“Well I finally finished the N5X amp I bought off you a year ago. It foundered unfinished for a good while ’til I finally got down to it at Christmas.After a thorough checkover in line with your instructions and actually of all the connections from components to the boards, which revealed 3 dry joints, I switched it on and it worked first time. Brilliant!
“I’ve been working on a prototype cabinet using ply, and after trying mounting inside the front panel with the controls facing upwards, which didn’t seem to work, I’ve done what I originally planned which is to mount it at an angle, which seems to work well for access compared with a front facing design, solves the problem that if it was mounted upside down for front facing I’d need to rework the control panel graphics, and also means I can make it quite compact as the amp sits at an angle above the speaker, a Celestion 12” Vintage 30.
“The guitar was custom made for me by a friend who’s a guitar builder, in solid ash, so the plan in theory is to now rebuild this prototype in ash, but at the moment I’m actually enjoying using the thing too much to want to embark on another building project! As suggested by you I’ve tried both a 6L6 and an EL34, contrasting a cleaner and a warmer sound. I’m finding initially that I can get much more interesting overdrive with the EL34, particularly by playing with the balance between master and gain, with the power turned way down. Really pleased with it. Thanks!”