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I feel the need to replace my giant 4x12 and super loud head with something more manageable like a 1x12 combo. I'm sick of this thing taking up so much space and I hate moving it. Sure it sounds cool, but it's a pain in the butt. I've been looking into things like the fender champ, but I'm not sure if they take pedals well. Also weary about 5w. There's also an old gibson amp up for sale on my local craigslist. The Gibson Scout. And there's a Vox AC15 that's pretty cheap too up on craigslist. I'm looking for some more suggestions to look into though.

Ideally I'd like something with 1 speaker that can take pedals, be useful for recording, and possibly be used live if I mic it up. The last isn't completely necessary as I'm not gigging at the moment. I really just want to write and record for the moment. I'm cool with tubes and I'm cool with solid state.

For pedals I use a fuzzrocious rat tail, civil war big muff clone, ibanez de-7, and a boss rv-5.

I would snag that Scout if you have the scratch.

SoaringTortoise wrote:I would snag that Scout if you have the scratch.

What are the specs on them? Any good with pedals? I've never heard of it before.

Silverface champ are awesome, but greatly benifits from a new speaker. 8s are stock but I'm pretty sure you can squeeze a 10 in there. 6 watts, takes pedals well, won't make your ears bleed.

Likewise, if you can swing it, Princeton Reverbs and Deluxe Reverbs are also great recording amps, and more gigable than the champ. Princeton Reverb is 12 watts with a 10, Deluxe is 22 with a 12, and two channels.

I use a Blues Jr. for bedroom recording and use pedals a lot. Also use it live.

me and the gf use SF Champ and Pro Jr for bedroom rehearsals.

TOMKAT_BKLYN wrote:I use a Blues Jr. for bedroom recording and use pedals a lot. Also use it live.

I usually go blues jr for pedal testing when I first get them and twin reverb for cleans.

The jr is nice sounding, light, can be nice and saturated at quiet levels, or it can get surprisingly loud.

For that type of use, I use modelers. Even a Champ will get stupid loud fast - think trumpet wailing and how much your neighbors might not appreciate it (or not care!).

They do take pedals well but as has been noted, stock speaker is poop.

I'm personally using a Fender Mustang V (and 4x12, but it's at lowish volumes and I use the DI more often than not versus the speaker). Jazz Chorus (with a little ambience/sidewash from the Mustang and the Hot Rod Deluxe) mic'd as needed, and a Hot Rod Deluxe with an attenuator should I want to try to make the tubes destroy themselves for the occasional power tube gain which I"m not a huge fan of).

Also have the Boss GT-001 for a totally quiet rig (or can run it out to the Jazz Chorus on demand) and have patches set up that are VERY VERY close to my room sounds.

ancientbones wrote:

SoaringTortoise wrote:I would snag that Scout if you have the scratch.

What are the specs on them? Any good with pedals? I've never heard of it before.

If it is the GA17RVT Scout from the mid-sixties it has a pair of 6AQ5 power tubes for about 10 watts output into a 10" speaker. I don't know how it takes effects. I'm sure it will handle them just fine, but with the on-board reverb and tremolo my guess is once you start playing it you will forget about the need for any other effects.

I'm not a big fan of modelers to be honest. Even amplitube kinda sounds shitty to me. I like the simplicity of old amps, too. Something like a Deluxe would be ideal. 22w sounds like enough to record with and enough to gig with. They're so expensive though . Are there any Fender-like amps that would be like the deluxe but not $1000?

I looked up some videos of this scout, but most of them are just blues dads playing overdriven blues scales.

I like the Epi valve JR. it gets loud, but I built an attenuator and it works great

I just got a Vox AC4C1-12 and I'm loving it.

ancientbones wrote:
I looked up some videos of this scout, but most of them are just blues dads playing overdriven blues scales.

Stupid blues dads. I wish they would stop playing all the cool amps and get their own internet.

Among my low watters I've got a vox ac15 and it's great for low spl level pedal platform. There was nothing wrong with the stock spkr. but I swapped it for a blue alnico and noticed improvements across the board. It's also very responsive to rolling tubes to tailer the sound.

I've got a blackface champ and it's a great practice/recording amp, usually only run modulation on it but it can handle dirt too...it just sounds so good on its own broken up is all.

Another one worth checking out is the Jet City 20w combo with reverb. Cheaper than a deluxe reverb, about the same power, but it favors Marshall flavors over Fenders. It has a pre and post gain, so for clean you have to Dime the post and control volume with the pre....it gets clean-ish. Still a good deal grittier than a Fender, but I think used they're around $400. When I had mine, I liked it. You can also probably coax more clean out of it with a speaker and tube swap.