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Amp techs who seem to hate amps.

#43
I wouldve taken it that he was actually afraid of working on your amp. The Fender 300 is an excellent peice of HEAVY gear, but its probably one of the most complex ciruited tube amps out there. He probably hates working on anything that is more sophisticated than a homemade radio.
 
#44
Mild thread hijack but I had a similar situation when I went to go take bass lessons.

I was a fairly new guitarist with maybe 3 or 4 years of being 95% self taught. Well I needed a bass so I picked up what I could afford at the time which ended up being the then new Squier II P-bass in black, no pick guard, and a maple neck and board. Anyway when I went in for the lesson the teacher had a top of the line Fender P Special and I received no end of crap about owning a POS bass. Um sorry dude I'm 15 what the hell do you expect?! I don't have a job much less the cash for a "REAL" bass.

Well here it is years later and I have better gear, but attitudes like that bug the ---- out of me. Especially in the OP's case.
 
#45
Jim Campbell said:
i've known bike mechanics like that.....they used to have so much fun showing the bolt on biker crowd that the 400 dollar performance part they just bought was actually reducing horsepower.....but these guys could go into their machine shop and make anything you needed,for way less than the cheapo stamped out crap that harley sold....one guy's favorite line was "the box that this came in is the best part of this pos"....
Click to expand...

i like that line. ;)

one of the things i used to say:
customer: "can you fix my amp?"
me: "i'll fix it like no one's fixed it." :)
 
#46
Folks, reality check time.....

1) Amp techs, and their ilk are not usually the fun loving party animal types...... in fact thay have a tendency to be anti-social.

2) Customers who think they have been done down have a tendency to roar and shout sometimes, calling names and once in a while needing the police called. (I worked in a shop back when dirt was clean, it ain't any better now, I'm betting). Mostly it's when they don't want to pay the bill, but it does vary.

3) After a few rude, loud, and demanding customers, anyone begins to get a bad attitude.......

4) Even for an anti-social tech, it's generally considered rude to diss on the customer's stuff, unless you do it politely for specific reasons... we had some brands and models we frankly told customers they should get rid of, AND the reasons for it.

5) A lot of techs are not such hot players (but some are really really good), so their opinions may be a little "disregardable", shall we say......... If you for some unknowable reason, are still playing a Marlboro amp (did they make any bass amps? I don't remember), and like it, that's your thing, and you don't have to listen to, accept, or "take" the abuse if you don't want to. Vote with your feet if you don't like it. Elsewise, let it roll off.....
 
#47
My old (retired) car tech is like that. Some customer feel insulted when he isn't trying to be rude. But if he really dislike the customer, he wouldn't say a thing.

I have learned to look pass merely the demeanor, and focus on the result and real substantial action. My day trade in the advertising and PR business taught that much.

It's interesting that nobody bother to bring up whether the OP ask the tech WHY he thinks negatively of the amp, and what the tech consider worthy.

Just because somebody brings up a point that doesn't agree with yours, albeit bluntly, does not mean you should dismiss it immediately. Note that by no mean am I encouraging anti-social behavior.
 
#51
i had to share this story, which is related to my prior post

after hearing me talk about my tech on a few occasions, my good friend bought a brand new leftie Gibson SG...when i mentioned to him that he ought to take it by the tech to have it set up since he bought from MF, he said, "yeah i'll do that next time i'm nearby"...a few month pass, and when i visit again, i pick up his SG and notice it's still in need of a setup, which involved some nut filing that i didn't have the tools to do at the time, so i mentioned again that the tech would set it up and have it playing in tune for him, which it wasn't doing due to high nut slots--he said then, "man, i'm just afraid to take it to him because i don't want him to tell me it's a POS!"

i guess the moral of the story is that the tech could be a little more eloquent in his explanations of bad instruments!

on the flip side, his knowledge and assistance has saved me a lot of trouble and money in the long run, even if it cost me a few $$ in the short term, because i learned how to sight a neck well (what to look for and how to look) and learned, after many years of cheaping out with ss guitar amps, that the sound i was chasing was simply an old single channel marshall amp, which i could have bought twice with what i'd spent on cheaper ss amps that either broke or i sold after not being able to get what i wanted from them
 
#54
hdracer said:
I would have turned around and drove home. After telling him what he could do to himself. I know that if someone goes into a job thinking it is a POS he will work on it likes its a POS
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There's something to that but it's not the old-school techs fault. When they're looking at your amp, they're not thinking about "fender" or "ampeg" sound, they're thinking about the little parts of the circuit that make it sound the way it does and like any engineer/mad scientist/whatever, they're picking it apart in their minds looking for flaws and possible improvements and likely they've seen other amps like that with the same/similair problems.

Could they be more diplomatic about it?...sure. Would a good diplomat make a good amp tech?...probably not.
 
#55
johnk_10 said:
as a tech i understand why he doesn't care for the Bassman 300 pro.
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This probably tells you all you need to know. It's not a knock against the 300Pro, I've played them, heard other guys play them and they sound great.....doesn't mean they can be worked on easily.

A Ferrari is a great car to drive. Ever tried to fix one? You'll think differently.
 
#56
I've never actually met my amp tech in person. He hides at the back of the shop. I drop my amp off with the front of the house, I leave, a few days later I get a call from Tim saying I'm good to come get it.

I almost like it better that way... he seems really cool over the phone.
 
#57
johnk_10 said:
as a tech i understand why he doesn't care for the Bassman 300 pro.
Click to expand...

Could you elaborate on this a bit please (for my own educational purposes). I know very little of the workings of amps I just make sure I know how to treat and look after my equipment. One of the things he said to me was 'these heads are full of crap they don't need' he was specifically refering to the LEDs that tell you if the tubes are ok.

I don't really care if he hates the 300PRO as long as he works on it well. I play it, lug it around and I'm obviously going to pay him for his work.
I understand why people are telling me this is normal and I should get over it but I'm not really that offended I just admit to being a bit of an equipment freak and love to hear about, play, discuss and learn about bass amps. It just left me feeling a bit deflated thats all.
 
#58
I think I can speak for johnK_10 here:
like the Marshall 2000 series is a barsteward to work on, everything that goes wrong is on the lowest board in the stack as you look at the guts
and it is just so awkward to take the thing apart with all those board interconnects still in place you can take the top cover off and try to get at the power amp board and tube sockets that way
with it all hanging there like an exploded concertina half upside down but in comparison with fixing an old marshall or fender bassman 50, hiwatt anything.. and any old orange or matamp????.
Marshall 2000's are an utter ergonomic pig and I gave up on marshall stock transformers in favor of mercury fatstack or sowter replacements long ago, also discarding the belton plastic valve bases in favor of ceramic and cutting the crappy pcb away between the tracks of pin 2 and three on the octals with a dremmel tool to stop the crap from carbon tracking.
Oh and drilling the top panel and pcb for ventilation holes
to stop the caps and valve bases from baking.
You see I haven't said anything rude about fender 300's:bassist:
PS So far!:spit:
PPS Now the the fender 400PS there, right there was an amp fit for heroes!
 

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