ts808 vs. ts9 modded

[orange418]

I had a ts-9 that I traded to my friend for an electro harmonix hot tubes...He uses a peavey 5150 and played through the ts-9 wondering how a modded one to ts808 specs would sound...In his mind there's too much dirt on the ts-9 and he just likes it as a boost to drive his amp further... I really don't get what he means half the time because when we jam he gets too finicky with his setup...Either way does a modded ts-9 sound that close to the ts-808 or is that mojo just untouchable and we just hope to reach what we can't afford?  Any response regarding that would be great...

[5thumbs]

Other than the cosmetic differences between the TS-808 and TS-9, there are precisely two resistors and one op amp difference between the two pedals.

Check out R.G. Keen's 'The Technology of the Tube Screamer' article for more details: http://geofex.com/Article_Folders/TStech/tsxtech.htm.  It's a great article and should help dispel claims of 'mojo' being the difference between the different flavors of the Tube Screamer pedals.

[bipedal]

I modded my mid-90's TS-9 to TS-808 specs a couple of years ago, when I was a newbie to this stuff.  A real leap of faith for me at the time, but was a relatively quick and easy mod, and a good learning experience.

My 2 cents:
To my ears, the change was noticeable, but rather subtle -- it's still a Tube Screamer, with that sort of nasally mid-hump that works well for certain things.  If your friend generally likes the TS-9 sound with his rig, changing it to match 808 specs might sweeten it just a bit more, but it wouldn't be a radical change.  I guess the 808 mod seemed to make mine sound just a little more smooth and "round", a little less "crispy" and sterile.

(Might be worthwhile to take a look at the op-amp in his pedal.  If it's a 7555-something-or-other (as mine was), then swapping it with a 4558 IC might be worthwhile.)

- Jay

[jalien21]

yeah. TS9's sound pretty much exactly the same as 808's to me. i just finished building a double tube screamer clone with some different switchable mods in each and IC sockets, so it's really easy to compare differences. changing TS808/9 really doesn't make a difference to my ears. the asymmetrical clipping diode stuff on the geofx article can be kind of fun, sometimes subtle (Ge in series with one of the Si's with drive not-too-high), sometimes more wild (two Si's on one side with all the knobs dimed)...

changing opamps makes a pretty pretty reasonable difference. i haven't tried a huge selection because i don't have a bunch of different dual opamps. but the difference between a dual 741 and a jrc4558 is pretty noticeable at most settings. but neither is "better."  put a socket in there and try a couple different ones. especially if he's super finicky with his sound. that's where most of your difference is.


that said, 808's cost a lot more than 9's. so i modded my brother's to an 808. and whenever i build them, i build them as 808's.

[shredgd]

My 2 cents:
To my ears, the change was noticeable, but rather subtle -- it's still a Tube Screamer, with that sort of nasally mid-hump that works well for certain things.  If your friend generally likes the TS-9 sound with his rig, changing it to match 808 specs might sweeten it just a bit more, but it wouldn't be a radical change.  I guess the 808 mod seemed to make mine sound just a little more smooth and "round", a little less "crispy" and sterile.

The change is very subtle but noticeable, especially if you have to know where to concentrate your hearing, that is very high frequencies ("presence"). However, differently from what many say, it is the TS-9 which is the smoother one! You can also spot it by looking at the schematic: it has got a bigger resistor along the signal than the TS-808; the 10k vs. 100k to ground, instead, doesn't really make a difference, because the very big 10u cap forms an high pass filter with a cut-off which is below human hearing possibilities with both resistor values. In fact, the TS-9 was born to be used with more modern amplifiers, which are notoriously brighter than vintage ones.
Therefore I really prefer the TS-9 over the TS-808: I was very happy when I changed those two resistors in my TS-808 clone to the TS-9 specs.

Giulio

[m-theory]

In his mind there's too much dirt on the ts-9 and he just likes it as a boost to drive his amp further

Reduce the 4.7k to 2.2k for more gain on the high end, and reduce the 51k to 20k for less gain on the low end.  Also, if it's a re-issue and has the 75558 chip, replace that with a 4558 or 4559.  My bet is that the key reason that he doesn't like the gain on that box is that it's got the "icky" chip.  On the ones that I've modded that had that chip, the owners also were using them solely as boost, and either used a TS808 or another O/D for gain. 

When I mod these for friends, they get an IC socket and either a 4558 or 59, the tants get dropped to .15, the two BP elec. get swapped for metal film, one of the clipper diodes gets swapped with a 1n4001, 4.7k becomes 2.2k, 51k becomes 20k, .047uf becomes .1uf.  It's a pretty radical change overall, but in a very good way. 

[shredgd]

In his mind there's too much dirt on the ts-9 and he just likes it as a boost to drive his amp further

Reduce the 4.7k to 2.2k for more gain on the high end, and reduce the 51k to 20k for less gain on the low end.  Also, if it's a re-issue and has the 75558 chip, replace that with a 4558 or 4559.  My bet is that the key reason that he doesn't like the gain on that box is that it's got the "icky" chip.  On the ones that I've modded that had that chip, the owners also were using them solely as boost, and either used a TS808 or another O/D for gain. 

When I mod these for friends, they get an IC socket and either a 4558 or 59, the tants get dropped to .15, the two BP elec. get swapped for metal film, one of the clipper diodes gets swapped with a 1n4001, 4.7k becomes 2.2k, 51k becomes 20k, .047uf becomes .1uf.  It's a pretty radical change overall, but in a very good way. 

Reducing the 51k resistor will only reduce the minimum available gain (i.e. the amount of gain when the drice pot is set to 0), not gain on the low end.

In my opinion, the best mods for the Tubescreamer are a bigger (0.1u) input cap and, most of all, an added germanium diode in the clipping section for asymmetrical clipping (but also for a less saturated sound - probably the "too much dirt" problem of orange418's friend could be solved or reduced by doing this mod).

Giulio

[MikeH]

It's the sort of mod that won't open any new sonic doors or make any fireworks go off in your brain.  I personally, think it's rather useless and can't believe people actually pay to have it done.  But it's a great place to start if you've never modded before.

[m-theory]

Reducing the 51k resistor will only reduce the minimum available gain (i.e. the amount of gain when the drice pot is set to 0), not gain on the low end.

Isn't that sort of the same thing?  If a guy complains that they can't turn the gain down as low as they want, and you reduce that resistor, isn't he then going to be able to make the gain lower when turns the knob down? 

It's the sort of mod that won't open any new sonic doors or make any fireworks go off in your brain.

That's true, but it does seem to address a specific request made by some.  It wouldn't matter a hill of beans to me personally, since I wouldn't personally use a T/S as a "clean boost," but it hurts nothing, offers a teensy bit more flexibility and takes all of about 1 minute to do while you're under the hood.  It's a no-brainer to me. 

can't believe people actually pay to have it done.

If that's all that were being done, I'd have to agree.  Personally, I just enjoy doing modding these things for friends, because I get a kick out of hearing their reaction afterwards, and because I know that, with just a few changes, these can be converted from rather boring pedals to something pretty cool. 

[orange418]

Well I talked to my buddy and he says the pedal's gain/ boost is fine...He runs it with the drive counter clockwise fully, and the level dimed, and the tone conter clockwise all the way down... He was hoping there was a way to tighten up the gain by boosting without coloring his tone at all ( total transparency ie., lose the mid range hump...) That's as specific as I can get.. Thanks for any suggestions...

[d95err]

Well I talked to my buddy and he says the pedal's gain/ boost is fine...He runs it with the drive counter clockwise fully, and the level dimed, and the tone conter clockwise all the way down... He was hoping there was a way to tighten up the gain by boosting without coloring his tone at all ( total transparency ie., lose the mid range hump...) That's as specific as I can get.. Thanks for any suggestions...

If he just wants a flat boost then forget about Tube Screamers. Try a simple clean booster. Jack Orman's MOSFET Booster is probably a good place to start.
http://www.muzique.com/schem/mosfet.htm

However, if he wants to "tighten" the gain, a mid-hump is exactly what you need. A completely transparent booster will result in too much low end (mushy and "farting" bass) and too much high end (harsh). The mid-hump of the tube screamer is designed to avoid this... Treble boosters (e.g. Rangemaster, Brian May booster) are also designed to push an amp into more distortion without "farting" out in the low end.

[shredgd]

Reducing the 51k resistor will only reduce the minimum available gain (i.e. the amount of gain when the drice pot is set to 0), not gain on the low end.

Isn't that sort of the same thing?  If a guy complains that they can't turn the gain down as low as they want, and you reduce that resistor, isn't he then going to be able to make the gain lower when turns the knob down? 

My bad (English), I took "low end" as "lows" and "high end" as "highs"...

However, if he wants to "tighten" the gain, a mid-hump is exactly what you need. A completely transparent booster will result in too much low end (mushy and "farting" bass) and too much high end (harsh). The mid-hump of the tube screamer is designed to avoid this... Treble boosters (e.g. Rangemaster, Brian May booster) are also designed to push an amp into more distortion without "farting" out in the low end.

I definitely agree!

Giulio

[m-theory]

Jack Orman's MOSFET Booster is probably a good place to start.

I think it's a pretty good place to finish, too!  It doesn't get a whole lot cleaner or boostier than that circuit!