The Painted Poodle is Home!

[tpappano]

Here it is in my living room, finally. The A102 and Leslie 245, other junk is a Korg D888 recorder with Crown active crossover and D75 amps bi-amping JBL Control 25s and a Design Acoustics sub.

[tiredoldgeezer]

Not THAT'S a living room!

Looks sweet.

[tpappano]

Thanks! 8)

[tiredoldgeezer]

Now, is everything rockin' bone stock?
Or do you have some inside tricks to go with the outside finish?

I happen to like the finish, BTW.
Especially with the Mediterranean legs. (Is that the style?)

[tpappano]

French Provincial, I think. The black paint happened way back. They apparently used spray cans then added what appeared to be polyurethane on top. I was able to peel most of the poly off with my fingers, which greatly reduced the glare. It came off in sheets, not bonded to the paint at all. It really doesn't look bad if you are a few feet away 8) I also built a custom speaker grill arrangement. The original was clogged with paint and rattled and buzzed.

When I got the organ it sounded pretty bad. The Leslie was stuck on fast, and was being driven by the organ's speaker amp which had a bad 6BQ5. The bad tube caused asymmetrical clipping at relatively low volume, which was fairly unpleasant. The TG caps were well out of tolerance, reducing the high notes with the result that low notes might overdrive while the high ones would be too soft. So, I recapped the TG which helped immensely. As far as actual “mods”, I disabled two caps in the speaker amp to flatten its response, which perked up the high end when using the organ speakers. I also reconfigured the Leslie to be driven directly from the preamp, which also sounded better. I added a line out jack and that's pretty much it. Now it can pretty much blow the windows out if the urge strikes 8)

I'm pondering the whole overdrive thing. Right now any “intentional” distortion happens in the Leslie amp, which seems a little risky for the horn driver, and is freakin' loud in that little room. I'm open to ideas for getting that sound at lower sound pressures 8)

[tiredoldgeezer]

Yeah, that's kinda the Holy Grail, idnit?

A good warm distortion without all the volume - and without burning out your grid caps.

If you're running a line-out, then you got about, oh, a thousand different guitar effects to try. Then another ten-thousand DIY versions.

My Secret Weapon distortion is nothing more than a very old Electro-Harmonix pre-amp; literally the size of a matchbox. Opened it up - 4 screws to replace the 9v (ugh!) - and found like one whole transistor or something. It was sold as an inline lump for guitarists but when I wired it in my console line out, it was the warmest, smoothest, solid-state i had ever heard. And that was after going thru dozens including all the big names and "tube" FX. That was many years ago and I still got the thing.

I just saw your Crown amps, there and wondered. I use Crowns for my Leslies. (well... i did... now they're in pieces).

Gosh, i better shaddup before i get kicked off the list for excessive solid state promotion :-)

[RogerRabbit]

Has anyone tried an L-Pad in a Leslie?

[4hammonds]

nice looking leslie, looks like the louvers were done with a simple router bit

[tpappano]

Oh gosh, don't get me started on Crown amps, I am an "ampliholic" with recovery not happening any time soon 8) I have quite an assortment of D, CT-200 and CT-400 series units at work and at home terrifying neighbors both residential and commercial. For fun I took a fairly trashed HR-40 tone cabinet and replaced all the drivers with inexpensive Chinese units and bi-amp them with a CT-200. In the shop we call it the "Death Cab" for its ability to produce truly terrifying (but clean!) sound levels 8) I will probably do some tinkering in my lab on some sort of DIY distortion device when I get a round 'tuit"

I see no reason why padding the speakers wouldn't work just fine. One thing that bugs me is that when the Leslie amp transitions into clipping, to me it sounds kind of harsh. Not as bad as a solid state amp, of course, but I think I would like something smoother. I'm handicapped by the fact that I have not heard up close how anyone else setups sound, so I'm not sure what is reasonable to expect.

This Leslie is a 245. I think they threw away the decorator grill cloth before giving it the rattle-can treatment 8)

[kziss]

Has anyone tried an L-Pad in a Leslie?

Hi RogerRabbit.
I have a 16 ohms/ 100 watt rated L-pad from Parts Express and I have tried this out as a speaker level attenuator, and it does work.

However I currently have a 16 ohms THD Hot Plate connected between the speaker output jack of the Leslie 147 amplifier and the speakers, and this is a better choice because it is an inductive load and it's bass switch and it's treble switch allow some tonal control over the attenuated sound.

Both the L-pad and the THD Hotplate allow the Leslie amplifier to be fully overdriven and the sound to be heard at any desired reduced volume level so that it does not strain your ears or bother anyone.
All the best.
Kon.

[RogerRabbit]

Thanks Kon, I'll have a look at the THD.

roj

[tpappano]

I'm ordering a l-pad, so cheap I can't afford not to try one 8)
Thanks for the tip!