H
hammer jammer
New member
Very pleased with my Egnater Renegade head, its been going strong for just over a year, burnt one preamp tube and is just now ready for a power tube change, I have jammed almost daily for several hours (including using it as a stereo to crank out tunes using a CD player into my mixer into a Rivera RockCrusher Attenuator into the Renegade while working on other gear) so I feel like I got a great deal buying this amp.
My head came with 2 Tung Sol El34B and 2 Ruby 6l6GC power tubes and I have literally had this thing cranked at club volume attenuated down to studio level and sweet sweet power tube break up the whole time, for a grand I couldn't be happier.
Just today a Quad of Tung Sol KT66's arrived and I am waiting for those to warm up before installing them for hopefully the next year long run, I had to remove the bear trap retainers as the Tung Sol KT66's have a metal base and is said to have a part of the tube wired to the 1 pin, whether this is fact or not I cannot say but it has been widely talked about on many forums so I didnt want to risk frying my tubes by grounding them to the base and removed the bear traps, I bought the appropriate KT88/66/6550 spring retainers to replace the bear traps, but was told I dont need them if my sockets are tight and hold the tubes well, of course if I was hauling this thing around I would defiantly advise putting the spring retainers in regardless, I also made sure to bust out the denatured alcohol and dip the tube pins in hopes of keeping the contacts of the amp clean, I have run alot of different preamp tubes through this thing experimenting and the last thing I want is to be gunking up the contacts and creating problems that dont exist, and before you fire up those new power tubes make sure you turn the bias controls all the way down on both sets of tubes, you dont want to accidentally red plate your brand new tubes and have to try and sucker the vendor for new ones because you forgot that step, the manual suggest setting the bias point between 60-70mV I just set mine to about 66/67, had to go back and re-bias the first set after biasing the second set as it changed the setting once the second set came into play....Im feeling good about this quad as both sides biased easily with out big fluctuations, I was worried about the tubes being stuck in the hands of the US postal service and the freezing temps out there for the last week but these seem to be operating up to par.
I have tried many preamp tube brands in the various positions and have found the Tung Sol 12ax7 to be the most clear and tone full sounding for my uses, I prefer to use my clean channel for the brunt of my work as my signal chain goes: guitar into a Peterson Stomp Classic tuner into a Origin effects Cali 76 compressor into a Carl Martin Parametric EQ into an Ethos Overdrive into a Strymon Timeline delay into a Strymon Big Sky reverb into a Pigtronix Infinity looper into an Allen and Heath Zed 10 mixer (which also has my CD player running into it) using the auxiliary out goes into my Egnater Renegade head (Clean channel 1) which goes into the Rivera RockCrusher attenuator into a 2x12 16ohm Mojotone cab of Celestion Vintage 30's, I have been very happy with the harmonics and tone I can get out of my guitar, I cant imagine that spending twice as much on a head would have been better than this.
So all told after today I will be running 6 Tung Sol 12ax7 preamp tubes and a Quad of Tung Sol KT66's power tubes in this beast and am excited to hear the end result, I have come to follow the advice given to me by a previous Renegade owner who told me that chasing the preamp tube dragon was madness and he found it best to find one brand you like and just go with those, and I am now experienced enough to know he's right, swapping out several brands in various positions is madness and way to time consuming for an end result that is hardly a shade different from swap to swap, I can understand experimenting with a V1 swap on occasion but now that I own a fairly hefty box of preamp tubes (kind of addicted for a bit there) I realize the wisdom of using a single brand of tubes across the board, ....but to each his own.
For the record I did call on Bruce and his staff a few times for advice and questions and was quickly answered resolving any issue or question I had in regard to the Renegade and I found this site and RIG TALK to be very helpful in alot of things I wanted to know in regard to the Renegade and tube amps in general, I will say if your buying a tube amp it behooves you to get a tube amp education as it will save you alot of stress and money maybe even your life if your more adventurous with a screw driver than you are with the computer.
So thats Rule no #1 get and amp education, I have learned that 90% of the time its just a tube problem, meaning an easy do it yourself fix which can be narrowed down to preamp or power tubes relatively easy, and the wealth of knowledge available online is astounding, so dont be afraid to do some research yourself, and in other forums, many problems are often tube amp general more than a specific brand, learning alot of the stuff I have has taken away alot of stress and worry, its all just parts and procedures, first try this then try that, but dont panic...lol ....I know I did too...lol
Rule #2 in my book, (get a good attenuator) the tone you will experience will leave you addicted to tube amps for a lifetime, I cant even imagine using an AXE Effects without a tube amp or any other direct device from this point forward, give me some tubes and a screw driver and I will gladly tinker and maintain to get that tone only tubes truly produce, heard all the modeling crap you can have it.
Rule no #3 for me its Tung Sol preamp and power tubes all the way, built solid as a rock and they sound great, and strangely are priced very fair for a great sound I am very pleased with, the only tubes I long to try since I found Tung Sol are Genelex Gold Lions which I will get to, but for now and for the price Tung Sol cant be beat.
My Egnater Renegade has been good to me.
My head came with 2 Tung Sol El34B and 2 Ruby 6l6GC power tubes and I have literally had this thing cranked at club volume attenuated down to studio level and sweet sweet power tube break up the whole time, for a grand I couldn't be happier.
Just today a Quad of Tung Sol KT66's arrived and I am waiting for those to warm up before installing them for hopefully the next year long run, I had to remove the bear trap retainers as the Tung Sol KT66's have a metal base and is said to have a part of the tube wired to the 1 pin, whether this is fact or not I cannot say but it has been widely talked about on many forums so I didnt want to risk frying my tubes by grounding them to the base and removed the bear traps, I bought the appropriate KT88/66/6550 spring retainers to replace the bear traps, but was told I dont need them if my sockets are tight and hold the tubes well, of course if I was hauling this thing around I would defiantly advise putting the spring retainers in regardless, I also made sure to bust out the denatured alcohol and dip the tube pins in hopes of keeping the contacts of the amp clean, I have run alot of different preamp tubes through this thing experimenting and the last thing I want is to be gunking up the contacts and creating problems that dont exist, and before you fire up those new power tubes make sure you turn the bias controls all the way down on both sets of tubes, you dont want to accidentally red plate your brand new tubes and have to try and sucker the vendor for new ones because you forgot that step, the manual suggest setting the bias point between 60-70mV I just set mine to about 66/67, had to go back and re-bias the first set after biasing the second set as it changed the setting once the second set came into play....Im feeling good about this quad as both sides biased easily with out big fluctuations, I was worried about the tubes being stuck in the hands of the US postal service and the freezing temps out there for the last week but these seem to be operating up to par.
I have tried many preamp tube brands in the various positions and have found the Tung Sol 12ax7 to be the most clear and tone full sounding for my uses, I prefer to use my clean channel for the brunt of my work as my signal chain goes: guitar into a Peterson Stomp Classic tuner into a Origin effects Cali 76 compressor into a Carl Martin Parametric EQ into an Ethos Overdrive into a Strymon Timeline delay into a Strymon Big Sky reverb into a Pigtronix Infinity looper into an Allen and Heath Zed 10 mixer (which also has my CD player running into it) using the auxiliary out goes into my Egnater Renegade head (Clean channel 1) which goes into the Rivera RockCrusher attenuator into a 2x12 16ohm Mojotone cab of Celestion Vintage 30's, I have been very happy with the harmonics and tone I can get out of my guitar, I cant imagine that spending twice as much on a head would have been better than this.
So all told after today I will be running 6 Tung Sol 12ax7 preamp tubes and a Quad of Tung Sol KT66's power tubes in this beast and am excited to hear the end result, I have come to follow the advice given to me by a previous Renegade owner who told me that chasing the preamp tube dragon was madness and he found it best to find one brand you like and just go with those, and I am now experienced enough to know he's right, swapping out several brands in various positions is madness and way to time consuming for an end result that is hardly a shade different from swap to swap, I can understand experimenting with a V1 swap on occasion but now that I own a fairly hefty box of preamp tubes (kind of addicted for a bit there) I realize the wisdom of using a single brand of tubes across the board, ....but to each his own.
For the record I did call on Bruce and his staff a few times for advice and questions and was quickly answered resolving any issue or question I had in regard to the Renegade and I found this site and RIG TALK to be very helpful in alot of things I wanted to know in regard to the Renegade and tube amps in general, I will say if your buying a tube amp it behooves you to get a tube amp education as it will save you alot of stress and money maybe even your life if your more adventurous with a screw driver than you are with the computer.
So thats Rule no #1 get and amp education, I have learned that 90% of the time its just a tube problem, meaning an easy do it yourself fix which can be narrowed down to preamp or power tubes relatively easy, and the wealth of knowledge available online is astounding, so dont be afraid to do some research yourself, and in other forums, many problems are often tube amp general more than a specific brand, learning alot of the stuff I have has taken away alot of stress and worry, its all just parts and procedures, first try this then try that, but dont panic...lol ....I know I did too...lol
Rule #2 in my book, (get a good attenuator) the tone you will experience will leave you addicted to tube amps for a lifetime, I cant even imagine using an AXE Effects without a tube amp or any other direct device from this point forward, give me some tubes and a screw driver and I will gladly tinker and maintain to get that tone only tubes truly produce, heard all the modeling crap you can have it.
Rule no #3 for me its Tung Sol preamp and power tubes all the way, built solid as a rock and they sound great, and strangely are priced very fair for a great sound I am very pleased with, the only tubes I long to try since I found Tung Sol are Genelex Gold Lions which I will get to, but for now and for the price Tung Sol cant be beat.
My Egnater Renegade has been good to me.
