Tell me about the Soldano Hot Rod 50

[Kapo_Polenton]

I love the sound of a SLO.. not sure i can foot the price though. Now I know this has been posted a few times before with people looking for that SLO tone on a budget but standing on it's own, what is your opinion of the Hot Rod series? I'm mainly an 80's guy and everything i have is a 1987x or 2204 ish circuit. It's all Marshall. Wouldn't mind stepping a little outside that box. The hot rod 50 to my ears, sounds pretty damn good for 80's tones and higher gain mid tones (lead). Additionally, how is the loop with stomp box effects?

As for the Jet City's modded by Soldano himself, any experience with those?

 

[stratotone]

I have a HR50, great amp, but pretty simple... the + has two channels, the HR50 is a one channel deal. High/low inputs, fx loop. Loop doesn't have any extra controls other than in/out, so it's likely pedal level fx won't work well.

Keep in mind on the HR vs Jet City stuff, the HR does have better parts including mercury magnetic transformers. I compared a HR50+ to an SLO head to head, the SLO was about 10% nicer but they were both in the ballpark.

 

[neilli]

I had a HR50+ and found that it just wasn't gainy enough for me, certainly at lower volumes. In terms if 80s stuff, it was great for Cinderella, not so good for Skid Row..

 

[splitendz]

Love my HR50. Mine has plenty of gain for Skidrow, Ratt, Dokken, etc

 

[gtrwun]

I had an HR50 for about a year and gigged with it as my main amp. I loved it. Roll back the volume on your guitar and it cleans right up good enough to gig with. Fender clean? No, but very usable. What I did was just dail in a killer crunch rhythm tone, (which it does very well) and then I used a TS9 to juice it for leads. Pretty bright amp. I used it with G12H30's and greenbacks and it sounded good with both and had no problem cutting through all the cymbals with a heavy handed drummer. Plenty of gain for hard rock in my opinion. I do remember it wasnt a great sounding bedroom/TV noodle amp. When you get the volume going it gives up the goods nicely. The loop doesnt work well with pedals. It was actually the first time I ever played dry live without delay on my leads. Made me really get my act together. Id recommend this amp to anyone looking for a different flavor of Marshall. Very different than a 2203/04 or a plexi thats for sure.

 

[mjtripper]

The soldano does have better parts but check out the jet city 100hdm as well. The jet city stuff is really well built. The newer soldanos use onetic trannies instead of mercury which I like much better, those onetics are really nice. For that 80s tone and the soldano type circuits I find I can get closer to the tone by using the od channel but running the gain around noon and hitting it with a tube screamer.

 

[Racerxrated]

I had an HR100..great amp. I had the depth mod removed..sounded less muddy. I always boost my amps with an eq pedal and this was no exception. Loop was great, got lots of compliments on the tone. My soundguy still misses that amp. With a boost to tighten it up it EASILY does 80s and more..very warm and cuts well.

 

[Dunstanmus]

I had one, thought it was great. Struggled with the loop as not using a rack. Am looking to get the HR 25 as the loop is different and it is deffo loud enough.