Power Scaling or attenuator?

[westside]

Hello,

I buried this in an old thread, I'll try it again where it's visible.

I found this board by way of GuitarNuts.com. I started out on BillM's Blues Junior site (from which you can deduce that I have one of those) (it's at ) and followed the links to GuitarNuts for the Strat shielding info (ditto deduction). So now I'm going to shield my Strat and mod my Blues Junior. I think I can do that, if I can figure out which end of the soldering iron to hold.

Once that's done, I want to run the amp at lower volume, but with some tone.

I'm trying to figure out whether I want an attenuator or something like a scaling unit. Has anybody installed one of the London Power scaling units? There is a new model that is apparently easier to install than the original one. www.londonpower.com/catalog/product_info.php?cPath=7&products_id=27

From what I can gather, the power scaling circuit seems like the best approach. It basically operates the power section of the amp at a reduced voltage, so you can saturate the tubes at low power. Conversely, the attenuator dissipates power between the output and the speaker, sometimes with tone penalties, and you have to run the tubes hard, with resulting wear and tear.

So, basically I'm leaning toward the scaling circuit. Does anyone have an opinion, or know of a third option? I know some of you are kind of shy. Thanks!

[newey]

Westside-

Hello and welcome! The welcome is a bit belated, I didn't spot your earlier post on the resurrected thread on attenuators.

You stated:

So now I'm going to shield my Strat and mod my Blues Junior. I think I can do that, if I can figure out which end of the soldering iron to hold.

By all means, shield your Strat. But if I were you, I wouldn't go tearing into the Blues Jr. unless I had considerable experience with modding amps.

I don't know anyone who has installed one of the London Power scaling kits, but it looks to be a fairly involved project. You run the risk of screwing up a good amp.

As far as the attenuator goes, the THD Hot Plate is a couple of hundred bucks. The consensus on that other thread seemed to be to get a low power tube amp like an Epi VJ ($140) and save the Blues Jr. for playing elsewhere.

And, if you don't like the tone of one of those amps, there are numerous mods you can try out on a VJ at little risk. IOW, if you screw it up it's only a $140 amp.

[chuck]

go with a GOOD attenuator , not the THD Hotplate.

the Dr z Airbrake is the most transparent Attenuator i have tried .

the Hotplate looks cool , and has added bells and whistles , but it has them because it NEEDS them to make up for poor design.

99% of the time simple is better.

the Airbrake just works , and it dosnt suck the tone and life from your amp.