New Amp Day.

[martyforrer]

Here's my just arrived Handbox R-400 amp. 400 watts, class A/B, handwired with three preamp tubes, weighs 10.5kg. Made in Poland, and the componentry is top-shelf!

[joppo]

Crikey Marty, something about "going through amps" and "hot dinners" comes to mind Looks like it will do the business

[martyforrer]

Hello. My name is Marty and I'm an amp addi.... ad.... I like amps that work proper-like with upright bass.

[john]

Looks sweet and that's a great weight/watt ratio, can you tell us a bit more about its tone?
I've never heard of that brand before but I used to have a Polish bass and it too was top shelf. Seems like Poland delivers.

I don't think I've seen any barefaced cabs in NZ, I love the form factor, can you tell us a little more about those too

[Tim1]

I have a Barefaced Four 10. Fabulous cab, designed with the idea of approximating the sound of a sealed cab with all-tube heads, but many people report success with solid state too. Sounds wonderful with every tube head I own (Ampeg V4b, Orange AD200, Fender Super Bassman 300 and Trace Elliott V4). Speakers take a few gigs to play in, then really open up. No tweeter but not really needed with this cab (unless you slap a lot I suppose). Plenty of power and really disperses the sound evenly around the stage. Can go very, very loud with a nice even tone. Absolutely no issues importing it direct fron Barefaced in England at a very reasonable cost.
They also have some highly specialised 12" cabs, the Big Baby 2 and the Big Twin 2 amongst others, which I find very tempting.
Well worth considering.

[foal30]

Nice one Marty

[martyforrer]

Hi John,
The Barefaced cabs are very light and have amazing "throw". They cut on stage, and the audience will hear every note, anywhere in the room. They need no tweeter, and the lows are huge. With my upright, I have to cut the bass frequencies, or they overpower. I had a Greenboy fearful 12/6 which was as good, maybe marginally better, but at 17kg my buggered back prefers the 7kg of each Barefaced.
HandBox R-400 has a massive toroidal tranny and big caps, and is hand wired, with components that are top shelf. I sold my GK MB800 to get the HandBox. There's something about an amp with a transformer based power supply that just seems .... better. I first heard it when I A/B'd the MB800 against a GK 1001. I would have got one of those, but I have an aversion to knobs. The HandBox has three for tone... bass, treble and mid (contour). It also has three 12AX7 preamp tubes. Leszek, the owner of HandBox, gave me a choice of colours and also what sort of case, full road case or wooden sleeve with detachable lid for the front panel.
I am officially GAS-free now, this is my ultimate rig. If I played in full-on rock bands I would go for 12" cabs, but for what I do the 10s are perfect.

[john]

Thanks for that review. I'd love to hear it. Hopefully the next time I'm in Napier you're doing a gig

[martyforrer]

Thanks for that review. I'd love to hear it. Hopefully the next time I'm in Napier you're doing a gig

Yeah, let me know. My cell is 021 470 205.

[martyforrer]

Sacrilege!!! I'm thinking of selling the Handbox. Now I've done a couple of gigs with it, I realise that while it is the best amp I've ever heard for bass guitar, it's not the best for my upright, and that's what I play 99.99% of the time these days. Dang! I think it's the three tubes in the preamp that are OK with the piezo pickup, but not as good as they are with bass guitar magnetic pickups. I've got a Peavey MiniMax which is all solid state and it suits the piezo and guts better. Dang!

[Pablo Basso]

Damn. Seemed to be a winner. Would a compressor help? It might just be an Impedance mismatch for the piezo.

[monster]

Only just seen this - I use an Fdeck HPF-3 with my upright and I think it does the job nicely, even with an amp/cab as venerable as my '68 Bassman 75 and similar vintage Jansen 2x12 (which does now have Eminence beta-ii drivers).