KRANK

[J.R.B.]

I agree! I hate that line they use "would you play a plywood guitar?". Idiots!!! If I had to answer, I'd say.....No, but I wouldn't play a poplar one either. Besides solid wood will shrink and warp with changes in the environment especially when it's cut in big enough sheets to build a 4x12. And I think when it comes to cabinet building, dimensions,inside volume and venting play a big part in the tone and from what I can tell the Krank Kab (sorry had to do it) is an oversized cab and probably a bad design. Krank probably made it bigger thinking it would look more kick-ass.

There is a reason why companies use plywood for their cabs and have simillar dimensions. It's because that's what works. Judging by the sound of the Krank 2x12 Revoultion I used to own, the solid wood cab sounds like a MDF cab and it's probably because of the density.

 

[devilrob1979]

I agree! I hate that line they use "would you play a plywood guitar?". Idiots!!! If I had to answer, I'd say.....No, but I wouldn't play a poplar one either. Besides solid wood will shrink and warp with changes in the environment especially when it's cut in big enough sheets to build a 4x12. And I think when it comes to cabinet building, dimensions,inside volume and venting play a big part in the tone and from what I can tell the Krank Kab (sorry had to do it) is an oversized cab and probably a bad design. Krank probably made it bigger thinking it would look more kick-ass.

There is a reason why companies use plywood for their cabs and have simillar dimensions. It's because that's what works. Judging by the sound of the Krank 2x12 Revoultion I used to own, the solid wood cab sounds like a MDF cab and it's probably because of the density.

Poplar's not a bad guitar wood actually. It's very similar to alder. One reason it's not used very often is that it's not as attractive with semi-transparent finishes. I have a poplar winged Carvin DC127 that breathes fire.

As far as the cabs go one reason many companies don't do solid woods is that they tend to resonate which isn't always a good thing when it comes to speaker cab construction.

 

[chris_EIT]

Sorry to Krank lovers but man...... I tried one at a guitar centre nearby just because I have the Arch enemy dvd and they supposedly use them... Wow was I dissapointed, I never though I'd say this BUT even the marshall combos in there seemed a little more enticing after playing that THING. Someone said earlier it sounds like a line 6. I own a flextone 3 for practice and YES it does sound like a KRANKED line 6. Maybe that was their plan?
*Shifty eyes*

 

[Rocky]

The Krank amps I have tried have all been fizzy sounding and reminded me of transistor amps...only the Ibanez Thermion was worse.

I think Krank amps are pretty bad.

 

[JoeEllison]

I'm sure the Krank amp is fine, as are countless other brands..VHT, Genz Benz, Engl, Bogner, etc...

Well, except the Genz Benz... those things are JUNK. The local dealer gave up on them, because they were so bad, and he got tired of boxing them up and sending them back 2-3 times before he got one that didn't die. It was actually starting to hurt his local reputation.

 

[jdurso]

I'm sure the Krank amp is fine, as are countless other brands..VHT, Genz Benz, Engl, Bogner, etc...

Well, except the Genz Benz... those things are JUNK. The local dealer gave up on them, because they were so bad, and he got tired of boxing them up and sending them back 2-3 times before he got one that didn't die. It was actually starting to hurt his local reputation.

are you saying the kranks are junk?? or are you saying the VHTs, ENGLs, and Bogners are junk.

if its the former i agree 100%... they sound like the vetta i just unloaded... wait... my vetta when i combined the ENGL and Diezel models together sounds 1000 times better than a krank....

if its the former you must be on something..... ENGLs and VHTs are such incredible amps... the ENGL SE is one of the best amps ever made for tone and versaitlity.... and the VHT UL while different than a mesa because its less saturated is worth every penny.... VHT makes incredible amps... maybe not the deliverance though... i didnt care for it... the whole less is more didnt fly with me

 

[JoeEllison]

I'm sure the Krank amp is fine, as are countless other brands..VHT, Genz Benz, Engl, Bogner, etc...

Well, except the Genz Benz... those things are JUNK. The local dealer gave up on them, because they were so bad, and he got tired of boxing them up and sending them back 2-3 times before he got one that didn't die. It was actually starting to hurt his local reputation.

are you saying the kranks are junk?? or are you saying the VHTs, ENGLs, and Bogners are junk.

if its the former i agree 100%... they sound like the vetta i just unloaded... wait... my vetta when i combined the ENGL and Diezel models together sounds 1000 times better than a krank....

if its the former you must be on something..... ENGLs and VHTs are such incredible amps... the ENGL SE is one of the best amps ever made for tone and versaitlity.... and the VHT UL while different than a mesa because its less saturated is worth every penny.... VHT makes incredible amps... maybe not the deliverance though... i didnt care for it... the whole less is more didnt fly with me

No, I'm saying the Genz Benz are junk. They're "assembled" in America, but all or most of the guts of it come from China, and are unreliable from everything I've heard and read.

 

[jdurso]

joe we seem to be going back and forth on a lot of these threads lately.... fully agree with you on the genz.... i like the gflex cabs but nothing about their amps.... i thought you were talking about the VHTs and Engls.... i'd have to throw down to defend those amps

 

[JoeEllison]

joe we seem to be going back and forth on a lot of these threads lately.... fully agree with you on the genz.... i like the gflex cabs but nothing about their amps.... i thought you were talking about the VHTs and Engls.... i'd have to throw down to defend those amps

I'm not going to say anything bad about those, or Diezels or Bogners. Krank amps are sort of... not bad, exactly. Just not all that impressive for the price. I just can't see spending $2700 for a more-fizzle-than-sizzle halfstack.

 

[jdurso]

joe we seem to be going back and forth on a lot of these threads lately.... fully agree with you on the genz.... i like the gflex cabs but nothing about their amps.... i thought you were talking about the VHTs and Engls.... i'd have to throw down to defend those amps

I'm not going to say anything bad about those, or Diezels or Bogners. Krank amps are sort of... not bad, exactly. Just not all that impressive for the price. I just can't see spending $2700 for a more-fizzle-than-sizzle halfstack.

yep... they are the ultimate fizzle machine..... on the other hand if you want to get dimebag's early tone all you have to do is buy a crank and your set... that and one of those ugly-ass dean razorbacks.... that is one guitar tone that people should jsut leave alone... dime made it work for him and when i hear early pantera i enjoy it but i havent heard anyone else use that tone like dime

 

[Shep]

RANK!

i tried one the other day .. it was true Sh!t.. i really hated it.. maybe i had to turn it up about 10 or something but it's as fuzzy and fizzy as a woolly mammoth.. i..ahahahh

 

[petejt]

Word is that Dime NEVER played Randalls...he supposedly had an old modded Superlead that he kept in the back, behind his "Randall" rig.

This came from a pretty reliable source. Like someone said, there are guys who play the gear they endorse, and there are guys that will just endorse whatever and keep playing their old stuff stealth.

That's what I hear too. My good friend works at a local music store, his dad is also one of the managers, and there's this customer that comes in every now and again who says that he was Dime's guitar tech for a little while. He was telling my friend how Dime was 'endorsed' by Randall, but had a Marshall combo or something in the back.

That was the first time I had ever heard of a musician doing that. At the time I was too young and niave to understand why someone would do that, but I now know the ugly truth.

WHAT?? :shock: :shock:


But..... Dimebag's tone even sounded solid-state, that cold, "not very full" type of sound, as well as the fizzy/squishyness. Although I do happen to really like his tone on Mouth for War.

How could it have been an old modded Marshall combo? His tone never seemed like a Marshall, only in his really really old days when he was called "Diamond Darrell" and had no goatee and REALLY big frizzy hair...

 

[petejt]

I also find it odd that the late Dimebag Darrell, who for many years favored solid state Randall amps, started endorsing these. While I have had a lot of respect for Dimebag as a person as well as his playing skills, I do feel that his tone was more to be desired.

I find it odd that people who love Dime's tone buy Krank. You'd figure they'd buy Randall, seeing as that's what he used. From talking to some friends of mine, even the last Damageplan album sounds like it's mostly Randall, they say they can only hear parts here and there where there's a different sounding amp on it that's plainly tube.

It was, it was his Randall Warhead. Just a little looser-sounding, I don't think he used the noise gate.

He didn't use the ranK Kranks until performing live with Damageplan.

 

[lailer75]

just saw the band Kittie on sat. they are listed as krank endorsees and guess what they had on stage, 2 triple recs and 2 traditional cabs!!

 

[Hardtailed]

We played a gig recently with sponsored gear. The other guy in my band had to run his Marshall DSL through a Krank cab.

Hmmmm... didn't know a cab could make a nice amp sound like a Metal Zone through full range speakers...

What a piece of ****.

 

[danvortex]

2 weeks ago a friend of mine and i decided to bring all of our amps in the same room. We had 4 different stacks side by side, heads with matching cabs (uberschall, mesa DR 2 channels, Krankenstein, ENGL) we compared them for more than 4 hours and even tried different head/cab combinations. To my surprise, the Krank was very good and i would say it was almost in the same league as the DR and the Bogner. But in the end, we both agreed that the best metal tone we got that night from all of what we have tried was the uberschall head combined to the Krankenstein cab. We were blown away by how the uberschall sounded through that cab compared to it's bogner matching 4*12. To our ears, the mesa DR was pretty close but missed a bit of that crunch and compression the bogner has. The only problem with the Uberschall, it is really noisy, a lot more than the DR

 

[fpoon]

I ONLY KRANK IT OUT OF MY REAR END...........BUY A MESA!!!!! :twisted:

-AJH

 

[danvortex]

i tried the Krankenstein with my band, it has a really good heavy btone but doesn't cut through the band mix like my 2 channels DR does. The DR is way better.

 

[krankaddict]

you guys have absolutely no idea what the hell you're talking about. i've been playing krank for a year and it's incredible! i recommend you listen to some tracks from firewind's "allegiance" album and arch enemy's "doomsday machine" before you pass comment. no distortion pedals used on either album. they're great live too! they are designed for metal. mainly extreme metal but the amount of different sounds you can actually get on it is amazing. i play through 4 revolution series one full stacks and wouldn't have it any other way. the thing i found with mesa is they are really muddy for doing fast rhythms and leads. also, the krank combos do sound bad. but it's because it's a combo! you need to try the full stack to appreciate how amazingly good it sounds. and just take a look at the artists listed on the krank site. they are obviously doing something right. you can't expect any amp to sound amazing straight away. you have to spend time getting the right sound for you. and that is easilly achieved with the kranks. i used rectifiers, road kings, and roadsters before i moved over to krank. i ended up spending nearly £1000 on distortion pedals and eq pedals, then an extra £2000 on rack compressors, noise gates etc. just to get a half decent sound. i play a lot of fast metal mixed with some maiden, metallica and megadeth and the krank has given a totally different sound. a better one. i'm not saying "everyone move to krank or i'll kill you" because that's besides the point. i'm just saying that before you all say "krank suck because i tried it once" give it a chance. especially through a full stack. and take the time to actually dial in the right sound. metallica also use krank. funny that....

 

[chris_EIT]

Umm, metallica? Krank? Last time I checked they use mesa and james uses diezel from time to time and now Kirk signed up with randall? Either way, just like others have said, Kranks are not the worst sounding amp! But for the price and the tone, I personally believe its rotten. I've heard Crate tubed amps sounding better and for cheaper, and I've tried the whole krank range. None of them touch any mesa i've played, and I'm not even into rectifiers