Amp Build: Cameron Aldrich

[SpiderWars]

For those that asked the preamp schematics are out there, and I believe there is a hand-drawn layout on here somewhere. The power section is pretty much straight Marshall with presence / depth / dark / etc to taste. Mark was also nice enough to answer a few questions I had while talking about the single channel CCV I bought.

Mostly it's piecing things together from information online.

I remember looking for it a while back and strangely got more info on Jose builds when searching 'Aldrich mod' than I did searching for 'Jose mod' and got virtually nothing on the Aldrich mod. Based on your board it looks pretty straightforward but as they say...the devil is in the details.

 

[psychodave]

An Aldrich-modded Marshall, a CCV, and a IIC+. Dave is already on his 'desert island'.

I believe Wizard of Ozz now owns that 2C++. It was my favorite one out of the 3 I had.

My Aldrich has lots of options. The presence is push pull negative feedback adjuster, high and low power switch, two 3 way gain/tone switches, depth pot and a metro effects loop.

 

[scottosan]

Man, I have been craving a new build.

 

[technomancer]

Man, I have been craving a new build.

Tell me I'm starting a trend... going to be Aldriches everywhere

 

[psychodave]

Man, I have been craving a new build.

Tell me I'm starting a trend... going to be Aldriches everywhere

That’s not a bad thing. Nobody is talking about the Helios or BE amps anymore... until someone changes a few parts and calls it a new amp.

 

[Wizard of Ozz]

An Aldrich-modded Marshall, a CCV, and a IIC+. Dave is already on his 'desert island'.

I believe Wizard of Ozz now owns that 2C++. It was my favorite one out of the 3 I had.

My Aldrich has lots of options. The presence is push pull negative feedback adjuster, high and low power switch, two 3 way gain/tone switches, depth pot and a metro effects loop.

Indeed I do and it is a bad mofo of an amp. It's currently kicking the @$$ of my MKIIC++ DRG.

 

[romanianreaper]

Man, I have been craving a new build.

Tell me I'm starting a trend... going to be Aldriches everywhere

I agree with Dave, not a bad thing! In fact, I fear for you if you are able to capture that Aldrich tone and vibe because people will be following you around and salivating. LOL!

Regardless of what the outcome, very cool that you are buildng an amp. The majority of us here on the forum have never accomplished anything like that so win/win in my opinion.

 

[technomancer]

Man, I have been craving a new build.

Tell me I'm starting a trend... going to be Aldriches everywhere

I agree with Dave, not a bad thing! In fact, I fear for you if you are able to capture that Aldrich tone and vibe because people will be following you around and salivating. LOL!

Regardless of what the outcome, very cool that you are buildng an amp. The majority of us here on the forum have never accomplished anything like that so win/win in my opinion.

I'm finding building fun, but definitely not something I would want to do on a schedule to deliver product. Fortunately I make a good living as a software engineer so not even considering doing anything commercial. Plus Mark has been cool enough that I would want to kick him cash back if I built his design for somebody.

I am curious to see how this comes out as I'm doing this at a bit lower voltage so it will probably be a bit browner than the average Aldrich... then again with this power transformer I have a ton of voltage options that basically come down to swapping a couple wires around so I have room to play with it.

What is really funny is I am in the middle of this build and already trying to decide what I want to do for my next one... even worse I am not playing right now because of some minor joint issues with my left hand that I am trying to let heal

 

[CrazyNutz]

I'm finding building fun, but definitely not something I would want to do on a schedule to deliver product. Fortunately I make a good living as a software engineer so not even considering doing anything commercial.

^^^ Exactly. BTW I have the same profession as you.

 

[psychodave]

Man, I have been craving a new build.

Tell me I'm starting a trend... going to be Aldriches everywhere

I agree with Dave, not a bad thing! In fact, I fear for you if you are able to capture that Aldrich tone and vibe because people will be following you around and salivating. LOL!

Regardless of what the outcome, very cool that you are buildng an amp. The majority of us here on the forum have never accomplished anything like that so win/win in my opinion.

I'm finding building fun, but definitely not something I would want to do on a schedule to deliver product. Fortunately I make a good living as a software engineer so not even considering doing anything commercial. Plus Mark has been cool enough that I would want to kick him cash back if I built his design for somebody.

I am curious to see how this comes out as I'm doing this at a bit lower voltage so it will probably be a bit browner than the average Aldrich... then again with this power transformer I have a ton of voltage options that basically come down to swapping a couple wires around so I have room to play with it.

What is really funny is I am in the middle of this build and already trying to decide what I want to do for my next one... even worse I am not playing right now because of some minor joint issues with my left hand that I am trying to let heal

There is definitely an art to his sound. I spoken to him too many times to count and he helped me with a Jose mod on an amp. I couldn’t get it to sound right...and I’m not a newb when it comes to tinkering. We tried everything. Some amps just don’t work and I don’t have the insight to make a turd into a gem. The funny thing is the stock amp sounds killer without mods. I figured it would kill modded.

The only amp I had 100% success with was a Jet City 20 watter. I did the basic mods and Mark helped me tone shape. After months of tinkering I’ve stopped and am completely happy with it. The amp kills. I’d have to say a really interesting thing is trying different manufacturers for the same part. For example, on the depth pot I tried so many different values from 570 to .0066. I couldn’t get anything to have “that” sound I was looking for. Then I was digging in my old parts drawer (keep in mind I’ve tinkered with amps for 20+ years) and came across an old Erie red ceramic cap that was .003uf. BOOM, the amp had this crunchy smooth sound it was missing. So I found another old Erie cap exactly the same as the other, but had a value of .0047uf. It was close, but that .003 was the magic. Everyone talks about schematics and layouts and something as small as a single part made such a difference...of course it’s the sum of all parts, but the fine tuning is where the magic comes in. This is why Mark has a hard time making mass produced amps. He has to play and fine tune each amp. This makes for some differences between amp, but each amp is now custom. With that I can say that I had the #3 CCV next to mine, which is probably #20+, and both amps sounded 99% the same. The last 1% was probably tubes or knob placement, etc.

 

[CrazyNutz]

The only amp I had 100% success with was a Jet City 20 watter.

I believe I heard that amp on one of your vids, and it killed. I have iron from a jet city 20w might need to pester you when I decide to do a build with it.
BTW I've seen a few of those (Friedman) modded, and it looked like the presence trace was cut. Whats up with that? too bright or something?

 

[technomancer]

I'm finding building fun, but definitely not something I would want to do on a schedule to deliver product. Fortunately I make a good living as a software engineer so not even considering doing anything commercial.

^^^ Exactly. BTW I have the same profession as you.

There is definitely an art to his sound. I spoken to him too many times to count and he helped me with a Jose mod on an amp. I couldn’t get it to sound right...and I’m not a newb when it comes to tinkering. We tried everything. Some amps just don’t work and I don’t have the insight to make a turd into a gem. The funny thing is the stock amp sounds killer without mods. I figured it would kill modded.

The only amp I had 100% success with was a Jet City 20 watter. I did the basic mods and Mark helped me tone shape. After months of tinkering I’ve stopped and am completely happy with it. The amp kills. I’d have to say a really interesting thing is trying different manufacturers for the same part. For example, on the depth pot I tried so many different values from 570 to .0066. I couldn’t get anything to have “that” sound I was looking for. Then I was digging in my old parts drawer (keep in mind I’ve tinkered with amps for 20+ years) and came across an old Erie red ceramic cap that was .003uf. BOOM, the amp had this crunchy smooth sound it was missing. So I found another old Erie cap exactly the same as the other, but had a value of .0047uf. It was close, but that .003 was the magic. Everyone talks about schematics and layouts and something as small as a single part made such a difference...of course it’s the sum of all parts, but the fine tuning is where the magic comes in. This is why Mark has a hard time making mass produced amps. He has to play and fine tune each amp. This makes for some differences between amp, but each amp is now custom. With that I can say that I had the #3 CCV next to mine, which is probably #20+, and both amps sounded 99% the same. The last 1% was probably tubes or knob placement, etc.

Without question. I've only talked to him a couple times, but he was telling me the idea of the original CCVs was that he would talk with the customer and each one would be tweaked to what that person was looking for. The Brad era stuff were the amps that were "standardized" and mostly all the same.

I am curious to see how the NFB section works out on this amp, and suspect I will be playing with values for a bit on that

 

[technomancer]

Hacked together DC heater board, check

 

[CrazyNutz]

That looks real nice!

 

[technomancer]

That looks real nice!

Literally the only place the small turrets were a GOOD thing They are literally the perfect size for that rectifier. Also, teflon insulated wire kicks MAJOR ass. I am loving the stuff.

 

[hopkinWFG]

Nice neat work !!

 

[SomedudeinTX]

Good stuff, looking forward to the end results.

 

[riffermadness]

Hope we can get thru this thread and just focus on the amp and the great tones and avoid any talk of the past. Not expecting miracles..

With that said, awesome that you are doing your own build and cool he helped you with some of the issues. I've said it before many times on this forum, that Aldrich tone was my dream tone for years and as I tried to buy Cameron amps from friends, they would not part with them. LOL!

I have heard great amps and have heard great tones but to this day, nothing can touch the first time I heard my buddy's Aldrich in person. It captured the tones I heard in Doug Aldrich's own Cameron that I had seen in a DVD when he was in DIO. That oversaturated crunch is just unreal.

That crunch gives me goosebumps when I hear it !

 

[riffermadness]

Here was a clip of my Aldrich I did for a friend. Showing it doesn’t need some fancy $225 pedal to get that modern tight high gain sound. I was emphasizing that I only needed to turn one knob. This is the magic that Cameron captures.

https://youtu.be/dtKm_wFy78s

Great. Now I have to add an Aldrich to the list of amps to build. Thanks Dave.

Do you happen to know what model the Marshall head thats in psychodaves clip here,damn that amp sounds huge and tight !! I feel the same way you do,need an Aldrich !

 

[riffermadness]

And some pics of the chassis... I had to get some to send to Valvestorm to ask about a faceplate, so figured I might as well post them as well.

Your build looks really good,I hope it turns out how you are wanting it to sound..if it sounds anything like psychodaves in his clip here in your thread thats going to be a badass M-F-er !! Damn I want one !!