Ahhh! That makes sense. Being an electrician, I always think of Ice Cubes as a type of industrial relay. Sorry.
The amp is Cathode Biased, so you can try any brand of EL-84 you like.
You can also use 2 different duets, might sound best if you put 1 duet in the middle 2 sockets and the other in the outer 2 sockets.
You can also use 4 different EL-84's.
Cathode Bias is a "Self-Biasing" setup, meaning that the tubes will find their own bias point.
I would start there as far as experimenting. It may also be a good idea to call Bob at Euortubes or Doug (can't remember his company off hand, must be that I need more coffee) and explain the tone you are looking for and what amp you are using.
I have an LSS 1x12 that I am very hesitant to do anything with. It has the stock Black Shadow C90, which is a very stiff speaker. It works well for me on the clean settings because I like stiff cleans that are spanky and seem to jump out of the amp.
As for Trace, he has made a very good name for himself, and in some ways, I would like to do the same. I do not want to offer generic mods though, I am seeking to become the "Go-to" guy for signature sounds. I want to create individual masterpieces of tone.
I sold a Heartbreaker to a guy in Texas. He had 3 already and was interested in my amp because I had moddified it. I had added a Bias pot, strengthened the Reverb and taken the muddyness out of the Lust channel. He liked it so much that he wanted me to mod all of his others because it had a very distinct tone that none of his old ones did.
Here is what I would do if it were my amp:
Write down exactly what it is that you are looking for and cannot find in the amp. Play with the amp and try to get the tone you are looking for. Be as articulate as you can when describing the things that you are looking to find.
Then
Before doing anything else, play with your settings on just 1 channel. Think outside the box, or maybe use the factory settings as a good starting point and go from there. I started with the 1st factory setting for the Clean channel, then, I raised the Master to about 1:00. Still nothing. Then, I turned the Output past 9:00 and something magical happend, the amp seemed to come alive at about 10:00 on the Output. Some minor tone tweaks here and there, and I actually wake up now just itching to play my guitar. It has been years since I felt that way.
Write down your settings so you don't forget them. PM them to me or post them here. Maybe the problem is the guitar or the way you are setting the amp up.
Try some new tubes, experiment with Preamp Tubes. I had a Soldano that did not like having all the same brand of tubes. I ended up with a Sovtek 12AX7WPS in V1 (which surprised the hell out of me because I can't stand Sovteks), Electro Harmonix (can't stand them either) in V2, JJ in all the rest of the sockets.
If that does not do the trick.
Call Ted Weber (sometimes he does not answer the phone, we get a lot of salesmen calling here and I screen my calls too), he's a great guy and very knowledgable. Tell him what amp you are looking for, he might not be familiar with the Lonestar, (his company is Weber Vintage Sound Technology) but if you tell him it's a 30 watt Cathode Biased EL-84 amp based on a Deluxe Reverb circuit, he will understand.
Ask him what speakers he would recommend. Speakers make a world of difference, and are by far cheaper than upgrading transformers.
Lastly,
Transformers,
I have spoken to Paul many times at Mercury Mag.
He is a really cool guy and seems to only have the best interests when it comes to tone. My old Soldano had Mercury as stock transformers and it sounded freaking awesome.
I wouldn't worry about the choke and power transformer just yet. If you end up changing these, you will never get your money back, so you better make sure this is the amp for you.
I have changed the Output Transformers on a few Mesa amps, here is what I found:
DC-2: I bought this amp on Ebay several years ago when I 1st started fixing amps. It supposedly had a bad OT. I played it at bedroom volumes and it seemed to work fine, then one day, I cranked it and the amp started making horrible noises. I took the transformer apart and what do you know? It had some burned wires in it.
I changed the tranny to a Heyboer that I got from Mojotone, which was about 4 times larger than the original one and sounded like it was 4 times larger. The amp instantly had more headroom than any other DC-2 on the market.
Many Fender players have been known to put larger "Iron" in their amps to get more headroom or a larger clean tone. If you want more breakup, this is not a good mod for you.
I actually think that the transformers in most Mesa amps are very high quality and the OT in the LSS is no exception. It is huge and heavy, which is a good sign. A Mercury might sound better, but if you go to their website, you will see that they are anywhere from $200 to $300. Lots of money.
I have modded so many amps thinking that I could make them work for me. Some of them (Heartbreaker head - work in progress, but makes me smile) do, and some of them don't. Some of them simply weren't designed to do what I wanted them to.
Try the things I mentioned above, and let me know if any of it helped or made sense. I gotta go get more coffee so I can stop rambling. :lol: [/code]
I have to apologize, I looked at the LSC and the OT is big. I just had my LSS open and the OT is pretty small. It sounds really great to me, but an upgrade would definitely add some oomph!
