Tried a Krank Krankenstein the other day...

you get a SLIGHTLY less solid state sound by running it like a VHT...master at LEAST 2:00, i had it somewhere between 2 and Dimed(pun intended :mrgreen: ). treble almost off. i think mids cranked, with the contour maybe 10:00 or lower to get less high mids. then presence adjusted to taste. this is going from memory from like 4-5 months ago, so i may be off on some settings. but roughly, thats where i got it to sound best. it still sizzled mind you, but wasn't as bad that way. i liked it better than the Rev cause it has a master to krank up and get the power tubes workin' some. :la: you get at least a little responsiveness(sorta) that way.
still, not anything i'd call good. but, could be worse.

Not to jump on the Krank bashing band wagon, but that was exactly my experience with the Krankenstein I tried. High end sizzle that could not be dialed out. Stiff solid state feel. Hated it. I suppose some guys could like that mushy fizzy distortion, but it had no deffinition or mids at all. My POD XT into a PA with the L6 insane model sounds better and feels better than the Krank. You couldn't pay me to play them. Seriously.

I was in a store trying out a 6505+ a few months ago (prior to me picking one up) and the sales guy gives me the "you HAVE to try out the Kranks!, They are AWESOME" line. I plugged into both the Krankenstein and the Rev1. I thought they were both HORRIBLE (although I found the Rev slightly less horrible). I couldn't get any sound I liked out of either. Kept trying to tweak it, and I got nothing even remotely close to a decent tone. Even the sales guy finally admitted, that the 6505+ that I had just been playing through pwned it! I just don't know how they try and hawk that stuff with a straight face.

dime boosted his kranks with a wylde overdrive.

The Krankenstein and Revolution are very special amps that will not appeal to the majority of players. That said - they sounded horrible to me. To get a sound out of them that doesn't make your ears bleed, you'll absolutely *must* have that sweep control/contour knob or whatever it's called at 0 or 0.5 max.
The chadwick sucked less, but it wasn't anything special and still annoying.

I still want to try a Revolution out for myself. AlexCows over at the ESP board digs his, so who knows.

One thing I have noticed though is that the "dime" gain is a little fucked.
I have the rest of it dialed in, but the gain I can turn no higher than 6.
If I go above that, at full guitar volume and facing away from the amp will produce everybodies favorite ear peircing feedback. :?
But at 6, the gain is still heavier than shit!!!!

New to the forum,

Love MY KRANK!

I've been playing my rev1 for about 18 months now and it's been a great amp. My band from last year recorded a cd with it.

I agree with all on the Krankenstein, though. It's total shit

rev is a nice amp. needs the fizz modded out of it though. if they could be had for $800ish used i would be allover another one. $1600 is just the most insane shit ever!!! I talked a bit with jerry p about these also, he took some gut shots of my chadwick(which is a great amp) and has worked on a rev or two, and he was really suprised at the decent build quality.

I tried the whole Krank line every year at NAMM accept for this year and all of their amps sounded like complete shit to me IMHO. I can also say with much experiance that as you down tune your guitar it will make a differance in sound/tone.

If we are going mention Andy Sneep, then you are Most likely hearing a Ts808 in front of the amp and not just the sound comming from the amp. I will go on record and say that I could make the Krank sound huge on a recording with a Tube screamer, but on their own..it just doesn;t work for me.

Speaking of Krankenstein, before his passing, There was a video demo featuring Dime playing the Krank. I laughed my ass off when he was taking about how much gain and sustain the amp had. I laughed because he went to hit an artificial harmonic and make it sustain and the note just fizzled out and cut off. He tried it 4 or 5 times but could not get the amp to sustain. I found it funny because his randall amps had way more gain then the Krank and that's without the boost pedals.


Different strokes for different folks but the Kranks suck ass for what I LIKE . All IMHO. YMMV

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Gainfreak":14009 said:

Speaking of Krankenstein, before his passing, There was a video demo featuring Dime playing the Krank. I laughed my ass off when he was taking about how much gain and sustain the amp had. I laughed because he went to hit an artificial harmonic and make it sustain and the note just fizzled out and cut off. He tried it 4 or 5 times but could not get the amp to sustain. I found it funny because his randall amps had way more gain then the Krank and that's without the boost pedals.


Different strokes for different folks but the Kranks suck ass for what I LIKE . All IMHO. YMMV

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Hey Ralph, is that the video when hes testing out the Krank in their workshop at insane volume levels? I think its on the Dimevision dvd..

I noticed the same thing... Dime could pull off the most insane squeels on almost any rig, yet when he was playing that Krank the squeels sounded like crap!!

Thats proof for me anyway that they suck. Dime could make most rigs sound awesome!

Anyone ever notice on Krank threads there is always a couple of noobs to the forum singing its praises. In this one we have Slackdaddy and TommyHorchata.

I am not saying these are people associated with Krank, but it sure is a trend I notice.....

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blackba":14686 said:

Anyone ever notice on Krank threads there is always a couple of noobs to the forum singing its praises. In this one we have Slackdaddy and TommyHorchata.

I am not saying these are people associated with Krank, but it sure is a trend I notice.....

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Nope, not affiliated with them, just own one of their amps and love it!!!