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GK MB Fusion 500 - tubes choice

Killed_by_Death

Killed_by_Death

Snaggletooth
Inactive
Jan 2, 2015
24,890
61,257
14 Megameters from Groong Tehp
#1
Yesterday I was the recipient of a used MB Fusion 500.
I plugged it in & thought how farty it sounded with overdrive.
Today I took the lid off & got a look at the tubes, expecting to find some off-brand no-name Chinese stuff, but they were all JJ tubes.
Yeah, I know they're still Chinese, but they're quite popular.

After fooling around with different settings on the amp, I finally gave up and plugged my Tone Hammer pre-amp into the return jack, and it was pure bliss!

I've got two Tung-Sols or two Shuguang I could swap into the Fusion, but I doubt that will get me a Tone Hammer timbre.

I'm a little surprised that a non-tube pre-amp sounds more tubey to me than a real tube pre-amp.

Any ideas on some tubes I could put in there to take the fartiness out & get closer to the Tone Hammer timbre?

Or am I barking up the wrong tree, so to speak?
It's days like these that I wish I'd done what a few told me way back when & just kept the MB200 & put the Tone Hammer pre-amp in front of it.
 
#6
Killed_by_Death said:
Yeah, I really enjoy it when people call my a rig a pile of crap.
Click to expand...
Sorry but having to use an external preamp to make your MB200 sound like a TH-XXX is a bit of a MacGyver IMO. OTOH I do something like that at a couple (four?) of my rehearsal spots where there is some POS bass amp already there - I can get an OK tone running my $50 Zoom B1on as a front end. I'd probably better enjoy a Tone Hammer pedal but for just rehearsals I'm not going to buy something that expensive that I'll never use live or with one of my proper rehearsal rigs. I have my own rigs at two spots.

Reading your many posts it sounded like you have enough carp you can sell to get the head you really want but my apologies if you have to make do with what you have - been there, done that LOL.
 
#7
A MB200 with a Tone Hammer would have gotten me where I wanted a year ago, and now I'm wasting a tube pre-amp in the Fusion if I'm just going to bypass it with the Tone Hammer.

Maybe I'll just sell the MB Fusion ASAP & stick with my under-powered 18 watt Hughes & Kettner tube amp.
 
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#8
Killed_by_Death said:
Yesterday I was the recipient of a used MB Fusion 500.
I plugged it in & thought how farty it sounded with overdrive.
Today I took the lid off & got a look at the tubes, expecting to find some off-brand no-name Chinese stuff, but they were all JJ tubes.
Yeah, I know they're still Chinese, but they're quite popular.
Click to expand...

AFAIK JJ tubes are of Slovakian production. Personally, I've never found them to be much better or worse than any number of Russian or ROC produced brands though, in any case.

I've only messed around with a friend's MBF 500 for a couple of hours, but my impression was that it's very different in voicing from the Tone Hammer thing. I kind of doubt that tube rolling will get you where you want to go, personally. Hopefully I'm wrong though...
Yel_wink.gif
 
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#9
I've ordered a 5.5mm nut driver to get the tubes out, and then I'll try putting the Tung-Sols in V1 & V2.
While I'm at it, I'll probably try the JJs in the pre of my Hughes & Kettner amp.
If that doesn't get me what I'm after then I'll try the Chinese Shuguang that came in the H&K.

Considering that probably won't have much of an affect, then it's time to sell it or just always run the Tone Hammer into the return.
I'd much rather have that little MB200 in that case though. I could literally just strap the Tone Hammer onto the top of the MB200, LOL!
Maybe it's time to revisit my thread about the tiniest amps & just choose the smallest one.
 
#10
I think the Fusion versions of the MB's are quite nice and little smoother sounding and more harmonically rich than the MB counterparts I own. Is it possible that with the amp being new to you, you just haven't found the right combination of knobs to get what you're looking for?

I play clean almost 100% of the time so I'm pretty useless here in terms of how to get the grit you're looking for, but from what I know about those heads in general I'm a little surprised. Pushing the gain should get you a pretty decent sound.

At least you have TH to help out in the mean time. However, I would say that if the TH tone is what you're liking, I typically find the MB's and the TH to be anchoring opposite ends on the tonal spectrum. Good luck!
 
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#12
Fiddling with the thing was my whole day. Presence on, Deep on, Presence + Deep on, Contour at zero, Contour maxed at 800hz, maxed at 500hz, Contour at noon, 3 o'clock, limiter on.
I can't think of any iteration I didn't try, but I will have another look at the EQ settings tomorrow. I'm not at all capable of making adjustments to an EQ that make sense.
 
#13
Killed_by_Death said:
Fiddling with the thing was my whole day. Presence on, Deep on, Presence + Deep on, Contour at zero, Contour maxed at 800hz, maxed at 500hz, Contour at noon, 3 o'clock, limiter on.
I can't think of any iteration I didn't try, but I will have another look at the EQ settings tomorrow. I'm not at all capable of making adjustments to an EQ that make sense.
Click to expand...
...been there, done that more times than I want to admit to!

Once you're chasing/compensating for EQ side effects with more EQ and the knobs are starting to get to extremes, I find it's essentially hopeless. I would say to start neutral with the EQ and see if you can get a combination of gain and master that gives you the basic OD characteristics you're looking for, and then carefully add or subtract a touch of EQ to get a tonal shape that sounds good to your ear.

The setting you like on the TH pedal may give you clue where to start working with the GK's EQ options. I find the GK EQ to be very powerful and therefore very easy to get things unbalanced before I know it. In any event, I hope you can get there without tube rolling.
 
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#16
Killed_by_Death said:
Completely flat on the Tone Hammer, all eq knobs to noon.
Click to expand...
AGS on I would presume, and gain somewhere around 9 - noon? With the AGS on and lower gain you get a roll off of the upper frequencies sort of like a vintage cab as best I recall. If you keep your TH EQ controls all at noon, then what you get as the gain control is increased with AGS on is a more and more mid focused OD type tone (at some point it becomes boxy/nasal sounding and really begs for some EQ). Since you said it sounded warm to you, I will assume you had the gain below noon.

If you like the TH in this fairly neutral EQ configuration with some AGS gain, then I suspect what you're not liking about the GK alone is the treble/high end and maybe high mids that are making the GK OD a little bright/harsh. Somewhere in that confusing mass of information may be the key to getting the GK to sound a bit more like what you enjoy with the TH. I hope that's useful!
 
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#17
RoadRanger said:
Sorry but having to use an external preamp to make your MB200 sound like a TH-XXX is a bit of a MacGyver IMO. OTOH I do something like that at a couple (four?) of my rehearsal spots where there is some POS bass amp already there - I can get an OK tone running my $50 Zoom B1on as a front end. I'd probably better enjoy a Tone Hammer pedal but for just rehearsals I'm not going to buy something that expensive that I'll never use live or with one of my proper rehearsal rigs. I have my own rigs at two spots.

Reading your many posts it sounded like you have enough carp you can sell to get the head you really want but my apologies if you have to make do with what you have - been there, done that LOL.
Click to expand...

There's nothing "MacGyver" about running your preferred preamp into a power amp, which is exactly what he would be doing if he plugged into the FX return of the MB200.

The OP is totally right, he'd already found the sound he wanted but just ended up going a needless tone quest.

Killed_by_Death said:
Yeah, I really enjoy it when people call my a rig a pile of crap.
Click to expand...

OP, if you dig the sound of your Tone Hammer, just sell the MB500 and pick up a Crest Prolite 2.0: you'll be all set :thumbsup:
 
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#18
I'm personally curious to hear your reports on how the tube swaps change the sound, as I have the same head. Also curious what you need to do to access the tubes in there. Looked under the hood once and it looked like a pain.
 
#19
Killed_by_Death said:
...

After fooling around with different settings on the amp, I finally gave up and plugged my Tone Hammer pre-amp into the return jack, and it was pure bliss!

...
Click to expand...
You got a pure bliss tone with the gear that you have. So why are you still screwing around worrying about switching tubes, getting another amp and the usual yada, yada, yada?

edit: not trying to sound rude
 
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