Your apology is accepted. Please continue being perfect. ;) Dude, stop apologising! Your work, your attitude and knowledge is first class. Im avionics (military) background. Your work is top-notch.
This is the only amp I’ve ever owned, for now almost 30 years which is crazy. Got most of its use in the first 10 years admittedly. I have to say it’s had its fair share of electrical issues which never got fully resolved. But when you crank this amp to the point where you need earplugs (at least I do), it really sings. And that’s where I felt the best tone came out of it. There’s a point right before it breaks where you get this sweet clean tone that crunches as soon as you pluck just a little harder. It took me a long time to find that spot, but once I did I became a lot happier with the amp. Not gonna try to say it’s on the level of a fender tweed but it did the job for me and I’m grateful for its service.
Just reflowed a Vintage Club 30; built Nov '94; looks basically identical and had - from player's perspective - an awful lot of problems. But actually it all boiled down to the same source - broken and/or iffy solder joints on tube sockets. It works like a new now, no weird rattling/rushing/firecracker/sizzle sounds anymore, no jumps in volume, all fixed, without having to replace a single part. Thank you so much Lyle for this. Best wishes from Vienna, Austria
I've got a VC6210 and it served me well for a good number of years. Like another commenter said, it runs hot and had a burned out something or other that I had repaired under warranty. It has a good sound and as long as I don't have to move it, I like it just fine. Seems that St. Louis Music used MDF infused with lead or depleted uranium. Heavy stuff. I always thought it sounded quite a bit better than the price point or name would imply. Thanks for this video!
I still have my VC3112 that my gf bought for me back around 1996. I believe they were going for around $600 or $650 back then. It has been an awesome sounding amp and VERY loud for its 30 watt spec.
I had some great Crate amps from the 90's and early aughts. As long as you don't need parts, they're great. I had to replace a couple of pots on a Palomino, and those were almost impossible to find. Ended up buying some from Ampeg service in Belgium or somewhere.
I have a Crate V18-112 of similar design, this video certainly gave me some things to think about when it comes time to service it. It sounds decent and while it's not a vintage Fender, Marshall or Vox, I didn't pay a vintage amp price for it either. It cost me less than $200 and for that, I can't complain.
I had the 212 version. I paid about the same price that you did. A Psionic video on one of those would likely be painful to watch. There were so many things that were objectively horrible about it. It was dark, heavy and noisy, it had ugly vinyl instead of tolex, etc, and just about everyting about it looked and felt cheap. For whatever reason, it was a great amp for playing music live with a band. It sat well in the mix. It was my main amp for at least 5 years. I never did any mods except a couple of lower-gain preamp tubes.
@@jkf9167😂 The way you talk about that amp you would think we're talking about different amps. Mine although it's blonde has regular tolex. I think you are talking about the palomino series V crate amps. Those did have that cheap looking vinyl crap that's on the new EVH amps and the blonde looks very similar to the vintage blonde fender amps.
@@AuntAlnico4 it's not the Palomino series. It's the later club V series that came with crappy black vinyl "tolex" and matte pewter-colored metal. Everyone who has one has it because Musician's Friend blew them out for $200, which even then (mid 00s) was ridiculous for a 2x12 EL84 amp. It served me well, despite being awful in some ways (noise floor, dark sounds).
That looks like a box of goodies from AES in the background! Best mail ever. Even beats Christmas cookies from relatives ! All the pots have different colored shafts! Adorable!!😊
The Crate VC amps were never something I paid attention to, I was one of the many players who thought of Crate as budget/beginner amps, even owned a Crate practice amp once that sounded awful. But then someone had a VC50 with the 1x15 that they were looking to trade for a digital amp, so I traded my Fender Mustang that I'd been fighting with for a year for it. It's big and heavy, but I absolutely love how it sounds. Hope I can get some years out of it. I made the trade based on these kinds of videos where actual amp techs are evaluating the amp, and most of the techs have very little bad things to say about the Crate VC amps. Nowadays I'm convinced that the best tube amps in terms of tone and versatility actually came from the 1990s. I've always been partial to channel switching amps with built in preamp overdrive and controllable volume, though. Modern amps are still good that way, but their construction quality and serviceability seems to have been compromised since the 90s.
I have an older version that I recapped and reflowed a lot of solder joints. It’s a ver good sounding amp now. The stereo effects loop jack worked with a “y” cable. Works great. Pots are the big issue as I couldn’t find replacements so I bought another amp cheap for parts. Knobs are heavy metal on older versions. Nice work Lyle, this is a great old budget amp that will serve someone well for years.
@@guydouglas6094 I have this combo, GREAT amp. This one is a later-made black one. I also had the white one which was like a heater in my music room in winter! that suffered badly from overheating the PCB but this later black one seems a lot better.
I got one of these (blonde) for $40. All problems were related to oxidation on switches plugs and pots. I didn’t like the knobs (prefer pointers), and eventually came upon the idea of shrink tubing over the shaft to accommodate standard knobs.
I worked in retail in addition to guitar repair back when these came out. They sound really good for an inexpensive tube combo. Better to my ear than the Peavey Classic 30’s although those were workhorses too. Great video!
got a 1995 blonde vc5212. mark knophler can be seen using two of them in a live london video from 1996. This was my first tube amp and will never part with it. great clean sound and good od with pedals. glad you did this one!!! love ur vids. always interesting.
Thank you for showing this amp rework. I have the smaller Crate Vintage Club 20 (VC-2110 with Reverb) with the blond tolex cab and grill cloth. Twenty watts from 2 EL-84's and 3 12 AX7's. Only one channel with no footswitch, but it works great as a pedal platform. I do wish mine was the 12" speaker, but those models were more rare in the 20 amp version. I am going to use your previous suggestion to me from your open chat a couple of weeks ago and upgrade the 10" speaker to a Warehouse ET-10. I have retubed the amp with all matched JJ's a couple of years back, but I have to find a local shop here in Jacksonville, FL that can recap it and not butcher it. O love all your videos and I love the old Fender, Crate, and Ampeg reworks that you do.
I’ve had more crate amps than anything else. Still have a big guitar combo and a little bass practice amp, both sound much better than their price tags might have indicated. Unfortunately they have really flimsy knobs, but otherwise are solid amps; a bit heavy though Given the state of guitar gear in the late 90s and early 2000s, and the cost, I would expect more love for the brand. In my experience, Crate was better at making cheap amps than Peavey
Perhaps the most fundamental lesson learned over past few months since I’ve started watching your channel is keeping hardware tight and everything clean. I think if you ever do a show with Phil McKnight, knowing your gear is maintaining it. Thank you, Lyle.
The reason people like these Voxy Crates is that they are biased hot as hell. El84 tubes are easily microphonic from the start or hot/cold cycles where the amp gets tossed around before cooling off. Some VC amps, Blond Guitar Center specials in particular sound way out of their price range if you lock them down to one location and put a fan on the chasis that’s louder than any 60 cycle hum one may encounter. The fix is to find the two resistors which can fry an egg and remote mount them off the board and onto the chasis with heat sinks so that the plastic in the pots do not flex out of spec so much that the wiper loses contact and cuts signal. In honesty the VC 30 is one of my favorites tone wise for recording but I would not want to kick it around much without replacing all caps to a higher temp variety and maybe running the bias slightly colder but not so much to kill it’s character. The pots are fine when cleaned and lubed with a safe product. Last, I install a quiet running fan, suspended by bungee or para-cord. Turning a combo into a head make the amp light in weight and plugged into an efficient cab or 4x12 will knock your socks off in great sound. Still not loud enough to play chords for some drummers I have played with but I require loads of headroom and so the EL 34 - 6550 usually wins if not solid state amp modeling love hate mess. Mic up that Vox sound in combination with a 100 watter and it’s tone bliss!
I had a Crate Solid State 1-12 amp from very early 80's. I had it for a keyboard, but started using it when i transitioned to guitar. I later got a Ampeg Tri-Ax 60w tube head. I really liked that amp, but since I wasn't playing out, it was overkill for home playing. SLM like Peavy are often derided as "Cheap Gear", but they have many examples of very serviceable equipment.
I have a VC3112, in the blonde tolex. It has much cheaper looking knobs than those, black with gold caps. The biggest problem with these amps is the tubes are soldered to the board, as you pointed out. Every time you wiggle the tubes out, they stress the board and their solder joints. Have had to resolder them multiple times.
I had a 94 VC30 that was my first tube amp. I think it sounded pretty great but it was plagued by constant bad solder joints. I actually think the issue is a combination of the thin board flexing and poor ventilation. I've never owned an amp that got so hot. You learned to to never touch those little metal vents on the top after a long play! Mine would switch channels randomly because the footswitch jack solder kept melting, which was no fun in the middle of a gig or jam!
I still have my Crate Stealth 50. I bought it new back in the early 90's I think. It lives in the closet now. Along with my BC Rich Ironbird from 1987. 😏
I had one of the earlier blonde editions of this and the clean side was fantastic. I ended up revoicing the OD channel which improved it but I found it too bright even with the treble at minimum. Moved it down the road but kinda miss it. A vox type cut control likely woulda made it a winner for me.
@@Jamman610 No, just black tolex. I think they stopped making them "crate" style in 82 but I do remember seeing that vintage in my local music shop. The CR-160 was 60 watts solid state but wow it was a loud 60 watts. Had no trouble competing with a 2x12 Twin Reverb clone made by Kustom. Honestly, I haven't played it much since getting a Marshall JTM-600 in 1997 but I recorded me around 1988 playing a cover of Clapton/Mayall doing Little Girl and on that day, that Crate and a crappy Les Paul clone recorded on a Tascam PortaStudio NAILED Clapton's Marshall 1962 tone.
I have the amp and I get this very loud Hum when the back cover is off and I put my fingers near the two white plugs linked by four red wires. I've had it four 15-20 years. I'll check the 4 ground screws on the circuit board too. I did clean all the terminals and pinched the terminal clips. I really couldn't see what you meant by cracked solder joints. Could you supply a well lit magnified view possibly? This video was very helpful. I really didn't think I'd find something pertinent so quickly! Thanks again! Also I bought this amp for $190 I think. It beat the hell outta a solid state Crate Vodoo. The volume was markedly louder.
Wow that must have been nice to be able to remove that board with such ease lol. Of course Crate can make an easy to remove the board amp ! lol. Cracks me up.
These amps and the subsequent V series sound pretty good, but they run really hot (don't touch a knob at the end of a three hour gig) and rattle like crazy so upkeep is a constant chore. But cheap and fun!
I remember that this amp got a really good review in Guitar Player magazine back in the early '90s. I thought about buying one years ago, but was put off by the weight of it.
Have 2 Palominos...1 30 Watt, the other a 5 Watt. 30 Watt one needs a lot of work.....the 5 Watt one works nicely but sure it probably needs some tube replacements.
The output black and green wires go to which speaker tabs. Black on negative? Green on positive. Thanks. My vc310 has been sitting unplugged too long to remember. Thanks
I have a v series 3112. Which I love. Seem very comparable. I’ve ran into some problems and want to upgrade. Would you have any suggestions on a more reliable combo that hit’s similar overdrive and cleans to these amps?
Very good video. I have a crate amp vc3112b and sometimes its sound disappear but it stills on. Nobody in my city knows how to fix it. If you help me I'd be very happy. THanks a lot
When you do a reflow do you just reheat the existing solder and renew the connection/seal around the wire or lift it off with the iron and put new solder on it? Thanks
Are there any inherent problems with the crate v33 series amps? I just got one and its outstanding. Just curious if anything is a problem child with them?
What do you think about using Loctite on the knobs? The idea is using something strong enough to hold, but something that can be broken if the knob needed to be removed.
After supergluing the crack(s) in the knob(s) ---- squeeze the crack back together with needlenose pliers or hemostats before the CA glue sets ---- fill the curved slots with epoxy glue, which will prevent the crack from splitting apart again. Cheap clear 5 minute epoxy is fine since it will have some slight compressibility to it (I wouldn't use JB Weld for this!). If the knob still fits kind of loosely, which is unlikely (unless the splines are all chewed and worn), you can wrap the potentiometer shaft with a little bit of plumber's Teflon tape.
@@PsionicAudio , I tossed that tidbit out for Russell's and other folks' benefit, not yours! For all I know, you may have already done this on occasion for jobs with a suitable budget where original style knobs aren't available; but otherwise it doesnt hurt to give people some tips on basic maintenance and repair that aren't so difficult or specialized that they could get themselves into trouble attempting it. Having somebody repair a knob themselves with epoxy, even if they screw it up, is far better than having them epoxy glue the knob onto the potentiometer shaft! We've both seen that happen, and cussed like sailors over it...
For the hum - just unplug the PI tube - you should hear no hum when the power tubes are good - because of the common mode rejection of a push pull design, you should hear close to nothing then. For the caps, I often measure the AC ripple with my DMM at the first reservoir cap. Some amps could also have a bad design, ineffective low pass filters and therefore too much AC ripple way into the preamp voltages ;)
Hey dude. You know that I know all that, right? I break the repairs up into shorter videos. This was initial inspection/reflowing. And that took us far enough along to make a suitable length vid. I’ve found that if I do long videos of a full repair few watch the whole thing.
@@PsionicAudio , I think you're on target, Lyle; I too tend to prefer short-ish videos, less than a half-hour generally. The only person whose repair vids I always watch from stem to stern regardless of length are Ted Woodford's.
@@PsionicAudio dear lyle, that wasn't critic, sorry - of corse I know who you are.......if you think my comment is rude, please feel free to delete it. It wasn't ment that way, but I understand it completely if you feel so....no offense. All the best to you, cheers Paco
@@curtiseverett1671 It's hard to see from a video, but if you see them in-person with a magnifying glass or reading glasses, you can see if they are bad or not. An experienced tech can spot them right away.
Yeah, like I said it’s hard to show on a camera because the general shiny seems to confuse the lens. I think you can see them pretty well when I show the input jack in this video.
At 12:09 I said “got it all recapped” but that was a brain fart. Meant to say reflowed. Big difference. Sorry.
😂
Your apology is accepted. Please continue being perfect. ;)
Dude, stop apologising! Your work, your attitude and knowledge is first class. Im avionics (military) background. Your work is top-notch.
This is the only amp I’ve ever owned, for now almost 30 years which is crazy. Got most of its use in the first 10 years admittedly. I have to say it’s had its fair share of electrical issues which never got fully resolved. But when you crank this amp to the point where you need earplugs (at least I do), it really sings. And that’s where I felt the best tone came out of it. There’s a point right before it breaks where you get this sweet clean tone that crunches as soon as you pluck just a little harder. It took me a long time to find that spot, but once I did I became a lot happier with the amp. Not gonna try to say it’s on the level of a fender tweed but it did the job for me and I’m grateful for its service.
Just reflowed a Vintage Club 30; built Nov '94; looks basically identical and had - from player's perspective - an awful lot of problems. But actually it all boiled down to the same source - broken and/or iffy solder joints on tube sockets. It works like a new now, no weird rattling/rushing/firecracker/sizzle sounds anymore, no jumps in volume, all fixed, without having to replace a single part. Thank you so much Lyle for this.
Best wishes from Vienna, Austria
Bitte sehr!
My wife and I loved our time in Vienna this past spring. Have a käsekrainer and know that I’m jealous.
I've got a VC6210 and it served me well for a good number of years. Like another commenter said, it runs hot and had a burned out something or other that I had repaired under warranty. It has a good sound and as long as I don't have to move it, I like it just fine. Seems that St. Louis Music used MDF infused with lead or depleted uranium. Heavy stuff. I always thought it sounded quite a bit better than the price point or name would imply. Thanks for this video!
I still have my VC3112 that my gf bought for me back around 1996. I believe they were going for around $600 or $650 back then. It has been an awesome sounding amp and VERY loud for its 30 watt spec.
I had some great Crate amps from the 90's and early aughts. As long as you don't need parts, they're great. I had to replace a couple of pots on a Palomino, and those were almost impossible to find. Ended up buying some from Ampeg service in Belgium or somewhere.
I have a Crate V18-112 of similar design, this video certainly gave me some things to think about when it comes time to service it. It sounds decent and while it's not a vintage Fender, Marshall or Vox, I didn't pay a vintage amp price for it either. It cost me less than $200 and for that, I can't complain.
I had the 212 version. I paid about the same price that you did. A Psionic video on one of those would likely be painful to watch. There were so many things that were objectively horrible about it. It was dark, heavy and noisy, it had ugly vinyl instead of tolex, etc, and just about everyting about it looked and felt cheap. For whatever reason, it was a great amp for playing music live with a band. It sat well in the mix. It was my main amp for at least 5 years.
I never did any mods except a couple of lower-gain preamp tubes.
@@jkf9167😂 The way you talk about that amp you would think we're talking about different amps. Mine although it's blonde has regular tolex. I think you are talking about the palomino series V crate amps. Those did have that cheap looking vinyl crap that's on the new EVH amps and the blonde looks very similar to the vintage blonde fender amps.
@@AuntAlnico4 it's not the Palomino series. It's the later club V series that came with crappy black vinyl "tolex" and matte pewter-colored metal.
Everyone who has one has it because Musician's Friend blew them out for $200, which even then (mid 00s) was ridiculous for a 2x12 EL84 amp. It served me well, despite being awful in some ways (noise floor, dark sounds).
That sounds a heck of a lot better than I thought it would.
That looks like a box of goodies from AES in the background! Best mail ever. Even beats Christmas cookies from relatives ! All the pots have different colored shafts! Adorable!!😊
The Crate VC amps were never something I paid attention to, I was one of the many players who thought of Crate as budget/beginner amps, even owned a Crate practice amp once that sounded awful. But then someone had a VC50 with the 1x15 that they were looking to trade for a digital amp, so I traded my Fender Mustang that I'd been fighting with for a year for it. It's big and heavy, but I absolutely love how it sounds. Hope I can get some years out of it. I made the trade based on these kinds of videos where actual amp techs are evaluating the amp, and most of the techs have very little bad things to say about the Crate VC amps.
Nowadays I'm convinced that the best tube amps in terms of tone and versatility actually came from the 1990s. I've always been partial to channel switching amps with built in preamp overdrive and controllable volume, though. Modern amps are still good that way, but their construction quality and serviceability seems to have been compromised since the 90s.
You described my 1990 Peavey Bravo.
I have an older version that I recapped and reflowed a lot of solder joints. It’s a ver good sounding amp now.
The stereo effects loop jack worked with a “y” cable. Works great.
Pots are the big issue as I couldn’t find replacements so I bought another amp cheap for parts.
Knobs are heavy metal on older versions.
Nice work Lyle, this is a great old budget amp that will serve someone well for years.
I have a Vintage Club 50 head with 2 x 12'' cab. It is noisey at idle but very loud and clean. Same 'Y' cable effects loop.
Blue locktite, on new pots wired to pcb.
@@guydouglas6094 I have this combo, GREAT amp. This one is a later-made black one. I also had the white one which was like a heater in my music room in winter! that suffered badly from overheating the PCB but this later black one seems a lot better.
I got one of these (blonde) for $40. All problems were related to oxidation on switches plugs and pots. I didn’t like the knobs (prefer pointers), and eventually came upon the idea of shrink tubing over the shaft to accommodate standard knobs.
Nice idea, think I'll take it!
I worked in retail in addition to guitar repair back when these came out. They sound really good for an inexpensive tube combo. Better to my ear than the Peavey Classic 30’s although those were workhorses too. Great video!
got a 1995 blonde vc5212. mark knophler can be seen using two of them in a live london video from 1996. This was my first tube amp and will never part with it. great clean sound and good od with pedals. glad you did this one!!! love ur vids. always interesting.
Thank you for showing this amp rework. I have the smaller Crate Vintage Club 20 (VC-2110 with Reverb) with the blond tolex cab and grill cloth. Twenty watts from 2 EL-84's and 3 12 AX7's. Only one channel with no footswitch, but it works great as a pedal platform. I do wish mine was the 12" speaker, but those models were more rare in the 20 amp version. I am going to use your previous suggestion to me from your open chat a couple of weeks ago and upgrade the 10" speaker to a Warehouse ET-10. I have retubed the amp with all matched JJ's a couple of years back, but I have to find a local shop here in Jacksonville, FL that can recap it and not butcher it. O love all your videos and I love the old Fender, Crate, and Ampeg reworks that you do.
I’ve had more crate amps than anything else. Still have a big guitar combo and a little bass practice amp, both sound much better than their price tags might have indicated. Unfortunately they have really flimsy knobs, but otherwise are solid amps; a bit heavy though
Given the state of guitar gear in the late 90s and early 2000s, and the cost, I would expect more love for the brand. In my experience, Crate was better at making cheap amps than Peavey
Perhaps the most fundamental lesson learned over past few months since I’ve started watching your channel is keeping hardware tight and everything clean. I think if you ever do a show with Phil McKnight, knowing your gear is maintaining it. Thank you, Lyle.
The reason people like these Voxy Crates is that they are biased hot as hell.
El84 tubes are easily microphonic from the start or hot/cold cycles where the amp gets tossed around before cooling off. Some VC amps, Blond Guitar Center specials in particular sound way out of their price range if you lock them down to one location and put a fan on the chasis that’s louder than any 60 cycle hum one may encounter.
The fix is to find the two resistors which can fry an egg and remote mount them off the board and onto the chasis with heat sinks so that the plastic in the pots do not flex out of spec so much that the wiper loses contact and cuts signal. In honesty the VC 30 is one of my favorites tone wise for recording but I would not want to kick it around much without replacing all caps to a higher temp variety and maybe running the bias slightly colder but not so much to kill it’s character. The pots are fine when cleaned and lubed with a safe product.
Last, I install a quiet running fan, suspended by bungee or para-cord.
Turning a combo into a head make the amp light in weight and plugged into an efficient cab or 4x12 will knock your socks off in great sound. Still not loud enough to play chords for some drummers I have played with but I require loads of headroom and so the EL 34 - 6550 usually wins if not solid state amp modeling love hate mess. Mic up that Vox sound in combination with a 100 watter and it’s tone bliss!
I had a Crate Solid State 1-12 amp from very early 80's. I had it for a keyboard, but started using it when i transitioned to guitar. I later got a Ampeg Tri-Ax 60w tube head. I really liked that amp, but since I wasn't playing out, it was overkill for home playing. SLM like Peavy are often derided as "Cheap Gear", but they have many examples of very serviceable equipment.
I have a VC3112, in the blonde tolex. It has much cheaper looking knobs than those, black with gold caps. The biggest problem with these amps is the tubes are soldered to the board, as you pointed out. Every time you wiggle the tubes out, they stress the board and their solder joints. Have had to resolder them multiple times.
This is a great deep dive into a more recent era of americana.
I had a 94 VC30 that was my first tube amp. I think it sounded pretty great but it was plagued by constant bad solder joints. I actually think the issue is a combination of the thin board flexing and poor ventilation. I've never owned an amp that got so hot. You learned to to never touch those little metal vents on the top after a long play! Mine would switch channels randomly because the footswitch jack solder kept melting, which was no fun in the middle of a gig or jam!
Thanks for the free information and knowledge man. You sound well chill today Lyle! Have a good festive season mate!
I still have my Crate Stealth 50. I bought it new back in the early 90's I think. It lives in the closet now. Along with my BC Rich Ironbird from 1987. 😏
it is a great sounding amp, I like them! :D
Live these vintage clubs. I have a 5310. Live both channels. Also had a bad effects loop that I just bypassed. Runs very hot though.
I had one of the earlier blonde editions of this and the clean side was fantastic. I ended up revoicing the OD channel which improved it but I found it too bright even with the treble at minimum. Moved it down the road but kinda miss it. A vox type cut control likely woulda made it a winner for me.
Yup known to be too bright, but the fix was pretty simple.
FIRST! And from the 'Lou.... Crate were very reliable starter amps. Still have the Crate CR-160 solid state amp my parents gave me at 17.
@@Jamman610 No, just black tolex. I think they stopped making them "crate" style in 82 but I do remember seeing that vintage in my local music shop. The CR-160 was 60 watts solid state but wow it was a loud 60 watts. Had no trouble competing with a 2x12 Twin Reverb clone made by Kustom. Honestly, I haven't played it much since getting a Marshall JTM-600 in 1997 but I recorded me around 1988 playing a cover of Clapton/Mayall doing Little Girl and on that day, that Crate and a crappy Les Paul clone recorded on a Tascam PortaStudio NAILED Clapton's Marshall 1962 tone.
I still have my wood crate from around 1980 when they first came out. It’s a bass amp 60 watts I believe single 12” speaker. Heavy and solid.
I recently had to put new pre amp tube in my main amp and it is now much quieter
I have the amp and I get this very loud Hum when the back cover is off and I put my fingers near the two white plugs linked by four red wires. I've had it four 15-20 years. I'll check the 4 ground screws on the circuit board too. I did clean all the terminals and pinched the terminal clips. I really couldn't see what you meant by cracked solder joints. Could you supply a well lit magnified view possibly? This video was very helpful. I really didn't think I'd find something pertinent so quickly! Thanks again! Also I bought this amp for $190 I think. It beat the hell outta a solid state Crate Vodoo. The volume was markedly louder.
I had a similar amp to this (2x12 tweed) come in with the most bulged caps I've ever seen.
Wow that must have been nice to be able to remove that board with such ease lol. Of course Crate can make an easy to remove the board amp ! lol. Cracks me up.
These amps and the subsequent V series sound pretty good, but they run really hot (don't touch a knob at the end of a three hour gig) and rattle like crazy so upkeep is a constant chore. But cheap and fun!
Got a v1512 and v58 and they're killer for what I paid, you'd be paying several times more for an equivalent product from the big brands
I remember that this amp got a really good review in Guitar Player magazine back in the early '90s. I thought about buying one years ago, but was put off by the weight of it.
Have 2 Palominos...1 30 Watt, the other a 5 Watt. 30 Watt one needs a lot of work.....the 5 Watt one works nicely but sure it probably needs some tube replacements.
The output black and green wires go to which speaker tabs. Black on negative? Green on positive. Thanks. My vc310 has been sitting unplugged too long to remember. Thanks
I have a v series 3112. Which I love. Seem very comparable. I’ve ran into some problems and want to upgrade.
Would you have any suggestions on a more reliable combo that hit’s similar overdrive and cleans to these amps?
Very good video. I have a crate amp vc3112b and sometimes its sound disappear but it stills on. Nobody in my city knows how to fix it. If you help me I'd be very happy. THanks a lot
The FX loop is the weak spot. Change it.
When you do a reflow do you just reheat the existing solder and renew the connection/seal around the wire or lift it off with the iron and put new solder on it? Thanks
It's pre ROHS so just heat & go, mostly.
Are there any inherent problems with the crate v33 series amps? I just got one and its outstanding. Just curious if anything is a problem child with them?
What size iron do you normally use on PCB’s? Bigger for quick heat transfer or smaller for precision? I’ve heard both recommended.
Smallish chisel tip. I can use the whole thing or just a corner depending on what I need it to do.
how do you remove the electrolytics?
What do you think about using Loctite on the knobs? The idea is using something strong enough to hold, but something that can be broken if the knob needed to be removed.
I think you’d regret it. The knob might break before the loctite does.
After supergluing the crack(s) in the knob(s) ---- squeeze the crack back together with needlenose pliers or hemostats before the CA glue sets ---- fill the curved slots with epoxy glue, which will prevent the crack from splitting apart again. Cheap clear 5 minute epoxy is fine since it will have some slight compressibility to it (I wouldn't use JB Weld for this!). If the knob still fits kind of loosely, which is unlikely (unless the splines are all chewed and worn), you can wrap the potentiometer shaft with a little bit of plumber's Teflon tape.
How much time should I spend at my hourly rate to repair 75 cent knobs?
@@PsionicAudio , I tossed that tidbit out for Russell's and other folks' benefit, not yours! For all I know, you may have already done this on occasion for jobs with a suitable budget where original style knobs aren't available; but otherwise it doesnt hurt to give people some tips on basic maintenance and repair that aren't so difficult or specialized that they could get themselves into trouble attempting it. Having somebody repair a knob themselves with epoxy, even if they screw it up, is far better than having them epoxy glue the knob onto the potentiometer shaft! We've both seen that happen, and cussed like sailors over it...
Hey, if the knobs are only 75¢, I'd buy a batch in a heartbeat. But if they're practically unobtanium ... options appreciated!
Why dont amps have blue Loctite on the threads???
Any opinions on the V-1512? I can find one for $250 locally.
They get hot as hell and don't have much headroom, but they sound great for top boost type tone
😎👍
For the hum - just unplug the PI tube - you should hear no hum when the power tubes are good - because of the common mode rejection of a push pull design, you should hear close to nothing then. For the caps, I often measure the AC ripple with my DMM at the first reservoir cap. Some amps could also have a bad design, ineffective low pass filters and therefore too much AC ripple way into the preamp voltages ;)
Hey dude. You know that I know all that, right? I break the repairs up into shorter videos. This was initial inspection/reflowing. And that took us far enough along to make a suitable length vid.
I’ve found that if I do long videos of a full repair few watch the whole thing.
@@PsionicAudio , I think you're on target, Lyle; I too tend to prefer short-ish videos, less than a half-hour generally. The only person whose repair vids I always watch from stem to stern regardless of length are Ted Woodford's.
@@PsionicAudio dear lyle, that wasn't critic, sorry - of corse I know who you are.......if you think my comment is rude, please feel free to delete it. It wasn't ment that way, but I understand it completely if you feel so....no offense. All the best to you, cheers Paco
No worries friend.
@@PsionicAudio , Just a quick question, Was that Crate amp manufactured with leaded solder or lead free?
how can you tell when a solder joint is bad?
By looking at it.
@@TheCyberMantis I know, but in this and many other videos, they look the same as the good ones....??
It’s difficult for a camera to show the crack, with good eyes or a magnifying glass you can’t miss it.
@@curtiseverett1671 It's hard to see from a video, but if you see them in-person with a magnifying glass or reading glasses, you can see if they are bad or not. An experienced tech can spot them right away.
Yeah, like I said it’s hard to show on a camera because the general shiny seems to confuse the lens.
I think you can see them pretty well when I show the input jack in this video.
OY, slow down with the videos would you?
You're making me look bad!
Pot's with a plastic shaft, what a kind of bull....t.
How can you make any money when you spend so much time on cheap plastic knobs and spider egg sacs?
I'm an hour from STL, see lots of those around . Every one was loud as hell, seemed like way more than 30 watts!