Properly overdriving a tube amp

[DarkAxel]

it's hard to find the right amp, isn't it... i've been always using two channel amps to get dirt sounds easily, the only problem is i haven't owned an amp that would satisfy me

Nowadays i play through George Dennis Mighty Mouse, i absolutely love the clean channel, it can be superfunky clean (and that's really important for me because of my band) and it took every pedal i've tried very well... then there's the gain channel and i don't really like it... suprisingly it sounds kinda... 80's to me in the means it's a bit shrill, kinda weak on mids, thin bodied. I don't think i can just blame the speaker (Celestion V30) or the amp construction since i use Frazz Dazzler on a clean channel and it slays. The preamp is just weird

i'm sure i'd be pretty happy with Orange AD30 because i tried it many times and it's awesome... BUT there's the thing that Orange doesn't make amps with effects loop cheaper than the Rockerverb (afaik)... and even the AD30 is expensive as fuck for me. And since i'd love to use the distortion channel, i'd love to have an effects loop

Um... not very helpfull i'm probably just babbling i just wanted to say it's not easy to find the right amp so you don't have to feel guilty for not liking yours. And also i think that dirt pedals have their place and when you know where to look, you can find something that can fully replace your amp's dirt

[univalve]

mathias, get a sib! varidrive. that does the overdrive and breakup part in front of a clean amp very good and sounds amp'ish (at least to my ears). Should be cheaper than a new amp and will work enduring for your practice space at low (amp) volumes. It also works good with pedals in front of it.
For "the new amp thing" it will be also hard to find an amp that will serve at low volumes right... even 1 Watt is already loud. Probably try out the Vox AC4 at the 1/4 Watt setting in a local shop until it breaks up (at 1-2 o'clock depending on the pickups) to hear the lowest tube overdrive volume i have experienced yet. Then you can check out the 1/2 and 1 Watt settings. Schools the volume understanding
"Hard breaking" amps sounds always kind of stiff... with my hot plate it like to stay above the 12dB setting. Below you loose much of the tone. When you even use headphones it's getting worse. Do you have a speaker emulation for the headphones? I do not know the weber in detail, so i have to ask...

[mathias]

mathias, get a sib! varidrive. that does the overdrive and breakup part in front of a clean amp very good and sounds amp'ish (at least to my ears). Should be cheaper than a new amp and will work enduring for your practice space at low (amp) volumes. It also works good with pedals in front of it.
For "the new amp thing" it will be also hard to find an amp that will serve at low volumes right... even 1 Watt is already loud. Probably try out the Vox AC4 at the 1/4 Watt setting in a local shop until it breaks up (at 1-2 o'clock depending on the pickups) to hear the lowest tube overdrive volume i have experienced yet. Then you can check out the 1/2 and 1 Watt settings. Schools the volume understanding
"Hard breaking" amps sounds always kind of stiff... with my hot plate it like to stay above the 12dB setting. Below you loose much of the tone. When you even use headphones it's getting worse. Do you have a speaker emulation for the headphones? I do not know the weber in detail, so i have to ask...

No speaker emulation on the headphone line; I'm pretty sure that the headphone circuit is just another volume pot (which seems stiff and scratchy compared to the pots I'm used to -- maybe it's a really high wattage and/or the equivalent of a ceramic resistor?) which sucks because it's way too loud for headphones at all but the lowest setting that it will put sound into the headphones at. (My Audio-Technica ATH-A900 studio headphones are super efficient as it is -- I can get away with pushing half the volume to them from my Macbook than I would use with a pair of Apple earbuds.)

I've tried little tube amps (1 watt, 5 watt varieties, had two of the Epiphone Valve Junior) but haven't tried the AC4TV yet. Just not really a fan -- unfortunately "low wattage" usually means budget (noise & quality issues) and no knobs to control gain, etc. I'm thinking I need to try the amp that Wes Mantooth uses, the VHT Special 6: http://www.vhtamp.com/avsp16.html but again it lacks a full tone stack and some sort of gain knob, just a single volume knob.

[univalve]

sorry, there is an error in my post: the ac4 has the settings 1/4, 1 and 4 Watt. Just try it in a shop at breakup. It is interesting to know how loud these settings are actually.
(the ac4 has quite good quality for its price range: good speaker, good trannies - i never changed anything except the tubes)

So a speaker emulation may help to make the sound better. but i'm with you, that is the next investment in a probably wrong setup.

[mathias]

sorry, there is an error in my post: the ac4 has the settings 1/4, 1 and 4 Watt. Just try it in a shop at breakup. It is interesting to know how loud these settings are actually.
(the ac4 has quite good quality for its price range: good speaker, good trannies - i never changed anything except the tubes)

So a speaker emulation may help to make the sound better. but i'm with you, that is the next investment in a probably wrong setup.

Yeah, the different AC4 models (there's a 6" speaker, 10" speaker and head version) claim different wattage output. In real world useage, the wattage number doesn't quite match, and as discussed elsewhere in my last amp thread, wattage to loudness is a log scale because dB is a log scale. So 1/4 watt is half as loud as 4 watts, 40 watts is twice as loud as 4 watts, etc. Tube amps are measured wattage at 5% RMS just like solid state amps, I think, but when they're overdriving they're usually past that 5% RMS because well, we want the distortion of the signal.