OT - Workhorse amps are available now

[billings]

Language I'd change in the ad:

1) "Protection circuitry...all critical components" - change to something like "Protection circuitry prevents costly power component failures"

2) "Toroidal power transformer" - "Lightweight, low noise toroidal power transformer".  Surely the toroidal power saves a pound or two in the final weight, no?  I'd think that'd help sell to a gigging musician who doesn't know a toroid tranny from a burnt donut.

And hey just think, if you'd made the amp self mic'd you could've included the speaker in a NFB loop!

[Cliff Schecht]

Yeah, like I was saying, there's a lot of stuff I feel Visual Sound left out in their advertising that shouldn't have been, there's a hell of a lot of great ideas that people aren't going to know about without the initial word being spoken.

Barcode: I was thinking the same thing, a grill cloth would baffle the sound a bit.

R.G.: Do you know of any units being sent to any guitar stores in Lubbock? I'm really curious about the 60 Watt Workhorse and would love to try one out. How much do they weigh?

[sfr]

My personal experience with grill cloths is that if you can comfortable breath through the fabric when placing it over your mouth, it doesn't seem to affect sound at all.  I generally use lightweight, colourful fabrics from the fabric store, as opposed to the heavy-duty stuff you usally see on grille cloths, as mine is merely decorative.  As such, I have no experience with the heavy duty stuff.

[The Tone God]

I used light weight cloth on my cabs that don't alter my sound in any major way. It is just decorative to cover and provide basic protection of the speakers. The grill cloth is really a compromise to get some of the advantages of the grill without having to alter the "classic" amp look that maybe scaring some musicians away. While the grills are paint-able some people will just dislike them either in shape or perhaps even in function since beauty can be found in the imperfections. Some may also view them as another mojo thing being pushed despite the fact that it may work. That could be enough of a turn off for a sale.

As for the realiabilty feature I look at it with a comparison of software. Software sells based on new features not realiabilty. If Microsoft forthcoming Vista had no new features but was actually made stable and secure how many copies would they really sell ? Yes there are some that will praise the stabilty and perhaps admins would like the security but honestly people don't care about those things. They would sit say "I paid alot of money to get the same thing I had before." They would not appricate the added robustness...well not until something bad happen of course.

So it might be hard to sell those amps based on that feature. I would put alittle more focus on the flexibility that R.G. mentioned before. Maybe explain better that the J&K pedal is being included as a replacement for multiple amp channels. As of now it just looks like a throw in to get people to buy the amp like a free T-shirt.

Andrew

[Cliff Schecht]

Well put Tonegod. That was the other point that I forgot actually . He should probably explain (in marketing terms) why the J&K is being included. People are just going to think that the included pedal is just a gimme and won't consider a part of the amp, as you intended.

I'm going to make a post about these amps on the Guitarworld forums, if that's alright with you R.G. .

[R.G.]

Thank you all for your comments.

Re: NAMM
Winter NAMM is in Anaheim, in about two weeks. I don't know whether the plan is to take amps that will be sold. Those of you who will be attending and have ambitions along those lines I suggest you drop me a PM so I can get you in touch with the guys who do that planning.

Re: Grilles
As I said, people either love them or hate them.

The sound diffuser grille is easily removable, from the front. Six screws hold it on its rubber gasket to the front of the baffle. The screws are independent of the fixing for the speaker, so you can remove the grille from the front, no problems. Did I mention that it's paintable? 

The speaker is held by machine screws from the inside into Tee-Nuts set into the front baffle. The machine screws cure a pet peeve of mine that replacing a speaker once usually wobbles out the holes unless special woodscrew/machine screw hanger bolts are used. I like the Tee-nuts, as they increase the strength of the baffle at the speaker's edge, instead of reducing it like screws into the baffle wood do.

The baffle is inset so that the grille does not make contact if you lay the amp on its face. So there is room to add a wooden frame and speaker cloth at the front of the amp by placing fixing fittings in each corner of the baffle board.

The grille design was actually fairly complicated. The spokes, for instance, are rounded to the inside, not the outside. This minimizes diffraction lobing from the spokes. There were a lot of different shaped diffusion cones that were tried before the specific shape that's in there got fixed. In spite of the design calculations, the final testing on the grille was by listening.

Re: Speakers
The speakers that are in the Workhorse are the result of interviewing substantially every Eminence and Celestion and other brands in a 12" guitar speaker. The selection was done literally by A-B listening tests of a zillion 12" speakers in a reference enclosure. The particular Celestion that's in there preserves bass thump at low volumes without being muddy at high volume. The treble and mid balance is nice, perhaps a bit of luck with the acoustics of the enclosure. But then speaker tone is a personal taste, too.

Re: Language I'd change in the ad:
Good points. I'll pass them along. Thanks!

Re: ..just think, if you'd made the amp self mic'd you could've included the speaker in a NFB loop!
... um ... that just might cause intractable oscillation and burnouts... How do I know this? 

Re: Units in Lubbock, or Toronto, or Denmark, or Denver, or Tierra del Fuego...
The best way to find a dealer who may have one is to look at the dealer list at visualsound.net, then call up your local dealer and ask them if they ordered any. Besides, if they didn't and get requests, they just might see the error of their ways and order them... 

I feel pretty happy with some of the things that the amps have already done. The last few NAMMs I got a steady stream of techies looking the amps over and muttering about the 9Vdc output and the biasing indicators. I think these just might start showing up in other amps. I was considering applying for patents on them, but found what I considered prior art, in expired patents no less. So there is not a problem using the ideas, even if I had to rediscover them. Bummed me out to have come in to the party late again though. Did I ever tell you about when I invented the ground-effect lawn mower? 

Re: weight
The 60W is ... heavy... about 72 pounds as I remember, although that's been a while. The thing is about the size of any other 2-12 combo, uses normal speakers and normal OT and choke iron, although we did save about 10 pounds off the normal E-I power transformer iron by using a toroidal. The cabinet is 3/4" (18mm) thick plywood, so that ate some of the 10 pounds back. The 30W Pony is actually a good place to look first. It's quite loud for an amp of its size. It sounds good at bedroom practice volumes because it has good bass response at low volumes, and its distortion does not depend on the amp being pushed into distortion. So you can get pleasing tone, even muddy blues distortion or ear-bleed tone at low volumes. My brother-in-law and I were doing this over Christmas.

Here's a trick that didn't get into the ad copy yet. If you have an amp simulator box and want to warm up the tone, you can plug it right into that "CD In" jack on the Pony. It goes right into the power amp input, no tone shaping on it. In effect, you use the DSP box for its emulation of whatever amp you like, and get to borrow the tube output section directly. I like what comes out in the limited testing I've done.

Re: Grille cloth
My experience is that the old saw from hifi about speaker grille cloth is true - optical transparency is a good predictor of acoustic transparency.

Re: J&H and channels
Good points. Thank you. We probably should hit that harder in ad copy.

Re: Selling reliability
You're absolutely correct - modern marketing methodology holds that visible features per dollar wins. Trying to step around that mantra is a calculated risk. Fortunately, Bob is a musician-oriented guy, not an MBA. He wants to build tools for musicians that work for them. That slogan "Real tone for real people" is not just something catchy to say. Musicians really ought to be able to buy an amp that is flexible and works well for a long time, and is easy to fix if it does break.

Once again, thank you for the comments, both ways.

[Cliff Schecht]

Re: Units in Lubbock, or Toronto, or Denmark, or Denver, or Tierra del Fuego...
The best way to find a dealer who may have one is to look at the dealer list at visualsound.net, then call up your local dealer and ask them if they ordered any. Besides, if they didn't and get requests, they just might see the error of their ways and order them...  icon_twisted

So from the looks of it, the only place that gets Visual Sound stuff is the smallest guitar shop in Lubbock, who probably won't carry the amp outside of special order . I'll have to talk to those guys and see if they can get one in... I'm sure they'll be quite curious as well.

What is the price for the 60w version?

[Somicide]

I'll have to look into these, simply for the single-channel factor.  That's the entire reason I got my crate powerblock.  I use pedals, never the "dirty channel," so it was the right choice for me.  Now, if there was a head version, I'd be sold!  I don't need another big box sitting around, room is tight in the practice room already.

[Dai H.]

couple other thoughts about generating the sound through pedals instead of amp distortion. Seems to me Hendrix's "Marshall distortion" was in a large part from a pedal (i.e. Fuzz Face), and some fans say this (that the Marshall was basically a power amp). Amp generated distortion (while it can be highly satisfying) can present all sorts of problems in trying to control the acoustic volume while maintaining the tone. Look at all the extraneous equipment out there to try to deal with this--attenuators (Hot Plate, Power Brake, Air Brake, etc.), external loading then re-amplifying, specialized attenuators with solid state circuitry in the attenuator unit (the "Ultimate Attenuator") or circuitry inside the amp ("power scaling"), etc. I think the volume is more controllable when generating the tone mainly through pedals, IME. When trying to get distortion the old fashioned way from an old amp, the noise level can be pretty bad too, sometimes. Lastly, I think the diffusors should stay (sounds like a good idea) and grill cloth isn't necessary, it's just the aesthetics!