Friedman 800 modded

For that amount I would just get a Naked or Custom 50 built by Dave (if I was going the Friedman route).

But honestly I would get a Monomyth, Ground Zero, Ceriatone, or Splawn. Friedman sounds too perfect for me. I like for an amp to fight me a little bit. I want it to be a bit more raw and aggressive. The bonus flow this is it's going to have Marshall iron and hopefully retain that bark
 
Kyrpajyra said:
Each to their own i guess. I've listened too many records to have that kerrang when it comes to Marshalls.
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Agreed. That smooth, more polite tone is not to me what I prefer to hear in a great recorded tone either. Plenty of great recordings that sound raw and kerrang-y. Listen for example even to VESmedic’s recordings. Does that sound smooth and polite? I don’t equate the Friedman flavor to being “recorded” or “too perfect”. Rather I hear those types of amps (not just Friedman, plenty others) as being restrained/holding back, like an overly diplomatic sound afraid to offend anyone’s ears. I think artists should to take the risk of having a more ballsy sound that won’t always be for everyone
 
braintheory said:
Rather I hear those types of amps (not just Friedman, plenty others) as being restrained/holding back, like an overly diplomatic sound afraid to offend anyone’s ears.
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This so fucking much. Lately I've actually turned the preamp gain way down and used the PPIMV to get more ooze out of my amp. Gives you way more ballz, kerrang and that british goodness.
 
braintheory said:
Agreed. That smooth, more polite tone is not to me what I prefer to hear in a great recorded tone either. Plenty of great recordings that sound raw and kerrang-y. Listen for example even to VESmedic’s recordings. Does that sound smooth and polite? I don’t equate the Friedman flavor to being “recorded” or “too perfect”. Rather I hear those types of amps (not just Friedman, plenty others) as being restrained/holding back, like an overly diplomatic sound afraid to offend anyone’s ears. I think artists should to take the risk of having a more ballsy sound that won’t always be for everyone
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You can have a dark, smooth top end and still sound original. I mean take a Mesa Mark series for example, they are totally unique sounding amplifiers and I wouldn't really classify them as bright amps, they have the ability to sound bright, but not really in the same way a stock Marshall does. I like my ears to not hurt after cranking my amps for a while, that doesn't mean i don't like originality and aggression in my tone (i'm one of the few that really digs Dimebag's tone, especially his live tone), i definitely do. Kerrang shmerrang.
 
LP Freak said:
Make sure it’s actually modded by Dave. His mod circuits are pretty readily available and easy to clone.
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This is true, and in fact, I modded my 2204 to be exactly what the OP is looking at - a Marsha. I have serious doubts that my 'version' sounds as good as Friedman's, but I'm happy with what I get out of it.

Quality and detail matters.
 
sahlomonic said:
This is true, and in fact, I modded my 2204 to be exactly what the OP is looking at - a Marsha. I have serious doubts that my 'version' sounds as good as Friedman's, but I'm happy with what I get out of it.

Quality and detail matters.
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Not sure you can clone a marsha in a sense. I say that because the marshas were unique and he selected parts and transformers based on what he was going for in that specific amp. The BE is more standard vs a marsha. I know my marsha has vintage caps and he used other caps specifically for the sound. He used different caps vs the same throughout the amp like a be. He also used transformers he doesnt use anymore.


I own(ed) a marsha, be, ss, jj, dlx, and have had friedman modded jcm 800s. They are all close but different.
 
Meh, the Marsha I played was just like a BE modded Marshall, with classictone transformers instead of Drake/Dagnall.
Ok amp. Nothing that unique about it.
 
sahlomonic said:
This is true, and in fact, I modded my 2204 to be exactly what the OP is looking at - a Marsha. I have serious doubts that my 'version' sounds as good as Friedman's, but I'm happy with what I get out of it.

Quality and detail matters.
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The BE is not a lot of Rocket Science. Basically an added half of a tube like mine to some degree. I like my added switchable cathode combos, plate load snubbers as smoothing caps, a few nfb options, three way boost with the voltage divider, depth frequency pots. etc. I added the three way boost on stage one after this pic but you get the idea. You can mod your own with a little knowledge. I have done quite a few. This one is raw and nasty and killer with low noise floor. I like it much more than most of the mods I owned. You can do it yourself.
 

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Cap217 said:
Not sure you can clone a marsha in a sense. I say that because the marshas were unique and he selected parts and transformers based on what he was going for in that specific amp. The BE is more standard vs a marsha. I know my marsha has vintage caps and he used other caps specifically for the sound. He used different caps vs the same throughout the amp like a be. He also used transformers he doesnt use anymore.


I own(ed) a marsha, be, ss, jj, dlx, and have had friedman modded jcm 800s. They are all close but different.
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That makes sense. The point I was trying to make, though, was you can follow purported schematics found online, but it likely won't sound the same as the real thing i.e. somebody trying to clone it (me) versus an actual Friedman amp given the component brands/values chosen.
 
If you wan't the raw sound of the friedman modded marshals out of your BE, you can just clip out some of the 500p snubbers, and increase the pre filters to 50uf.
 
The mod is "easy" for someone who knows how to do it I guess. But if you mod it yourself then you are decreasing the value of the amp and probably going to have a hard time selling it. If dave does it, the value should go up and it should be an easy sell. Even if its the same work either way.

I think a stock used 2203x is about $2500 and the mod adds value.

FYI. The amp is mine but its not listed anywhere except FB CL currently. Dave confirmed he did the mod in 2009. It sounds good and better than another 1984 jcm 800 I had modded. It has a new master volume pot because the old went bad. I had to track down a split shaft 1m audio pot so the original knobs would fit. They wouldnt fit a solid shaft. Dave confirmed that its hard to track these down.
 
SpiderWars said:
I think part of it is the NFB, part of it is snubber(s), and part of it is the iron. Also, if the amp doesn't have a Depth control it often has a "fixed depth" circuit that tends to increase lows and low mids, which makes the amp seem darker.

And with my SS100, the pots were a different taper so you had to really crank the Treble and Presence to get any bite, so it appeared to be darker than it really was.
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I can attest to that.. you really have to push the presence around to 8 or 9 and keep the presence around 6 or 7 to be somewhere in the marshall camp.
 
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