Load Box vs EVH

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Exo-metal

Exo-metal

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I see a lot on the net about load boxes and attenuation. The companies that produce these intend for them to be used lightly. Which one was made to be punished at full tilt by EVH if any?
 
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I don't believe that company is in business. There's a lot of big names in the game. I'm wondering which one would actually hold up with hard use day after day. These amps are so expensive now that it should make someone think twice about what they trust.
 
Arch Stanton said:
That's the one Jose built that is at Mark Cameron's place.
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looking at that thing, i’d be hard pressed to believe that with minds like fryette and suhr behind the latest offerings, the jose load box would sound superior to the new stuff.
 
mentoneman said:
looking at that thing, i’d be hard pressed to believe that with minds like fryette and suhr behind the latest offerings, the jose load box would sound superior to the new stuff.
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It does not.

It's a purely resistive load.. which means it has a flat impedance curve.

Very compressed sounding, but I guess it worked for Ed because according to Dave Friedman, he was still using a purely resistive load in the "Bradshaw Rig" days. ?‍♂️
 
I have a Hotplate, Rocktron Juice Extractor and Fryette PS-2. They all work fine. Buddy had. Scholz Power Soak he used to use. It worked fine too. Even after getting so hot he could light cigarettes off it.
 
Arch Stanton said:
It does not.

It's a purely resistive load.. which means it has a flat impedance curve.

Very compressed sounding, but I guess it worked for Ed because according to Dave Friedman, he was still using a purely resistive load in the "Bradshaw Rig" days. ?‍♂️
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There it is...If Friedman was such a visionary he would have saw a way to help Ed see something so basic. He is a paint by numbers hack.
 
Arch Stanton said:
It does not.

It's a purely resistive load.. which means it has a flat impedance curve.

Very compressed sounding, but I guess it worked for Ed because according to Dave Friedman, he was still using a purely resistive load in the "Bradshaw Rig" days. ?‍♂️
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right. it just looked like “a” solution to stage volume via loading/reamping. bradshaw claims to have innovated that idea of speaker dummy loads but maybe he was speaking of reactive loads vs resistive.
 
Arch Stanton said:
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Way before Suhr came out with his Reactive load boxes, he introduced me to slaving a amp and I saw him slap together a resistive load similar to that Jose load box, sounded amazing! of course now his reactive load boxes will mimic a real cab better and have the option of speaker IR's..but maybe there's something to the tone of a resisitive load, more compression might be a good thing especially with a plexi type amp
 
Greazygeo said:
I have a Hotplate, Rocktron Juice Extractor and Fryette PS-2. They all work fine. Buddy had. Scholz Power Soak he used to use. It worked fine too. Even after getting so hot he could light cigarettes off it.
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?
the scholtz and the marshall “power bake” were notoriously molten after extended use.
a gtr friend of mine would cuss every time the power brake was mentioned due to it burning his forearm between sets one night, while trying to look cool by leaning on his marshall half stack to chat with chicks, and instead screaming like a schoolgirl. he later fried an old marshalls of his.

i had the thd, komet airbrake, and still have the rockcrusher and juice extractor. my friends nearby currently have the fryette ps stuff. great sounding but both were experiencing issues. turns out:

"The internal fuse was blown. It was blowing because of the failure of the line voltage spike suppressor capacitor. That has now been replaced with a higher tolerance part."

just fyi power station guys!

i once played a germino masonette with a Ho (pre-ultimate) attenuator, which was an early load box with built in ss power amp, and it sounded great but looked a bit light in build quality.
 
There is a rock crusher fs near me, also a bad cat II that seems like it has a ton of cool options. I've been happy with my tone but this whole thread has turned all my attention to the evh tone chase like never bf and it's all your fault mentoneman?
 
Exo-metal said:
There is a rock crusher fs near me, also a bad cat II that seems like it has a ton of cool options. I've been happy with my tone but this whole thread has turned all my attention to the evh tone chase like never bf and it's all your fault mentoneman?
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?don’t shoot the messenger.
just trying to melt face like the rest of y’all?
 
I’ve been cranking 100w Super Leads (some real some homebrews) thru a reactive load box for a few years and the load gets hot but not that hot. You can rest your hand on it and it won’t burn you…but it’s hot.

And it’s usually variac’d which reduces power. I did the same when I had a PS2 and same result, hot but not scorching. I have occasionally ran 100w Marshalls thru it without the variac.

Right now I’m using a Rivera Mini Rockcrusher Recording (mini RockRec) but only for the load. I just use a second speaker cable from amp to Suhr Iso Line Out box then into the rack.

I think it sounds Van Halen-ish. If Stradazone was playing it it would sound close enough. And that’s straight in, no boost or EQ. It has the alleged Ed specs which definitely add gain.

The thing about the PS2 for my use is that it is a tube power amp and I’ve already achieved all the tubey goodness I need coming from the amp speaker out. For power amp I want clean so a SS amp seems better. You still don’t get the same response as a cranked Marshall but it’s as close as I’ve found.

EDIT: I had an Airbrake and never did like the attenuated tone. It was purely resistive. Had that thing for many years before the PS2/et al came out. It mainly sat there because it really neutered the tone.
 
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Yeah, Palmer recommends leaving a space above their rack units if the continuous power pushed into them is above 50-60W or so, and I have to agree they barely heat up at all below that. At that point you´re pretty turned up with a high gain master volume amp, but barely on with a 1959 that isn´t on a variac or is attenuated a little bit. But like we said in that other thread just now, a variac plexi apparently doesn´t put out more than 50W.
 
Exo-metal said:
There is a rock crusher fs near me, also a bad cat II that seems like it has a ton of cool options. I've been happy with my tone but this whole thread has turned all my attention to the evh tone chase like never bf and it's all your fault mentoneman?
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GAS inducing sites and conversations will do that.

Resistance is futile.
 
To make matters worse we have this guy and his 50w to end all wars. Jason are you using a load box here with everything on 10 bro?

 
I use a Fryette PS-2.
Works great.
Plus it has a loop that IMO works great.

Used the Mesa Powerhouse attenuator for a minute and thought that was pretty good too.
 
I’ve been going down this rabbit hole the last week. Seems the load box + attenuator world is slim pickings if you want something ‘legit’. The 2-notes stuff uses a fixed impedance curve, so while you might be able to attenuate the amp, getting a proper sound going DI isn’t going to have the best results.

Fryette seems to have the placeholder as ‘this is the shit and gives me all I want”, but apparently they’re never in stock and people have a few bricks sitting in their homes when issues have arisen and customer support sucks. I know I’m not investing $1200 on something that might die or I‘ll have zero support with.

The Suhr Reactive IR and Fractal’s load box get a lot of praise.

If you got some time to kill, this dude did a good demo of a lot of popular ones-


There’s also this one that I found useful-


Ultimately, I’m probably just going to get two different units, one for a load box and one for an attenuator.
 
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