Cranked Sovtek MIG-50 amp with DeArmond M70 guitar

Some random riffing around with my Sovtek MIG-50 amplifier and my DeArmond M70 guitar.

Below is a transcript of the captions in the video:


Here's a demo of my Sovtek MIG-50 amplifier.

It was made in Russia in the mid-1990's.

It is another variation of the Bassman / Plexi type design.

It has the standard controls -
Normal Volume, Bright Volume, Treble, Middle, Bass, and Presence

I have internally jumped the two inputs so both volume controls are blended (no need for Y-adaptor cable).

The only other modification I have done is I replaced the 470 Ohm screen resistors (after smoking one during a power tube failure) with 1 kOhm resistors.

Here are the control setting used:
Normal Volume 2, Bright Volume 7, Treble 7, Middle 10, bass 4, Presence 5

It has 3 12AX7 in the pre-amp and 2 6L6 (or 5881) power tubes.

In this clip, it is running a pair of Winged-C 6L6GC power tubes.

I believe all of the preamp tubes are various Russian New Sensor types (Sovtek, Electro-Harmonix, etc).

The guitar is a DeArmond M70.

It was made in Korea in the late 1990's. The neck and body are mahogany.

The bridge pickup is a Seymour Duncan JB.

The left speaker cabinet is an Avatar 1x12 with a Hellatone 60 (really a broken-in, rebranded Celestion Vintage 30).

The right speaker cabinet is a stock Sovtek 2x12" cabinet that I got used with the head. The speakers have no brand markings, but are probably Eminence.




All of the speakers are 8 ohm. They are essentially all in parallel, resulting in a 3.2 ohm load, which is connected to the 4 ohm jack.

Pretty much any tube amp with a 4 ohm output is going to be perfectly happy driving a 3.2 ohm load.

The speakers are close-mic'd with Shure SM57's. Unfortunately, the right microphone's cable was fritzy, so that track is not used. The left mic is panned center.

I also used a pair of Audio-Technica 4041 overheads for some stereo room ambience.

No effects, no compression, and no EQ were used in mixdown.

No attenuator is used, this thing is LOUD!

Thanks for watching!

Category:

Music

Tags:

• Sovtek
• MIG50
• MIG-50
• DeArmond
• M70
• cranked
• tube
• amp
• non-master
• volume
• Winged-C
• 6L6GC
• Duncan
• JB

[angrypunk666]

I have the EXACT SAME amp. I love it. Won't play anything else. I use the factory cab (hotwired both speakers into one channel,) and added two 12'' Eminance Wizard speakers. With that, I use a Marshall Jackhammer for distortion. Pure. Beastly. Rock.

[AmpsAflame]

@angrypunk666

It's a great amp. It's great clean with pedals, it's great when hit hard with an overdrive, and it's heavenly all by itself, cranked ALL THE WAY UP! Thanks for the comment, keep rocking that MIG.

[stiffupperlip4]

how did you attach both inputs? I have a sovtek mig 50 and want to do the same thing.

[AmpsAflame]

@stiffupperlip4

you can always just use a Y-splitter cable and just plug into both simultaneously. I forget exactly how I did it- I think I just soldered a wire to connect the signal pin of one jack to the other. But then I had a problem because the jacks are the shorting type; if there's nothing plugged in, it shorts the signal to ground. So the unused jack was muting the whole amp. So I cut off the unused phono plug end from a bad cable and shoved it in the unused jack. Problem solved.

[18francesco18]

How are the cleans on this amp ?

[AmpsAflame]

@18francesco18

The cleans are really good. It can be kind of dark sounding, especially through the "normal" input, but through the bright channel with the right speakers it can sparkle. It's really loud and powerful. The response is very solid and firm, it doesn't feel smushy at all. That can be a good or bad thing depending on what sound you're going for. I don't do much with pedals, but I hear that others really like it for their pedalboard setups. Thanks for checking out the vid!

[donofisch]

damn dude...I'm so jealous!

[markb1231]

i have a mig 50 also and my second channel buzzes... do you have a problem with than?

[GregoryJohnsonJr]

i love this amp.

[azombiestool]

Its weird you mention burning out those resistors. Same thing happened with my MIG60. Only something about the diodes (??) and resistors and a burnt tube socket and all this and that.. you could literally smell the smoke. The power wouldnt even turn on.. got it back. and its loud as EFF and has amazing weighted sparkle fuzzy chunky tone.. love it.

[maxdz59]

Sounds great and so WARM !!!