Ed's 1978 touring rig.

[adamsapple]

So it appears we've ruled out the power resistor tied across the plates mod ever being used (ala ******/twistneck), no?

[StuntDouble]

I've wondered that too. Apparently the cap across the back was for the master volume, but I recall reading an interview with Ed where he talks about a cap...probably a resistor..."that sucks juice". Wa this just Ed making stuff up or a reffernce to what we now reffer to as the ******* mod; I'd like to know too?

[rockstah]

So it appears we've ruled out the power resistor tied across the plates mod ever being used (ala ******/twistneck), no?

a long time ago.

[fivecoyote]

Awesome. Many thanks, Robin L., Mark Cameron and everyone else for the insight. It's just as awesome that Rockstah found all of this out, give or take, on his own and got "the" sound.

Questions for Robin:

1. Do you know what Seymour did to the pickups he altered for Ed? Any details or hearsay would be great.

2. Did Ed say anything about why he liked brass nuts?

3. Did he mention what type of bridge he liked the best?

4. Did he mention liking any types of tuners better than others?

5. Did he stick with the Ohmite brand of Varaic or did he use others?

6. Did he like any kind of guitar cable (guitar to amp) in particular or did he use whatever he had?

7. How much cable (length) between the guitar and the pedal board?

8. Did he alter his whammy bars at all?

Trying to nail down as many details as possible!

Thanks again.

[adamsapple]

"a long time ago." I've been away from this forum for a while. good to be back. I wonder what that says about u know who's credibility. I for one tried the "bass ckt" for evh and never thought it sounded right. way too flubby.

[Mr. Beasty]

OK! Strings 9-40 fenders! I know a lot of this has been posted before... but seeing how a lot of it was wrong, I just wanna be complete... springs in the back... what do you remember about those? Tremolo setup? I used to hear people back in the day say "closes like a garage door"... but the common setup has some float...

... no agenda here by me... I'm on board!

I think this one is easy because Ed never had back plates on his guitars so there are tons of live pictures showing the back of Ed's guitars.
He is know to have never used floating trems. Most guitars had two to three springs.
The three set-up was the traditional one straign-two slants. The two spring set-up usually was the same as the three springs minus the centrer straight spring. Sometimes, the two spring set-up was one straigh spring and one slanted. Sometimes both srings would be parallele to one another but set diagonally across the cavity.
Conclusion: whatever position was needed to get the tension right.

[Mr. Beasty]

Robin L.

Is this the style of "stick of dynamite" resistors Ed used for slaving in the early days?


Thank you.

[papawoofer]

None of this was new or strange to me...it was very simple....alot of guys I knew did this stuff. But this is the stuff that I was into and doing in 82 for friends and bands I worked for.... BUT Eds playin.....thats the big thing...this stuff is just the iceing on the cake

Mark do you know of any recordings of people you worked with so we can compare?

[Grosh_Guitars]

I've read in a few places that using a variac can actually cause all sorts of problems, including blown OT's.
(scroll down to the picture of a variac)
http://tone-lizard.com/Marshall_Myths.htm" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Man that guy sounds bitter
It seems like the use of the the variac and the fact that Ed had the variac'ed marshall dimed for at least one show a night probably led to lots of blown OT's and, depending on the voltage he set it to, blown tubes.[/quote]

Variac's are fine when used properly. I used one for years on a 62 Fender Bassman, I just biased the amp seeing that 90 volts at all times.

Robin thanks for the info!!!

[ROBIN L.]

Its nothing special...Its just a later brighter 74 style circuit in there....not the 68 circuit. The transformers are ...or where....mid 70s too

Well that's really interesting, because that amp never sounded like Ed's mid 70's metal plate super leads.

See, when he bought it, that amp had the master volume knob in the back, it was bought secondhand.
Maybe when he bought it,, its circuit had already been changed or modified to that of a mid 70's superlead(hence the master volume in the back).
So it wasn't a plexi from the beginning !
Frankly I don't think this is correct but ...

I would tend to think it had the 68 circuit when Ed bought it, because it sounded a lot sweeter than the later mid 70's metal plate Marshalls (more mids, crispy highs but not ice picky).
It sounded just like those 50 watt smallbox plexis Ed owned, but had more chest.
Having seen that amp fry and blow up so many times because of Ed's abuse, its transformers replaced many many times, and considering all the repairs and service done by Jose, it 's likely that it wasn't the same amp by the time you serviced it.
What year was that Mark ?

[ROBIN L.]

Robin L.

Is this the style of "stick of dynamite" resistors Ed used for slaving in the early days?


Thank you.

Those have nothing to do with slaving.

[papawoofer]

Jose Arredondo built a few prototypes for Ed.
The one used by Ed on the 1978 world tour featured 2 inputs, a volume knob, and 3 line level outputs.
That volume knob was used to control the overall stage volume of the rig.
The 2 inputs were fed with the speakers outputs of the main plexi and the 50 watt smallbox plexi

This is the one I have....from people who would know.....have said to me..it may be one of the ones he used ...what do you think???

Mark from your pics it looks like there are 3 different loads there, 2 with their own cable, and 1 as a box you plug into, I mean I dont see any wires connecting the resisters. Am I missing something?

[vh junkie]

He is know to have never used floating trems. Most guitars had two to three springs.
The three set-up was the traditional one straign-two slants. The two spring set-up usually was the same as the three springs minus the centrer straight spring. Sometimes, the two spring set-up was one straigh spring and one slanted. Sometimes both srings would be parallele to one another but set diagonally across the cavity.
Conclusion: whatever position was needed to get the tension right.

Thanks Beasty!

I just would like Robin to weigh in on how this was setup... how did he exactly tweak all this... perhaps common knowledge is correct on all this, but maybe not...

At any rate, it would be useful to edit the core of the thread to include any relevant info here!

[MarkCameron]

None of this was new or strange to me...it was very simple....alot of guys I knew did this stuff. But this is the stuff that I was into and doing in 82 for friends and bands I worked for.... BUT Eds playin.....thats the big thing...this stuff is just the iceing on the cake

Mark do you know of any recordings of people you worked with so we can compare?

This might be the closest on recording that I can find.....its an ---old JB pickup--fl--ph90--EP--to the amp..but no slaving.....just turned up to stupid volumes on this song......also a 57mic and 25watt greenbacks in an old Marshall cab that Jose wired up....LA2A---EMT Plate Rev..every thing is 1 or 2 takes....fx are all live...not added.............

This song might sound familiar

Check out......Half Way Home....

This is the only place I could find that you can hear it online.......

http://musparade.com/album/John+Norum/A ... estination" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[MarkCameron]

Its nothing special...Its just a later brighter 74 style circuit in there....not the 68 circuit. The transformers are ...or where....mid 70s too

Well that's really interesting, because that amp never sounded like Ed's mid 70's metal plate super leads.

See, when he bought it, that amp had the master volume knob in the back, it was bought secondhand.
Maybe when he bought it,, its circuit had already been changed or modified to that of a mid 70's superlead(hence the master volume in the back).
So it wasn't a plexi from the beginning !
Frankly I don't think this is correct but ...

I would tend to think it had the 68 circuit when Ed bought it, because it sounded a lot sweeter than the later mid 70's metal plate Marshalls (more mids, crispy highs but not ice picky).
It sounded just like those 50 watt smallbox plexis Ed owned, but had more chest.
Having seen that amp fry and blow up so many times because of Ed's abuse, its transformers replaced many many times, and considering all the repairs and service done by Jose, it 's likely that it wasn't the same amp by the time you serviced it.
What year was that Mark ?

Its just what Jose would do. I can hear on boots that it first had the stock circuit. I don't think one Marshall sounds the same as the next Plus there are so many other things too.....His amp does...even these days...have something about it tho...