VHT Pittbull

[rabies]

anyone owned/tried one at great length? I know Page Hamilton of Helmet was using a Pittbull at one point (Betty?)

how are the cleans and class A modes? does it have the marshall EL34 crunch?

how does it compare to a Diezel Einstein? thx.

 

[stephen sawall]

If you are looking for vintage and modern English flavored crunch sounds I recommend checking out the Sig X and Deliverance amps also ....

The Pitbull's are a more modern voiced amp and there is a few different models . They do a great crunch .... all the Fryette amps do a great crunch ....

As you probably know Fryette changed it's name from VHT to Fryette 3 years ago. I believe Page Hamilton is still using Fryette amps. The Fryette amps are versatile and cover any style and a lot of voices. This will give you a idea of some of what it can do ....

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aYpaJmLd ... ideo_title

 

[skoora]

I'm pretty sure that back in the Betty days Hamilton was only using VHT power-amps. I heard he was using a Kolbe or Kolbe modified, preamp but honestly don't know for sure. Love the sound of the whole band on Betty. He never got a guitar sound I would want but it sure worked for Helmet. People always talk about Iommi and Hetfield as the riff meisters, which they should, but Page Hamilton wrote some of the all time, heavyweight classic riffs.

FWIW I wouldn't look to a PItbull to ever have a mid range crunch like a Marshall. I owned UL for a while and played quite few 50 and 100CL's. They have mids and a good cut but they don't have that sweet kerang that a Marshal gets on the upper mids and top end. If you want thick and punishing they will deliver for sure but the mids and treble if turned up a lot can get pretty obnoxious.

 

[_actual time_]

FWIW I wouldn't look to a PItbull to ever have a mid range crunch like a Marshall. I owned UL for a while and played quite few 50 and 100CL's. They have mids and a good cut but they don't have that sweet kerang that a Marshal gets on the upper mids and top end. If you want thick and punishing they will deliver for sure but the mids and treble if turned up a lot can get pretty obnoxious.

i just snagged a 50CL. if any VHT can get close to the Marshall sound, it should be that one. EL34s and a switch for tube rectifier for more sag, compared to KT88s and solid-state rect on the ULs for a super-tight but dry tone.

so far i found that a Tung-Sol reissue in v1 makes a big difference over a JJ or Electro Harmonix--much sweeter, with nicer bite, than the somewhat brittle sound i got with the EH. i'm gonna fiddle with different power tubes next.

 

[Mr. Burton]

I've had a Pittbull 50/cl for a few weeks now. As said above it has a very modern voicing. Tight and dry with a ton of gain on tap. This goes for both channels.

I had to really dig into the green channel to get a useable clean tone. Not the hallmark of this amp at all. It can get into Marshall territory with a bit of gain. Mine has the EQ and I have it assigned to this channel to spark a little life into my clean. Cutting the gain back on the green channel really kills a lot of its character, so the EQ comes in handy for my uses.

Red channel is aptly named as it is an absolutely searingly brutal distorted tone. This amp was clearly designed for distortion and does this job exceptionally well. It is my go to for rhythm bar none. I didn't find the mids and top end to be harsh in my experience. In fact I run mine with pretty high settings for both. I found it to be voiced with a bit more low end so I dialed the bass down and mids and treble up.

I haven't played an Einstein, but I have tried a Herbert and VH4. I can say that they are somewhat akin to the VHT in the sense that they are all modern, dry, tight, and a bit weak in the cleans. Not a slight to Diezel at all, just my unabashed perspective.

For the record, I found that 10" speakers work exceptionally well with this amp.

 

[_actual time_]

I had to really dig into the green channel to get a useable clean tone. .... Cutting the gain back on the green channel really kills a lot of its character, so the EQ comes in handy for my uses.

Red channel is aptly named as it is an absolutely searingly brutal distorted tone. ... I found it to be voiced with a bit more low end so I dialed the bass down and mids and treble up.

so far, i'm using the Green channel for a heavy rhythm sound and the Red for a fatter medium-gain sound. EQ on both, with a slight upper-mids boost. tube rectifier on both, for more sag and fatness. i'm running the mids around 1 o'clock and the treble around noon, and it's bright/sharp without being shrill.

on the Red, i can get good classic rock to hard rock to heavy hard rock by using the gain switch low/high and the boost. on the Green, i can get a good bright hard rock sound, sorta VH, with the high gain and no boost and a good thick metal rhythm tone with the boost.

Burton, feel free to post some of your settings if you want.

 

[philnz]

Yes Page Hamilton is still using the Ultralead & yes he has written some monster riffs

I own both UL & 100CL & have found the UL to be the sharper sounding of the two.
The 100CL I've found to be fatter sounding....not what I expected of the EL34 powered amp
Although the UL is a killer sounding amp, theres something I prefer about the 100CL. I think it comes down to the slight preference of the CL's EL34 power section.

Not really a go to amp for VH stuff, far too tight.

It really has no dedicated clean channls but can be set up to do them well
I actually use green ch for highgain & the red ch for cleans as its a little more compressed.

Never tried the 50CL so I can't comment.

If you set it up right with the option of the onboard eq its an extremely versitile great sounding amp

 

[ConcreteVampire]

I've owned my 50 CL for five years now, can't see selling it. Plus one on all CL comments so far, spot on reviews!
I'll add...
Very versatile, its why she still in my stable, a few Marshalls have come and gone.
Can be bright if dialed wrong, onboard eq is huge bonus.
When doing, "Marshall tones", you won't find old school, you'll find 80's slammed with an eq tones. Not a bad tone to find! Very big, harmonically rich, high fi Marshall tone. I agree the 34's have something to do with it. I've got a tungsol in v1 as well.....

 

[Mr. Burton]

so far, i'm using the Green channel for a heavy rhythm sound and the Red for a fatter medium-gain sound. EQ on both, with a slight upper-mids boost. tube rectifier on both, for more sag and fatness. i'm running the mids around 1 o'clock and the treble around noon, and it's bright/sharp without being shrill.

on the Red, i can get good classic rock to hard rock to heavy hard rock by using the gain switch low/high and the boost. on the Green, i can get a good bright hard rock sound, sorta VH, with the high gain and no boost and a good thick metal rhythm tone with the boost.

Burton, feel free to post some of your settings if you want.

I spent a bunch of time with it in the first week deciding how to set it up. One thing I noticed is that the presence control is very interactive. I had some trouble with top end at first messing with the front panel. Looked at the back and I noticed that my presence was cranked and once I backed that down everything was perfect.

Red channel is currently: treble 2 o'clock, mids 4 o 'clock, bass at noon, and gain just below noon. Edge and boost engaged.

Green channel: treble 1 o'clock, mids noon, bass 2 o'clock, and gain at 9 o'clock. EQ is assigned to green with 630, 1.2k, and 2.3k just over unity.

I may play with it a bit as I'm noticing a lot of you guys are running the channels the other way. I did like the crunch of the green channel a lot. I haven't tried cleans on the red at all yet so who knows I may like it better. Thanks guys for posting your settings.

 

[rabies]

there's a 100CL (VHT) available here locally but I just found out on the fryette.com site that the 100 watt doesn't have the recto tube but the 50CL does.

hmmm. I like the spongy/sag from recto tubes sometimes for jazz/swing/funk jamming...

 

[rabies]

anyways, now I own 4 amps: Rivera S120, Marshall VM2266, H&K Switchblade 100, Stiletto Stage 2

I've decided the H&K can go but the others not sure about and I don't think buying yet another amp is necessarily a good idea when you're not in a band anyways.

But I've never played a VHT/Fryette and only heard good things.

Honestly, I really like the organic, dynamic and response of the VM2266 (KT66 tubes) but I'm a EL34 guy at heart.

Maybe I can try running some of my amps in parallel with the radial switcher and see how the mix sounds...

 

[_actual time_]

there's a 100CL (VHT) available here locally but I just found out on the fryette.com site that the 100 watt doesn't have the recto tube but the 50CL does.

yep. that was a big reason why i went with the 50CL.

Red channel is currently: ..... Looked at the back and I noticed that my presence was cranked and once I backed that down everything was perfect.

cool, thanks! will give those settings a spin.

so about where are you setting the Presence? i've been leaving mine at noon, just because i don't have any better idea.

re: clean sounds, i'm admitting from the start that this just ain't a clean-tone amp. so i'm not even trying to find a clean tone in it.

for speakers, i'm using a Bogner 2x12 with Hellatone 60Ls (the tweaked V30 that has more low-mids and brighter highs). i think that too is helping me get the looser, not-the-regular-VHT-super-tight sound. the VHT cats swear by the VHT cabs, which i think is a big part of that super-tight, classic-VHT tone.

 

[philnz]

Even tho I have UL & CL, I got the Deliverence cab specifically because its a little more vintagey... not as focused & directional as the Fat bottom cabs

 

[ConcreteVampire]

there's a 100CL (VHT) available here locally but I just found out on the fryette.com site that the 100 watt doesn't have the recto tube but the 50CL does.

hmmm. I like the spongy/sag from recto tubes sometimes for jazz/swing/funk jamming...

There is part of the versatility...

Green channel, Tube rectifier, (Drops the wattage to 40) go easy on the gain, 2-3? lil more bass than treble, Class A, a Strat, some good verb.... Blues goodness! the low gain, with a Strat and the tube rectifier + Class A, will suprise...
very articulate, punchy, warm...

 

[Mr. Burton]

anyways, now I own 4 amps: Rivera S120, Marshall VM2266, H&K Switchblade 100, Stiletto Stage 2

I've decided the H&K can go but the others not sure about and I don't think buying yet another amp is necessarily a good idea when you're not in a band anyways.

But I've never played a VHT/Fryette and only heard good things.

Honestly, I really like the organic, dynamic and response of the VM2266 (KT66 tubes) but I'm a EL34 guy at heart.

Maybe I can try running some of my amps in parallel with the radial switcher and see how the mix sounds...

I think the VHT would certainly be an upgrade from the HK. The S120 is a great amp but if not running stereo kind of a waste. Not much experience with either the Marshall or Stiletto. VHT's command a much higher resale value so you may want to factor that into your decision. The Pitt is very different from the amps in your current stable. If you are looking for another flavor I don't think you can go wrong with a VHT. Worst case you can flip it.

 

[rabies]

i need to try out a pittbull, i guess that would be a good next step.

does sick cleans (or good enough https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=udjnGnZ3f54

 

[Mr. Burton]

so about where are you setting the Presence? i've been leaving mine at noon, just because i don't have any better idea.

re: clean sounds, i'm admitting from the start that this just ain't a clean-tone amp. so i'm not even trying to find a clean tone in it.

for speakers, i'm using a Bogner 2x12 with Hellatone 60Ls (the tweaked V30 that has more low-mids and brighter highs). i think that too is helping me get the looser, not-the-regular-VHT-super-tight sound. the VHT cats swear by the VHT cabs, which i think is a big part of that super-tight, classic-VHT tone.

As I recall the presence is somewhere between 9-10 o'clock. I'm not in the same state as my amp right now so can't confirm at the moment, but I'm pretty sure that was the last setting.

I've been rotating the amp between a Sunn 4x12 w'75's, Sunn 4x10 with Eminence Rajin Cajun's and Ramrods x pattern, and a Diezel 2x12 w/D12V16's. I think that the 4x10 sounds the best of the 3 as it has the tightest bass response. I also think this is a large contributing factor to the presence setting as I get more top end with that cab.

I've noticed a popular correlation between Diezel and VHT. Seems that most folks that own a VHT also own some type of Diezel product. This is funny considering my acquisitions were purely circumstantial.

All of this said I am highly considering offloading all of the cabs for a trio of 3rd Power 312's. I may consider pairing the Diezel and VHT if there is an aggregate return. It would take a lot for me to sell the VHT though as I am pretty attached. I still have some time and plan to run this setup through its paces.

 

[stephen sawall]

I like the Diezel stuff .... but it is too compressed for the way I play. That and the voicing does not work well for me with other midrange instrument's. I often play with other guitar players, keyboards and a brass section. I tend to use amps that cut because of this. I feel the same way about a lot of amps....

I do like them mixed with other amps .... but I have been avoiding using more than one amp at a time for several reasons the last few years.