CLASS 5 BAD RATTLES

[LivewireBlanco]

How about a class 10 or class 15??

Can we say, VM with one KT66....

[rvin28]

one kt66, tremolo and 2 x 10 greenbacks and in dark blue or red tolex, handwired and all Mullard valves, dagnells and hand selected components and only £99

I'm first in the queue

:chug

Suddenly I'm awake......................

[Kongels]

lol, exactly my point.

Although I think a 15w with a KT66 and a good 12 inch would sell well. I love my Orange AD15 and other than a Dr. Z maz 18 jr don't know what amp to upgrade, replace it.

[rvin28]

How about a really SRV approach and have a 15" speaker??

[DeanM]

YEAH!!! a 5watt amp thru a 15" 200watt bass speaker!! :high
only jokin!

when i revalve my VM maybe il build somethin with a single kt66 that i can throw the old valves in! or maybe il strip the first amp i built and make another along those lines!

[ClubAndCountry]

A 5W amp through the right 200W 15" speaker will sound amazing! There's no such thing as needing "enough" power to drive a speaker - any speaker will operate perfectly at any input below its rated power... if you think about it, when you turn down a powerful amp to a low setting, it's producing a tiny fraction of its power (volume controls are usually logarithmic, so the output even at "half" may actually be more like one-tenth of the full power) and the speakers still work fine. In fact, years ago the cabinet I mostly used in my little city one-bedroom flat was a 1980s Marshall 2x15" bass cabinet, with Celestion Sidewinders rated at 250W each. It sounded HUGE with tiny amounts of power going through it, and it was much easier to get that 'big amp' sound at whisper volume than it is with a little speaker. I also used a 200W Marshall Major amp with it sometimes - in the flat! - with the volume just cracked open, and an external valve preamp for overdrive, and that also sounded fantastic at no more than transistor radio volume. The *tone* that you get from a big amp still shines through even at those volumes, through a good cab. That's exactly why I don't rate most small amps as sounding 'big', because by that sort of comparison they don't.

I think I mentioned this before, but I'd really like to hear a Class 10 too - basically the same idea as the Class 5 but with a single EL34 or KT66, a 12" speaker, and possibly a master volume, since 10W is getting quite loud. I think that would sound much better, even assuming the Class 5 I tried wasn't a particularly representative one.

[rvin28]

I think you are right, a Class 10 would be a good idea.
Years ago (dinosaur age!) when i was first playing I never wanted to buy a 'small' powered amp so even though I had the opportunity to buy small reasonably priced combo (Silver faced deluxe reverb or similar) at a rating of 22 watts it was never going to be loud enough (???) so I never bothered. Most of us were using HH100 combos (turned down 'cause they were too loud) and it was possible to pick up a vintage AC30 for less than £100 (they weren't popular then). Before you ask, this was early to mid 70's. If i thought like this I am sure that thousands of other kids at the time did the same.

Nowdays it does appear that tone is king so small valve amps are having a revival which is great. Marshall have produced some terrific small valve amps in the past so perhaps hear is an opportunity to produce some 5, 10 and 15 watt amps of real quality

Any one agree/disagree.

I suppose its all down to money!

[spidey]

Marshall already make a 15w head, the Haze, an 18w handwired reissue combo and a 20w handwired head. I guess they couldn't do too many low powered valve products for fear of cannibalising sales of existing products. That said, I'd love to hear an 18 or 20w version of the class 5 too.

[Lil]

Hi All,
Sorry to bring up the rattle scenario once again as I know it’s been discussed a great deal here already, however, I was wondering, is there anything that can be done at home to fix the problem?

About 3 weeks ago I decided to buy a Class 5 and my first impressions were that it is a fantastic amp, loud albeit, but with a great sound. Up until today I was rattle free, however, when I turned the amp on the dreaded rattle started to occur, particularly on the G and A notes on the fifth string.

Anyway, I was wondering is there anything I could do that will fix the rattle? I read on the gearpage that to fix the rattle all that’s needed is to tighten or remove altogether the metal spring tube retainer. Does this work, and if so, is it easy to do, or is my best bet simply trying to return the amp and hopefully get another rattle free one?

Sorry for the long post but after having the amp for three weeks, and really loving it, especially now the speaker is starting to smooth out, it was a bit disappointing for the rattle to start now, as i thought after three weeks of playing rattle free, i had bought one that was immune from the rattle.

[pablues]

I did try removing the wire clip on my first Class 5,it made no difference.It's easy to do once the amp is removed from the cabinet.To do this you have to undo the seven screws around the edge of the back panel plus the screws on the top at either end of the control panel.

BEWARE there is a risk of components in valve amps holding enough charge to shock or POTENTIALLY KILL YOU even when turned off!
So if you are not sure what you are doing be very very careful to keep your fingers away from the amps insides or get a tech to do it.

[rvin28]

Hi all,
Not good to hear that another class 5 owner has a case of the 'rattles' but I still think the issue is the thinness of the chassis.

Steve D - is it all possible that Marshall can show a simple method to us all of how to make the chassis more 'integral', where this be throught the use of something line door draft excluder etc. with pictures how to acheive this. I am sure that this must be a sound idea (excuse the pun) rather than sending the amps backward and forward for repair and hopefully make all happy.

I too have noticed that my 3rd amp is beginning to rattle albeit tolerable but i do not want to open the back and potentially void my warranty.

Any thoughts??

[Lil]

Hi,

Thanks for the response pablues, if removing the wire clip makes no difference I won’t pursue that avenue.
Thanks Again!

[SteveD]

As I've stated previously, if you aren't happy please return it to the store stating the problem.

[surfnorthwest]

Man 74 posts here about the Class 5 and not all about the rattles, don't know how to break this up so I will just let it keep going.

[Kongels]

I think when it hits here in the States and this isn't an issue that should resolve itself.