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Post subject: Red Knob "The Twin" overdrive
Posted: Tue Apr 01, 2008 7:10 am
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Joined: Fri Aug 24, 2007 2:29 pm
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Location: Buffalo NY
OK, so it's actually got black-knobs, but it's a red-knob "The Twin" nonetheless :wink:


Anyhow, I bought this about a year ago on E-bay for $400+50 shipping. It got bashed by UPS, smashed the front panel in and busted/bent most of the pots. - ended up getting $300 from them and I fixed it myself for $100 in parts (I'm an EE - I do "sorta" know my way around a circuit board! :lol: ) Besides a couple small tears in the tolex, I got it back to 100% condition. So I essentially got an all tube american-made fender for $200... not too shabby :wink:

The clean sound is to die for. So smooth and warm - ahhhhhh.... And loud? God himself couldn't create a thunderbolt that shakes the walls like this heavy mother (she weighs like 85 pounds!). Overkill for basement practice, of course, but for outdoor gigs I don't even have to pump through the PA usually. Wow!

OK - so I digress... on to the question....

The "overdrive" channel sounds like crap. I use pedals usually so I don't care THAT much, but I have to wonder if it's SUPPOSED to sound like it does. It's more of an annoying buzz than a smooth overdrive and not all that "musical". It's not so bad that I think it's actually broken - it's just not the sweetly warm distortion that I was sorta hoping to get a taste of.

So before I go replacing tubes by trial & error trying to sweeten it up, I was wondering if anybody had any words of wisdom??? (Besides "Sell that Red-Knob POS!! Which I'm not gonna do even though I see 'em go for $600+ on e-bay nowadays). I'd love to get some suggestions as to which tubes y'all have had good luck with and which you haven't.


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Posted: Tue Apr 22, 2008 10:50 am
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Hey man, I've got one of those too! I got mine 2nd hand too - it's hard to get good reliable info isn't it?

The black knobs thing - I read somewhere that these amps had a few glitches and were discontinued in '94, but the last run (circa '95) were tidied up and much improved, and were given black knobs because the reds were unpopular and associated with duff amps... this could be complete s*** of course - you know how reliable the net is!! I like to believe it's true though and the performance from this amp has been nothing but world class for me.

As far as the distortion goes, mine is a ****ing monster!!! :twisted: It's totally amazing!! It should also give you massive flexibility as it has a lot of tone shaping options. It was basically Fender's answer to modern late 80s early 90s high gain amps from Marshall/ Mesa Boogie etc. It took the already popular Twin sounds and gave you more gain to play with. With all the notches, boosts and other funky stuff on the pull out dials you could get a thousand sounds out of it.

All I know is mine is awesome in every sense. The distortion channel is every bit as overkill-loud as the clean, maybe a bit more so, and it's a thick, extremely musical distortion with great response. You can soften it for a bluesy crunch or go straight balls out with it and take the roof off. It's a very rich, very smooth, driving sound that you should be getting. If you scoop out the mids it goes a bit 90s metal (think Metallica, Nirvana etc - very cool to play with).

I think you are on the right track with the tubes, especially if it has taken a hefty knock. Don't mess about though get the best tubes you can because trust me you will get every penny back out in tone from this amp. At least you will eliminate possibility of damaged tubes if nothing else.

Worst case scenario is that you spend a bit on the tubes, they don't help, and you are left with a bunch of brand new tubes to put in whatever you get after you sell the amp...!

I'd also get a multimeter and check the output tube balance/ bias (on the back) because if this is set incorrectly it will often ruin the tone (or the amp)! If it's off and you can't reset it then your output tubes are boned.

Don't be afraid to really explore that drive channel though because there are LOADS of options in there. If you can't get the sound you are looking for then there's something fishy.

I'm a big Marshall fan too and I have a 100W JCM2000 stack (a beast) which I love too, but The Twin blows it away. It always gives sound engineers a bit of a fright too which is always fun! It's my secret weapon, for use especially on the bigots who love to look down their nose at you for bringing a Fender amp to a gig! I love sending them home, partially deaf, with their tails between their legs, trying to fit their stacks in their cars...

I always get probed after gigs and rehearsals by other guitarists about what pedals I'm using etc and no-one believes that it's all amp tone - seriously! I use a lot of pedals but I never use distortions or amp models live - it's all amp and usually it's all Twin.

I wouldn't trade it for anything. It's a real gem and I consider it a lucky find. Get some new tubes and hopefully it will give you the same joys as mine has given me.

Good luck!


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