Neil Young's Rig (Herzog)...Tone Quest Report question.

What is it you want to know?It's a simple thing to 'pad down' the output of an amp using either a dummy load to disable the amp's internal speaker and then use a simple voltage divider to drop the output down to line level so you can insert that into the input of another amp.
If you think of a distortion or boost pedal as an amplifier,then it gets fed into the input of another amp,you get the idea.
The Herzog had an extra 12AX7 to add tons of gain to an amp.A simple champ will do.Depends on what sound you want.
The idea of the actual distorted output of a power amp driving the preamp of another larger amp is kind of cool,but it isn't the world's best tone.Well maybe for Mr Bachman.each to their own.

 

Backline companies hate Gordy Johnson because he blows up marshalls with his Herzog.
It definitely is a big fat sound,but you need to use some discretion when using it.
I do repairs for a local backline company and they complain when Gordy comes to town!
Build a champ and pad the output with a voltage divider to drop the output to line level and you are set.
The biggest reason why many people don't do it is the cost.
The sound you here when driving a clean amp is basically the preamp of the Herzog,but it is colored by the preamp of the power amp so it's not a real representation of the Deluxe when you are talking about Neil Young.I would simply use a line out on the Deluxe and pipe the sound into the PA system.That way you can mix it in the monitors too.People do things the way they please and whatever they end up with is fine.

 

I'm pretty sure Larry put a resistor on the external speaker jack of the 5e3. Gerald Weber describes this mod in one of his books. I have a 5e3 that is connected to my Magnatone 280 in a similar fashion. Works great.

 

@Old Black... what's the name of Gerald Weber's book that you refer to. There are three on amazon !! Thanks

 

I have recorded neil in the studio.
it was just the tweed deluxe with 6l6's.
It sure did sound like neil.

 

Power amp distortion sounds different from preamp distortion.

 

Pretty sure it's in this one...

http://www.amazon.com/Desktop-Reference-Vintage-Guitar-Amps/dp/0964106000

It's the only one I read and I do remember a reference to something similar. IIRC, most of the "tricks and tips" were republished from his magazine columns.

 

The simplest way to see if you like this sound is to get a direct box that allows amp level inputs (Peavey, Hosa etc). Plug the amp into that and the speaker into the parallel jack, then send the output to your clean amp. If you like it, then build a voltage divider and "line out" jack into the back of your amp.

 

I was googling and came across this, thought I would add the schematic for other googlers:


I've added this to a few of my small tube amps. It works great! I really love it on a small supro I have - I just plug the input into one of a couple big amps and it sounds insane! Exactly like you would imagine a cranked up supro into an Ampeg V4 would sound!

It makes that small amp tone gigable

 

IMho, it is best to take that line out to a power amp...not to another preamp situation. All that is really needed is to amplify that signal of the entire circuit of the first amp IT is not necessary and probably not technically advisable to re-preamp that line out signal. Whatever they do for N. Young's amp situation might be something that someone of lesser means would want to afford. His tech is probably on a 'retainer'. LOL
IF it is run into the preamp of another larger amp, it would be best not to push that larger amp's preamp hard.

 

Terry Kath used to run a tube Bogen PA head into a Showman or other big amp, IIRC.
In jr. high I did it with a Wollensak tube tape recorder set to "PA" mode into a #2 input on my SFSR.
Interesting, pretty ragged. I managed not to blow anything up, even though I think I just used the speaker out of the Wollensak.
Serious impedance mismatch

 

Just a guess, but perhaps Neil assembled his rig back in the days when micing small amps live was not as prevalent as today, also his rig might be made of the limited amount of gear he could put together in the seventies. Once he found his tone, he stuck with the rig as it was. One could argue that he could profile the rig with a Kemper and just use that, but Neil is probably too old school for such things.

 

This works great into an amp - it is a voltage divider circuit, if you use the right resistor values it will not blow anything up. A line out will always sound crappy until it hits a speaker, or at the least speaker emulation. A speaker is the final EQ filter on your tone!

The interesting part of this is how the two amps interact, it works out somewhat like using a fuzz or colorful dirt pedal into an overdriving amp if you really crank the second amp. I personally like it to accentuate the smaller amp sound and add some of that "bigger amp transformer" sound into the small amp mix.

 

The V4 has a jack in back for "Ext. Amp" and says 10k ohms. Is that for the V4 pre-amp to go to an external amp or an external pre-amp to go to the V4 power amp?

Mike

 

http://bmamps.com/Schematics/ampeg/Ampeg_v4preamp.pdf
It looks to be an output from the V4 pre-amp, ie to feed the V4's pre-amp output signal to an additional / external amp.

 

The V4 has a preamp out jack - not sure if you were just asking about this, but I plug the small amps into the v4 sometimes in the front like normal and it works great. I've used the preamp out as a sort of DI into my recording rig for bass, and that works pretty well too, but I prefer to have a separate line without the preamp coloration if possible.