When Gear Acquisition Syndrome is fuel for the fire

After my last post on using the Torpedo Cab and the Nady TD-1 in conjunction with the POD HD500X, I thought I’d talk a little bit more about the configuration I’m currently using and then A/B the approaches for you.

The TD might stand for “Terrible Design”

I had done a substantial amount of research for a BIAS review for Guitar-Muse that may or may not be see the light of day and in researching all aspects of the tube pre-amp, rediscovered the 12AU7.

This tube is a direct replacement for a 12AXA7 but has some different tonal characteristics and offers less gain.  On a recent trip to Drome Sound, I found a NOS Groove Tubes 12AU7 for $10 and decided to swap it out in my Nady TD-1.  The TD-1 is a cool pedal in terms of tone, and a terrible housing design as replacing the tube requires completely dismantling the casing.

As a first step, you’ll need 3 tools to do this.

On my first dismantling attempt, I realized that I didn’t have a star shaped driver to undo the sides of the casing.  It seemed cruel for Nady to not simply use philips head screws but a quick trip to Radio Shack got me the driver I needed (with some other attachments) and soon I had this.

There are 36 parts holding the casing together.  You need to remove all 36 to get the tube out (a Chinese made 12AX7B in this case).

You’ll also notice that you don’t have a lot of wiggle room to extract the tube.  The photo above shows the replaced GT in the socket.

The A/B Rig

First off.  I had a strange experience with my hybrid solution at the last gig I played.  Soundcheck went fine and then live when I switched to my lead patch the volume dropped by 70% or more.  I had to full crank my QSC K-8 (which I’ve never had to turn past 10 o’clock [the off position starts at 6 o’clock]) to be heard.  I assumed it was a cable or a bad connection but checking the cables after the gig, they were all fine.  Line 6 just released a new Firmware update to deal with volume drops with that occurred when switching patches with specific configurations and I guess mine was one of them as it seems to be working now.

I started the process this weekend of porting all of my patches from the HD-500 over to the 500-X (and trying to recreate some of my POD Farm patches there as well) and thought I’d give you an A/B example of the dual rig.

This was one of my old POD patches that I liked.
It was a great dirty rhythm sound but the leads were hit and miss.  I put a FX loop in with a 6 DB increase and used it as a boost for solos.

In contrast, here’s my current configuration.  The tube screamer is gone and replaced by the TD-1.

The TD is also the first step of my signal chain so I use that for the lead boost.  Here are the amps:

You may notice that the cab models are turned off.  The FX loop now goes out to the Torpedo for the cab simulation.

So this means that I have 2 extra things plugged in with my POD.  Which is way more of a pain than simply using the POD direct.  But does it make a difference?

Well the tones are completely different but here’s the A/B.  I’m just improvising some D major patterns over a D5 chord.

Recorded the TD/Torpedo is more saturated, but the biggest difference is live.  When played through my QSC, the second tone has substantially increased presence in the room.  I don’t know how to describe it but seems to jump out more from the speaker.  There’s also a little hiss from the pedal, but I can live with it in a live context.

Wait there’s a third option?

Having said all of that I took advantage of a recent cancelled rehearsal I showed up to to put my Positive Grid Jam Up App through the paces.  I can work with it at home but it’s a different context to put it through an amp on a stage in a large hall and see what happens and I have to say – I was pretty blown away.

I’m going to be doing live accompaniment for a production of The Exonerated at the BuckMoon Arts Festival in July and currently it looks like I’ll just be bringing my iphone, a laptop for some synths and looping and a powered speaker.  It doesn’t have the flexibility that the POD set up does, but for situations where I just need a decent clean/dirty tone – it gets the job done and then some.

More tone reports as the summer progresses – but hopefully this is useful to some of you.

As always, thanks for reading!

-SC