Why do Peavey Steel amps need mods, in the first place??

James Morehead · From: Prague, Oklahoma, USA - R.I.P.

Curiosity has got me. Ok, Seems like I hear that most folks who buy a new Nashville 112, or other Peavey amp, have the Brown Burr mod done right away, or soon after purchase?? Why doesn't Peavey just do that at the factory?? Or are there more folks who do NOT do the mod?? My limited understanding is that the first Session 400's and 500's and LTD's and Nashville 400's sounded great out of the box, voiced for steel. So I'm curious why the newer steel amps need mods to sound like the old, first issue amps---Why doesn't Peavey just make 'em like the originals?

Jay Yuskaitis · From: Massachusetts, USA

As a Twin Reverb user, I've always wondered, myself, why the modifications? I've been thinking about a Nashville 112 for the weight reduction, hopefully this will enlighten me.
Jay Y.

Jack Ritter · From: Enid, Oklahoma, USA

i have never updated any of the Peavey amps that i have had or now have and they have all sounded great to me. i am playing the n-112 thru my new revelation pre-amp rack assy and it does a super job. i am either going to get another n-112 or maybe the TC split box. i haven't decided which as yet, but i won't be without a n-112.--either way. jack

Dave Mudgett · From: Central Pennsylvania and Gallatin, Tennessee

I think it's too much to expect that everybody will like exactly the same voicing in an amp. Mods have been a part of the guitar amp world for decades now, and there have been various steel amp mods going back to the NV 400.

I like the way my NV 112 sounds the way it is, so I haven't messed with mine.

Eddie Freeman · From: Natchez Mississippi

James..I have a 112 and a nv400, while I like the sound I get from the 112 and do not feel I need to do anything to it,my 400 had a sound that a lot of players call "honk". Anyway,I couldnt get "that sound" I was looking for.I had Ken Fox do the mod and it definatly improved the sound,But the biggest change was in the reverb. It had a much cleaner sound,and to my ears,produced a clearer tone. Dont know if this helps to answer your question or not, but I am glad I got the mod on my 400. E

Steve English · From: Baja, Arizona

It’s my belief that everything’s constantly evolving. Change is eminent. As much as many of us would prefer to enjoy the past and present for just a few more minutes, in reality, as I write the future is rapidly becoming the past and the present is but a fleeting moment. Thank goodness for those that tinker, modify, and innovate. They are constantly striving to explore the “what if’.

I would argue that all of James’ initial questions could be answered with: They were all the products of the moment. All a basic business designs meant to meet a targeted audience and produced in a manner to show a profit. There is no such thing as “the ultimate” anything. As soon as the idea is out of one person’s brain, it becomes the object for improvement, or at the minimum, change by another’s alterations.

Enjoy the show. It’s not only the best one playing, but also the longest running………
_________________
Always remember you're unique..... Just like everyone else

Jack Stoner · From: Kansas City, MO

The only Peavey Steel Guitar amp that really "needed" a modification was the Nashville 400's that used the 1501 speaker. The mod takes the amp that was designed for a different speaker (with a different response curve) and "revoices" the amp for the 1501 speaker. This mod, first introduced by John Lemay ultimately was adopted by Peavey (less one capacitor that the Lemay mod used) and eventually made an engineering change to production in the fall of 96.

The OPA2604 chips were a late addition to the Nashville 400 mod kit. These are a superior analog chip, but it can change the sound, compared to the original chips. Whether this is a positive or negative depends on the person. I tried the OPA2604's in my Nashville 112 and didn't like it, as the Nashville 112 no longer sounded like a Nashville 112. I played two gigs with the mod installed and could never get what I wanted for sound so I removed them and put the original chips back in the amp.

As a former amp tech (I ran the Ampeg factory repair center in Nashville in the early 70's) other than the certain version of the Nashville 400, I see no need for any "modification". The amps are great the way they are designed.

The Lemay "mod kit" for the original model Session 400's (with discrete components) was not really a "mod kit". All it did was refresh (replace) all the electrolytic caps on the preamp board with new ones. This type of reworking is very beneficial to many older amps (any amp, not just Peavey) and is a major component of Ken Fox's mods (along with other components he replaces).

Jim Cohen · From: Philadelphia, PA

So far, it seems from the poll that most people do NOT mod their Peavey steel amps, so that might explain why it's not done at the factory. (Of course, it could simply be that most players don't want the cost and hassle of sending their amps somewhere to be modded. I know that, for me, the very thought of packing my amp up to be shipped is unthinkable!)

But, it raises another question in my mind. Almost EVERYBODY I know (and we could do another poll on this to see if it holds up) cuts the mid-range on their Peavey steel amps very significantly. This has been true in every Peavey steel amp I've ever known. So, why has Peavey not taken that to heart and just re-set the mid-range on their steel amps to account for this? Perhaps Mike Brown can enlighten us on that?

Jack Stoner · From: Kansas City, MO

Jim that is only on the amp models with the Parametric EQ.

However, I don't cut mine "very significantly". In most cases I have the cut set at about -2. I've set it that way in the Session 500 I had, the Nashville 400 I had and in the Nashville 1000 and 112 that I have now. A fixed amount would not work for everyone.

James Morehead · From: Prague, Oklahoma, USA - R.I.P.

Jack, Is the parametric eq in the newer PV's or the older ones?

Dave Mudgett · From: Central Pennsylvania and Gallatin, Tennessee

I'm not Jack, but my understanding is that they both use a semi-parametric EQ for the mids, but that the Session/LTD 400 is passive and that the Session 400, NV 500, 1000, 112 are active. This thread started by Brad Sarno talks about the frequency response of the old Session/LTD 400 midrange filter: http://steelguitarforum.com/Forum11/HTML/003822.html

A passive control has no "active" circuit elements like tubes or transistors - things that can amplify - and hence can only attenuate the response at various frequencies. An active control must have active circuit elements, and can either amplify or attenuate the response at various frequencies.

I use the term "semi-parametric" EQ. A parametric type of EQ is a band-pass or band-cut filter. It's called fully "parametric" if it controls these three filter variables: center frequency, amount of cut/boost, and bandwidth of the cut/boost. A "semi-parametric" filter controls only center frequency and amount of cut/boost. For example, see here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parametric_equalization - but this is pretty standard terminology.

I have an old LTD 400 (same guts as a Session 400 in a smaller box), Session 500, and Nashville 112. I really prefer the tone of the Nashville 112. To my understanding, when the EQ is set flat, it's really flat - i.e., has unity gain at all frequencies. I don't care for that sound with my steels with modern highly wound pickups, but the wide-ranging active EQ allows me to shape the tone pretty much any way I want to. The flat sound is impossible on something like a Twin Reverb or even the Session 400, which have some midrange cut at any setting.

Why would I prefer that? Well, for example, my jazz guitar prefers a very flat setting, perhaps even with a bit of midrange and bass boost. So the NV 112 is a very versatile amp - it works great for anything I do that requires a clean sound. And if I want a not-so-clean sound, I just put a Pod or other modeler in front of it. Same if I want a more Fender-type sound.

I agree that it requires a different mindset than the old "plug it in and it works" approach. But I want something that can be easily adapted to steel, various types of guitars including baritone, or banjo onstage and be changed in an instant, without carrying a bunch of amps or tons of outboard gear.

All my opinions, of course.

Donny Hinson · From: Glen Burnie, Md. U.S.A.

James, here's the scoop...

Peavey makes a good amp. Many people just aren't happy with their sound, though, so they modify their amps to get something different. Most of these "mods" on solid-state amps go back to the time (about a decade ago) when Peavey had deliberately limited the bass response in their amps in order to reduce speaker failures. This gave their amps a "honky sound" characteristic, and players eventually got wind of this and had their old amps modified...first with John LeMay's kit, and later, with a "Peavey Authorized" kit. This mod (let's call it a "tone restoration" mod) was very significant, sound-wise, so much so that Peavey started including it in all their steel amps. The result, of course, was that many players (even nowadays) think that some very significant gains can be had by modifying their amps.

In truth, the modern Peavey amps are much better, tonally, and the gains to be realized by modding them aren't nearly as significant. These newer mods cost money, and Peavey probably won't spend extra money on further "mods" unless the market demands them.

Robert Harper · From: Alabama, USA

I would like to hear more about settin the EQ. I use an old as in old like me Peavy Bandit. Go ahead laugh, Its paid for

Robert Harper · From: Alabama, USA

Now that you have had your laugh, i recently bought an MSA single neck E9, good guitar, but man the highs on the 3,4,5th string are hih especially at the 8t fret. so I am kinda looking into toning it down some what.

Sonny Priddy · From: Elizabethtown, Kentucky, USA, R.I.P.

I Have Never Had Mods In Any Of My Peavey Amps Don't Need It I Get The Sound I Want Without It. SONNY.

Brad Sarno · From: St. Louis, MO USA

Personally, I find that nearly all commercially sold electronics could use some improvement. It's the nature of mass manufacturing and cost minimization to settle with average quality components here and there. A design may be great, but its implementation may be mediocre. Generally I find that this applies to capacitor and opamp choices. Corporate bean counters will always choose the 5 cent cap over the 75 cent cap. They'll always choose the 25 cent opamp over the 4 dollar opamp. That's just business. But I'm a compulsive tweaker, and it's hard for me to resist the desire to unleash an amp's potential by giving it the best guts I can put in there. A new Nashville 112 is really great and evolved amp design. Brilliant people and years of refinement behind those amps. Really that 112 is full of excellence throughout, but when it comes to the component choices, I cringe when I see all those little yellow ceramic/monolithic cap's in the audio path and in the tone sections. I modded my personal NV112 the week I got it. The fact that those amps sound so good with all those crapacitors in there is a real testiment to the design. But I can't imagine anyone truly defending the use of those caps for sonic reasons. The improvement by replacing them is undeniable to anyone with ears. I never did the opamp mod, but I'm curious. I feel that the bottom-of-the-barrel audio caps is by far the weak link and first place for upgrading. But a friendly bit of advice, if you choose to get into re-capping the audio path of a NV112, be super careful. The boards are also made much more cheaply these days compared to a NV400 or Session 400 which had very rugged traces. The tiny, thin traces on the new boards are extremely fragile, and in my modding I had to repair many broken traces along the way.

Even the older series of amps like the NV400 had a number of stages that used aluminum caps for coupling, and in the tone section lots of ceramic was used. This is a cost consideration by a large corporation, not a sonic consideration by an engineer seeking the best sound. It's one of those mentalities that's says it's good enough for your average Joe and it keeps the costs down. Leo Fender was no different in his day. It's the difference between mass produced stuff and boutique stuff. For me, knowing that the designs are so good in these amps, I sort of feel like I'm honoring the design teams by bringing the ultimate potential of these amps to life with the cap upgrade mods.

I see two aspects to the modding. One was to re-voice the low end of a NV400 to reduce the honk. Those small cab's didn't always reveal the super low end of what a speaker was doing, so speakers got hurt. So I understand why Peavey may have limited the low end response in the pre-modded design. But I also see the desire to open it up with a mod kit. The other aspect of modding is simply improving the quality of the audio path. That's my general focus on modding stock amps, leaving the design alone trusting that the engineers knew what they were doing, but then over-riding the bean counters and going the extra mile and putting good components in the audio path. Quite often this kind of upgrading breathes tremendous life into an amp. Just read the reactions to Ken Fox's "intense" mods on the NV400's. Nothing but rave reviews from what I've seen.

Brad

James Morehead · From: Prague, Oklahoma, USA - R.I.P.

Great perspective, Brad!!

Kevin Hatton · From: Buffalo, N.Y.

Brad says it all. He knows. Great post.

Randy Beavers · From: Lebanon,TN 37090

When I was a teenager I was doing "mods" on my car trying to get extra horsepower out of them, so I guess it's only the natural progression that I would try to "hot rod" my amps and such.

Ernest Cawby · From: Lake City, Florida, USA, R.I.P.

When Ken replaced the parts in my 112 at quitman the other nite I could press the volume pedal all the way down and no noise at all before the amp had noise. I like the modded 112 very much.

ernie

Duane Dunard · From: Troy, MO. U.S.A.

I'm absolutely for the mod kit in a Nash-112. No question that it improved my tone. However, when I installed the mod chips in a Nash-1000, I heard no real improvment.

Mike Brown · From: Meridian, Mississippi USA

When a product is mass produced, a company hopes that that design is purchased by the "masses". However, there is also competitive companies who hope for the same results, ie; selling a lot of that product. It's common sense ie; make it affordable, make it sound good and have a good marketing plan to make these things happen.

Brad has the idea/concept of mass production, but he is an engineer who wants to make a product sound better. To do this on a massive basis, one has to have buying power. On the other hand, I believe that he knows that he would have to increase the price of one of his modified products if he continued to market his products on a small scale. No problem with this. On the other hand, if someone went into mass production, they would need capital to pay the massive workforce. Nothing wrong with this either. It's just a way of doing business in the marketplace.

I invite you to read the article from our website concerning Peavey's growth as a musical instrument manufacturer. Fender has changed hands a few times since Leo's days, but Peavey is still under the same ownership for the past 42 years. Here is a link to the article;
http://www.peavey.com/support/corporate/

By the way, we introduced our mod kits so that our customers could update their steel amps for a "reasonable" cost. We're here for the long run and will continue to design and build the best steel products at a reasonable price.

Mike Brown
Peavey USA

Dave Mudgett · From: Central Pennsylvania and Gallatin, Tennessee

I would really like to see a Peavey amp line with upgraded components - capacitors, chips, sturdier PC boards or point-to-point wiring, and solid wood cabinets - but especially I would like to see better PC boards so component mods would be easier as Brad mentions. That alone would eliminate the biggest of my concerns. Right now, I'm not patient enough to go in there and mess with those fragile boards.

Still, I think they are making some very good-sounding amps, and comparable in quality to what companies like Fender, Marshall, and Vox are doing, but at a more competitive price. I got a Valve King 112, and I think it is very innovative and quite a bit better than what its competitors are doing for quite a bit more money - to my personal tastes. On the NV 112, I don't think there is anybody out there with anything comparable - size, power, sound, and cost, all together. I think it's a bit unrealistic to think they should drop the type of thinking that lead to this amp.

The bottom line is that there has to be a significant market that will pay a significant upcharge for a large company to mass-produce closer to what boutique makers are doing. With Peavey's buying power and innovative approach, I would think they could in fact bring in such an amp at a significantly lower cost than many competitors. I also think there is a market for that, but that's not my call, nor would I attempt to tell them how to market their amps. I do know that I would be very interested in such an amp - a Peavey "Maserati", so to speak. But it would need to really address the issues that the boutique makers have turned into a cottage industry. Fender, Marshall, and Vox have all turned out expensive point-to-point wired boutique-style amps. I'd really like to see what Peavey could do with a steel amp in that vein, using their common-sense approach to keep the costs out of the stratosphere. But they do have to stay in the real world of business. All my opinions, of course.

James Morehead · From: Prague, Oklahoma, USA - R.I.P.

Dave, Good thoughts. Perhaps a Peavey "special order" shop or "custom shop"? That might be a great way for Peavey to "test the waters", so to speak. Mike B., any thoughts along those lines?

I know Peavey's prices are always a great bang for the buck. I also know that there are a lot of players who might be interested in spending a little higher price for that "special sort of amp".

rpetersen · From: Iowa

I think this comes down to Peavey makes a Great product for the money and most are happy with it - Others, including myself has tried mods and have been very happy with them - But how many steel players have you ever found that was totally pleased with his sound????

Forum Index > Electronics	Goto page 1, 2 Next	Next oldest topic :: Next newest topic