Rocket with reverb for James "Honky tonk" Carother

[RJ Guitars]

I've been building up an amp for local hometown boy that has taken his show to Nashville and is doing quite well. http://www.jamescarothers.com/

A couple years back when he was a regular working dog like me he sent me an email and asked if I could put new guts in either his Line 6 amp or a solid state Marshall combo amp he had. He wanted something similar to an old Fender blackface with reverb.

It took me a while to get to this but the first thing I found was that I had a donor amp already but it didn't fit into either of his donor cabinets. I started with an old Rocket build that I had put together a few years back... https://tubeamparchive.com/viewtopic.php?t=6405 and rebuilt it then added reverb.

Im putting the final touches on a combo cabinet and 'll get some photos posted up over the next couple days. I'll be in Nashville next week to hand deliver it and take in a live show with James and his band.

There were some challenges and demons I had to conquer and I'll share the story on those a bit later as well.

[M Fowler]

Nice looking amp rj I bet it sounds great.

I've got several Rockets doing duty in Nashville as well

[ampmike]

His music is great,Been listening this morning.Thats great RJ !!!!Have a great trip.Mikey

[RJ Guitars]

Hey thanks guys, we are in Amarillo Texas this morning... heading east. The amp real came out nice and it sounds like it was made for country music... since it was sorta designed around a Tele when Ken Fisher created it i spose that all makes sense.

A couple technical details... the reverb works awesome but finding a place for the tank was a challenge. The natural place for it is in the bottom of the cab. However it was too close to the transformers and wanted to hum along when i played. I had to put it on the side, which worked but was tight for space. It was also hard to isolate the tank from vibrations. Ultimately it was best when i used long hookup wires and set it about a foot away from the amp... which defeats the compact combo idea. Ill be working on a shielded tank idilation box to swap out later.

I akso got some ugly hum from a brand new set of Voskhad 12AX7's that took me too long to figure out.

I'll pass this on to James in a couple days and it will get the real test.

[RJ Guitars]

A couple photos...

[Ron Worley]

Why not put the reverb pan on the bottom floor in a bag, it worked for Leo!

[RJ Guitars]

I'm not sure how the older Fender reverb pans differ from this "MOD" unit, I started with it sitting in the bottom in a reverb bag, but it hummed anywhere i put it until I moved it vertical along the side opposite of the transformers. I also found it was less resonate using isolation mounts than it was in the bag... it didn't all make sense to me but i went with the best results. If i build anything else with spring reverb, I'll do some experimental work with other reverb pans, shielding, and isolation.

[norburybrook]

RJ, I have a 1970 Bandmaster reverb head and that has the pan mounted on the bottom of the cabinet, which as it's only a head is quite close compared to a combo. It is taller than a standard head though for that reason, as I believe it was noisy in the standard size head when they tried it.



Marcus

[M Fowler]

Reverb pans are weird, some will cause hum and others no problem at all.

Take a look at this pan in my Reverb Rocket head, zero issues since built and this head was gigged steady for years. I don't understand why it's noiseless when other times I can't get the hum out no matter where the pan goes in head style. Combos are more forgiving since we have more space.

The rj Rockster Reverb combo I built works very well with pan on bottom top photo.

Mark

[RJ Guitars]

Greetings from Memphis... watched a great local band at BB Kings club last night. Great sounding Gibson hollowbody with soap bars.

Yeah, I've got my own Rockster Reverb combo that uses the same reverb pan and its happy enough. I had initially built it as a head and it hummed just a bit but it was really a tight fit.

I'm also considering a Belton Solid State module for future projects. Has anyone done that against a Rocket style preamp? I am curious if they need a recovery stage?

[cbass]

Alright very cool about your amp going big time .
Be careful out there avoid the law when in arkinsaw .

[RJ Guitars]

If you haven't been to Nashville during CMA week, them you'll need adjust your definitions of: loud, hot, and crowded... not to mention "good guitar player". Telecaster is certainly "the guitar" around here, probably 10 to 1 over everything else.

I had a great time and got to see my buddy James play a couple times. He shared the stage with some legends on Wednesday and then played at George Jones' club last night. It was great to see/hear the amp in action.

Back to memphis tonight and slowly making my way back to reality these next few days.

[kwijabo]

congrats on the amp, RJ.

Telecaster is certainly "the guitar" around here, probably 10 to 1 over everything else.

that's interesting. seems to me like modern country radio features LP's way more than anything else, but on the ground sounds like the tele still reigns king.

[xtian]

...Nashville during CMA week...I had a great time and got to see my buddy James play a couple times...Back to memphis tonight

Wow! What a dream. Joy.

[RJ Guitars]

Went to Graceland and then the STAX soulville museum in Memphis today. Was quite cool... I was a little surprised to see that Elvis played a Martin acoustic in the early days.

Again, tele's were everywhere. They had a blonde tele that was supposed to be Ike Turners... it was odd because it was a fairly new looking Squire. I believe STAX closed long before those came out but maybe he bought one at guitar center before he passed away back in 06?