass. It powers up and you can take it off standby (purple light comes on and light hum) but no sound. The only thing I did to it out of the ordinary was I forgot and left it on standby several hours when I went out to mow grass and do yard work, but when I came back in I played it and it was fine. But, when I turned it on the next day, I had no sound as described above. I don’t think it’s the bass or the cab (Ampeg 4x10 HLF Classic), because I hooked up everything to my SVT and they were fine. Since I bought it be a few weeks ago, I took it back to the music Store I purchased it from, and he’s going to get it checked out. I will let everyone know when I hear back from him.