Vox VT30 with 12" speaker mod ?

[Linty7]

Hi everyone,

I haven't been on here for a while as I went off and bought myself a Fender Mustang II and I've been learning everything about that recently. I have to say I'm extremely impressed with it.

I hadn't touched my VT30 for over six months and was thinking of selling it on. However, over the last week I've been playing around with it and I'm sort of liking it again! I've bought another guitar since I last used it which is a Cort M520 (a sort of PRS copy). This is the guitar I've been trying with the amp and I'm far more impressed using this with the Humbuckers than I ever was with my strats with single coils. However it still lacks some punch! It lacks the nice punchy bass that I get from my Mustang II.

I'm now thinking of pulling the VT30 apart and doing some mods (I had previously lined the interior with carpet and placed it on an amp stand). What I'm thinking of doing is to increase the height of the amp case by 3" to 4", this should then allow be to put in a 12" speaker. I'm pretty good at woodwork and my intention is to slice the case in half around the middle and fix in a new section 3" to 4" high to increase the overall height.

Now I know replacement speakers have been mentioned many times before but I am looking for a 12" speaker and not a replacement 10". I really like the sound from the stock Fender 12" speaker in my Mustang II and I feel that a similar speaker to this would probably work quite well. However the Mustang speaker is 8 ohms and I need a 12" 4ohms speaker. Does anyone have any ideas of what may be suitable? I don't want to spend a fortune, just something good 2nd hand really.

[TimC]

I'm far more impressed using this with the Humbuckers than I ever was with my strats with single coils.

Funny you should mention that, that's exactly what I've been thinking recently. The single coil brightness is accentuated by the amp's sometimes harsh treble. This is mellowed by a decent set of humbuckers.

[Col Mustard]

check this page:
www.musiciansfriend.com/search/search.j ... 22+speaker

I believe these are mostly 8 ohm speakers, but should work fine in the Vox because they are higher watt capable. I put a Jensen Mod 10" 4 ohm speaker in my VT-30 and like it quite well. So if they make a 12" 4 ohm version it would fit well, the only question is if you like the sound. Good luck.

One thing about a new amp, or a new speaker, is that they take some hours of guitar work before they are 'broken in' which means it's no surprise that you like your Vox amp better later, and it also means that a brand new amp may not sound its best until after you've played it A LOT.

I also think since you're good with woodworking, that you could make yourself a 2-12 cabinet, and put in two 8 ohm 12" speakers and set your Vox on top of that, and connect it to your speaker line with a simple jack and run two twelves just fine. There are a couple of other threads on this board about that, so you might not have to saw your amp in half. Your amp has plenty of power to run two 12" speakers, this would give it much more authority. *grins

[Linty7]

Thank you very much for your replies TimC and Col Mustard.

Yes, after giving it some thought and before I get too drastic with the amp I'm going to do the speaker out jack mod first. My friend has a Blackstar 2x10 cab so I will try that with it. At least it will give me a taster of the potential. Then I'll build myself a 1x12 or 2x12cab. I'm not really interested in too much volume as I only ever play at home and usually late at night, so can't annoy the neighbours! It's really quality not volume I'm after.

The main reason I wanted to mod the amp so drastically was because of space. I have an L shaped living room, the dining area bit is my guitar area and it's getting a touch cluttered (six guitars and two amps). So if it works fine with a 1x12 or 2x12 I may then turn the amp into a head unit, just to save on space really.

[Duffy]

Linty7 -

I'm curious as to how you made out with the twelve inch speaker in the VT30.

I put a what I think is nice, twelve inch eight Ohm Celestion Seventy/80 into a Crate Flexwave 15R, replacing the four ohm twelve inch speaker in it and it sounds really great. A totally great improvement. I use the amp a lot to play my Walkman portable cd player into so I can jam along to songs with my Yamaha Stage Custom drum set. The clarity of the cd's is now totally awesome compared to the muddy sound I was getting from the stock speaker.

Did you ever do the speaker upgrade to the VT30?

I just bought a NOS VT30, brand new for 120US out the door. I think the amp sounds great, not harsh at all and it seems to sound best with full sized humbucker equipped guitars, but also sounds great with a good telecaster with single coils, actually two different quality telecasters - just a little more twangy, but nothing that the tone knob on the guitar couldn't knock down, and "harsh" is not a word I can associate with the sound I get. These are nice Alnico II Pro Seymour Duncan pickups in a Fender MIM telecaster standard and the stock pups in the butterscotch Squier Classic Vibe Fifty's Telecaster. These pickups are not "harsh" sounding in my Fender '65 Deluxe Reverb Reissue either. I have, however, played some "harsh" tele pickups in the DRRI and they definitely sounded very unconcerting and noisy.

Right now, as I take a break from playing and am typing this, I'm playing my PRS SE Singlecut Tremolo guitar with humbuckers thru the new VT30 and I am enthusiastic about how good the amp sounds. I have not stuffed anything into it or done anything to it at all. I played a couple other good guitars thru it also and had fun, thinking that it sounds great.

Am I missing something I should be noticing, because I think the VT30, personally, is the best sounding amp in the VTxxx series. I had a nice little VT15 for a while and this sounds way better. I played a VT50 unmodified at the store and found it to be wallowing in thick, heavy bass - irretrievably mired in the muddy bass and nothing I could do at the store was able to rectify the problem. I dismissed the idea of getting the VT50 because this brand new VT30 was available and my experience is that it sounds well balanced and very cool.

I don't think I have gotten a sound out of my NOS VT30 that sounds less than awesome. The single coils required turning down some gain and adjusting to a suitable model, but the Telecasters sounded very nice.

If I should be listening more attentively for something in the sound of the amp, or making some mods, I'd appreciate some info regarding how to proceed.

Any feedback is appreciated.