NAD - WTF Soldano HR 50

[ibenhad]

So I buy this Soldano HR 50 and get it home and clean her all up, yeah I'm anal like that. Check the tubes on my tube tester and they seem pretty good. 5881's (EH yuck) and some JJ ecc83s's in the pre and pi sockets. OK whatever not a big fan of them either. Amp is biased really cold which seems common for these. So I bring it up to around 32ma and both tubes are real close in range. Fire it up and it sounds like poop. WTF? The last one I had was pretty snotty and had a good sound. So I plug in my Roccaforte Custom 40 and bam an hour goes by and I realize some amps just make you wanna wank forever and some don't. Back to the Bias and tubes anyone wanna shed some light? Should I go back to like 13ma like it was set at? Plate voltage is around 512. Weird the Rocca straight up hands down smokes it.... Now if I go down and plug into my HG100 I probably won't come out of the man cave till morning. Just saying.

 

[glip22]

So I buy this Soldano HR 50 and get it home and clean her all up, yeah I'm anal like that. Check the tubes on my tube tester and they seem pretty good. 5881's (EH yuck) and some JJ ecc83s's in the pre and pi sockets. OK whatever not a big fan of them either. Amp is biased really cold which seems common for these. So I bring it up to around 32ma and both tubes are real close in range. Fire it up and it sounds like poop. WTF? The last one I had was pretty snotty and had a good sound. So I plug in my Roccaforte Custom 40 and bam an hour goes by and I realize some amps just make you wanna wank forever and some don't. Back to the Bias and tubes anyone wanna shed some light? Should I go back to like 13ma like it was set at? Plate voltage is around 512. Weird the Rocca straight up hands down smokes it.... Now if I go down and plug into my HG100 I probably won't come out of the man cave till morning. Just saying.

I thought the HR was supposed to be pretty good. Maybe youbenhad.

 

[gtrwun]

I've had both. I thought the HR50 was killer. The Rocca left me cold till I had It modded with the BE. It's worth having a tech look at IMO.

 

[ibenhad]

This HR 50 doesn't sound bad but doesn't give up the dirt like the Rocca. Maybe I need to set the bias back to 13ma. Maybe my Rocca is modded. It does say something inside like modded D.R. and a date. It also has Dougs sig and original build date. The Rocca is also tube rectified. Maybe tomorrow I will throw a brand new pair of 6l6's in the HR 50.

 

[Filter500]

Maybe I need to set the bias back to 13ma.

I'm doubting that part. Maybe something else in the amp has gone bad.

 

[gtrwun]

Sounds like you have my old Rocca? Is there a mini toggle on the back, and 2 inputs in the front?

 

[loudgtr]

From my experience Soldano's do not like being biased that high at all. Drop it down to around 25ma or even less...it's cold, but it's how the amps are set up to run.

It Should Rock your face off

 

[ibenhad]

Sounds like you have my old Rocca? Is there a mini toggle on the back, and 2 inputs in the front?

Nope. They both appear to be bone stock. Although I am going to email Doug and ask him about the MOD D.R. and date stamp inside my Custom 40. Maybe he did something to the circuit. I have a custom 18 in red and it smokes the HR 50 too. UGH...



loudgtr - I'm going to mess with it again tonight and lower the bias and such. Try some more random pre-amp tubes too. My Purple HR 50's both sounded great. This one sounds like ass. Wait maybe the purple tolex ones just sound better? Stranger things have happened. HAHA

 

[D-Rock]

Yeah, Bill at Soldano told me to bias my 5881's at 20ma. I think they are a bit higher than that but not much.
Having too many JJ pre's sound bad in Soldano's too. V1 spot only maybe. Try some Chinese/Sovtek and Ruby 12AX7's for the rest.

 

[LukeCurd]

So I buy this Soldano HR 50 and get it home and clean her all up, yeah I'm anal like that. Check the tubes on my tube tester and they seem pretty good. 5881's (EH yuck) and some JJ ecc83s's in the pre and pi sockets. OK whatever not a big fan of them either. Amp is biased really cold which seems common for these. So I bring it up to around 32ma and both tubes are real close in range. Fire it up and it sounds like poop. WTF? The last one I had was pretty snotty and had a good sound. So I plug in my Roccaforte Custom 40 and bam an hour goes by and I realize some amps just make you wanna wank forever and some don't. Back to the Bias and tubes anyone wanna shed some light? Should I go back to like 13ma like it was set at? Plate voltage is around 512. Weird the Rocca straight up hands down smokes it.... Now if I go down and plug into my HG100 I probably won't come out of the man cave till morning. Just saying.

Sounds like you just need a fresh re-tube. Did you play it before the bias change?

Both amps you mentioned from the Roccaforte are pretty great amps. The hr 50 uses cheaper stuff than the real SLO.

Have any pics of the chassis?

 

[Ventura]

Maybe I need to set the bias back to 13ma.

I'm doubting that part. Maybe something else in the amp has gone bad.

HR50 is a bitchin' head. Rid it of the glass entirely, re-bias, rock that bitch out. These amps sing

Mo

 

[SLOgriff]

Soldano's need to be biased a little cooler than other amps. 32 is way too hot and will smooth out the tone too much. Try backing it down to 28-26ma. Put sovtek 5881 "wafer bottoms" in there with JJ in V1 and sovtek LP's in the rest. That will get you the goods.....

 

[ibenhad]

I will try that. I changed out the pre-amp glass and lowered the bias to 23ma with the sovtek 5881's that were in it. Sounds much better than it did. Have to have the presence and treble all the way up or it sounds like a blanket over it. Using a closed back 2 x 12 loaded with original greenbacks. Still say it holds nothing against my Roccaforte Custom 40.

 

[D-Rock]

I will try that. I changed out the pre-amp glass and lowered the bias to 23ma with the sovtek 5881's that were in it. Sounds much better than it did. Have to have the presence and treble all the way up or it sounds like a blanket over it. Using a closed back 2 x 12 loaded with original greenbacks. Still say it holds nothing against my Roccaforte Custom 40.

My presence it at 9 and my treble is at 8, so yeah I know what you mean. You seem to have to do that in order to get that bite and lively crunch from the gain.
These amps are similar to the Avenger, if not almost the same. They are fat sounding and dark voiced amps. Not bright like the SLO is.

 

[sled]

Did you actually play the amp before you started pulling tubes and changing the bias? If not that's the WTF part.

 

[gtrwun]

I always considered my HR 50 to be a bright amp. Very bright. With h30's, I had to run the presence pretty low and treble around noon. Still a lot of crunch with these settings. Mine had no mods.

 

[D-Rock]

I always considered my HR 50 to be a bright amp. Very bright. With h30's, I had to run the presence pretty low and treble around noon. Still a lot of crunch with these settings. Mine had no mods.

Your eq settings depends on your playing genre though. I'm playing high gain modern metal. So I need that cut and sizzle. I you are playing regular crunch rock, than more conservative settings are ideal. H3O have a bright and spiky high end too so that would add treble. I use V30's which is all mids and fat lows. The 5881's in my power section also have less highs than 6L6's. Lot's of factors then I guess.

 

[gtrwun]

No arguement with the above comment. Huge difference using the H30's if someone is using V30's. and I def wouldn't call my genre modern in any way.

 

[ibenhad]

Did you actually play the amp before you started pulling tubes and changing the bias? If not that's the WTF part.

No I'm just so guitarded and GAS kills so bad that I took a 2 hr train ride to Manhattan then a 20 min Subway to Queens where the owner picked me up and brought me to his studio so I could look at it and buy without playing. LOL

Duh of course I played it with his 4 x 12 and some Gibson Les Paul Firebrand or something with a pickup that squeled like honey boo boo. So to answer your question of course I played it first. Home on my setup it sounded like a rug over it. Still trying tubes in it. I think it may have to go. It just doesn't bring the goods.

 

[JB6464]

Does it have the fixed XL-mod on it from the factory ?
If so have it removed and it will come alive with some real glass , best thing Bill Sundt at Soldano ever did to my HR100+ amp .
Even Mike Soldano will tell you he hates the XL-mod he use to offer and discontinued it over the phone, that's why they switched to the depth knob style instead. When on Zero , it's like it's not even there and the amp will be plenty bright enough.