Taming the Nanovalve

OK, so you'd not think that a 5W amp needs taming but nevertheless 5W is far too much to use at home given you want to wind it all the way up to get a reasonable degree of overdrive.

JayGee suggested I try an L-pad with it as he'd had success with one on his Mesa 5:25. So I bought a suitable one and mounting plate from Wilmslow Audio.

Waving the mounting plate at the cabinet suggested it'd fit tidily in the side so I stripped the guts out of the Peavey. You just need to undo the four screws at the back and the two that hold the handle on then the whole thing slides out. I also undid the speaker to avoid getting sawdust in it. The speaker really is nastily made, it may yet get upgraded with a Celestion Super 8.

The mounting plate was just the right size that my biggest holesaw would suit it nicely, I centred it by eye then got a passing JayGee to hold the cabinet while I attacked it with the drill.

Smell of burning MDF aside this was trivially easy and pretty soon I had the plate tidily mounted.

I figured I also wanted the option to drive an external speaker as experimenting with this had show it to be worthwhile. So while the guts were out I put a hole for a jack socket in the grille at the back of the amp.

Following the instructions that came with the L-pad I made a simple loom which would allow me to connect this up without modding the amp itself. The spade connectors normally connected to the speaker just push onto the L-pad instead.

After this is was simply a case of just bolting it all back together and connecting it up.

Now with the L-pad fitted you can wind the amp all the way up but turn the volume down until it's perfectly usable for neighbour friendly practice. It does a very nice 'dirty rock' sound and has transformed the amp from something I just wouldn't use into something I probably will. I reckon the L-pad does rob the amp of some treble but not enough that it's a problem, it was almost overly bright before.

The good thing about using the matching mounting plate for the L-pad is that it almost looks like it came this way from the factory. Only the white wires loosely routed in the back of the cabinet really give the game away.

Only time will tell if it'll supplant the Indie IT-30 I normally use for weekend practice sessions. Provided we're playing 'rock' and not 'metal' it should certainly manage it OK although I'd definitely be tempted to change the speaker.

It's currently lurking downstairs as my 'check things while fettling' amp and it works brilliantly for that.

The Nanovalves first outing

Today I took the Nanovalve round Ruperts house for our regular Sunday practice session.

This was the first time I was really able to actually crank it up and play it for a bit. This has dispelled my initial disappointment. You can get some really quite nice overdriven sounds out of it although it is pretty tinny and there's definitely a rattle from it on full chat.

Wound up though it is still far too loud not to annoy the neighbours and I ended up playing most of the time with it at a low volume and using my old Boss MZ-2 to give me the distortion I wanted.

When I got back I had the back cover off and connected it up to a nasty 1x12 cabinet I built for my Smokeydock project.

The difference was astounding, all the rattle disappeared, it was no longer tinny and got even louder.

So much though an amp modding habit isn't something I want to develop I think I'm going to start messing around with it. The objectives are.

• Tame the volume
• Get rid of the rattle

My mate Jaygee has suggested that an L pad would be a good way to deal with the volume on a low power amp like this and it makes sense. Modding the circuit for a master volume is a whole load more aggro and  involves learning how to safely mod valve amps which I can't be arsed with.

The rattle could be harder to pin down. I think some of it is one of the valve protector cages rattling as it's poorly formed and a bit loose. Although it could be anything in the cabinet rattling to be honest as trying to bend the cage back into shape didn't really help. I wouldn't be surprised if the speaker is very buzzy.

So I can try another speaker and/or take it to bits and try to find the rattles. Alternatively it might be an amusing conceit to build a new cabinet for it. Either as a 1x12 combo or a tiny little head.

Anyway, for now I've ordered an L pad and mounting plate which I'll stick in the existing cabinet. At lower volumes I imagine these problems will go away.

Peavey Nanovalve

So, there was me thinking that these little 5W class A valve amps might be cool and most importantly quiet enough to actually run flat out and get cool valve tone.

Except I'm tight, far too tight to buy some piece of boutique loveliness and wanted to spend maybe £75 at most in case it's just the usual story of rampant GAS that turns into disappointment. I'd looked at the Epiphone Valve Junior and noticed Thomann do the same thing branded as a 'Harley Benton' for roughly £65 and thought about ordering one. Only by the time I'd thought about it more seriously the pound has gone down the toilet against the Euro and you've got to add shipping on. So I abandoned the idea.

Then while dropping my old RS530 off with Tim Marten for a fret polish I noticed Music Ground selling the Peavey Nanovalve for about £85. Get home, look on eBay and kerching £65 delivered.

Getting it out of the box it's a solidly built little practice amp with the simplest possible selection of controls. There is, amazingly an instruction manual but it's mostly safety warnings.

The verdict? Er, I'm now thinking that one of these little 1W class A valve amps might be cool and most importantly quiet enough to run flat out and get cool valve tone...