Awesome- way to save it!
I've got one of those Friedman modded JCA20s too- it's a great sounding little amp. I put a Metro loop in it and it became that much more useful.
Guytron GT100
Guytron GT100 F/V
Jet City 20W (Friedman modded)
BluGuitar Amp1 <-- Backup for gigs, plus a great amp in its own right
The original Guytron goes to gigs and anything that gets recorded. It's got mojo.
It's been ages since I had a good Marshall in the house. Should be this year's...
Fwiw, I had an N4 ages ago (wish I still had it) ... switching to the Bill 'n Becky 500L from the BL USA one did wonders for it. Still lots of highs, but it wasn't nearly as thin.
As noted, with the BL pickups you need to approach your EQ a little differently- they don't loose as many highs as...
There's always going to be a certain amount of latency ... the way around it is to use the "direct monitoring" switch on the front, so you hear the direct signal from your guitar while you're recording. (For playback, latency is a non-issue.)
Another option might be the Bluguitar Amp1. I've got the Mercury Edition- it's really good, and great at low volumes. Plus they can be had used at a reasonable cost. Does a few great flavours of Marshall.
I'm somewhat fascinated by these old PA conversions- breathing new life into old gear. The kind of thing you could have front and center in your living room as a (somewhat deafening) conversation piece.
I was the guinea pig for that mod- Dave converted an SD60 of mine into a Duel and played with the bite switch so it worked on both channels.
Really great amp (understatement), though I never found the clean channel on the Duel to be particularly useful for anything- kinda bland and a bit noisy...
Agree on the longevity ... I'm still paying a TD-8 kit (with a couple of upgrades) that I've had forever. The sounds are well out of date, but I have it triggering Superior Drummer via MIDI and it sounds and feels great.