Anyone else tried the Randall RG50TC yet? (it rocks!!!)

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bduersch

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Today I had some time to kill while the car was in the shop... no better way to kill it than to walk down to the local music shop and see if they had anything cool in stock. Only thing that really caught my attention today was one of the RG50TC 1x12 combos ( http://randallamplifiers.com/products/amplifiers/tube/index.asp ), which (I believe) is the latest all-tube amp from Randall. The most worthy guitar in the shop was a Schecter with real duncans and incredibly nasty strings, but nonetheless, I put the RG50TC through its paces.

Quick feature summary... two channels, each with 2 footswitchable voicings and its own EQ; 50w driven by EL34's into a 12" Celestion; spring reverb; FX loop; 4-button footswitch. That's about it... not too fancy.

In a word, I was pretty impressed with the RG50TC... the clean channel was very crisp, great for funk work, but also delivered a fat jazzy tone when I rolled down the tone control on the guitar. The lead channel has two variations... one of which is designed for crunchier tones, the other is designed for smoother lead tones. It has that wanna-be hot-rodded Marshall feel. There was plenty of low-end thump for chugging on power chords, and plenty of gain for Santana-esque leads (though the voicing was not particularly Santana-esque). I think I was expecting the tone to be more harsh, so I was pleasantly surprised with how warm & fat it was. The reverb was rather subtle, adding a nice amount of texture to the clean channel while not overwhelming the lead channel. While it sounded good loud, it also sounded pretty good at low volumes, which is a bonus. I was pretty impressed with what I could coax out of the amp with the dead strings on the Schecter, and will probably go back to the store to give it a test drive with one of my PRS's; however I know if I go back to play it again, I'll end up buying it.

All in all, I'd say this is a heck of a deal... at $560 new, you basically get a 50w all tube combo that acts like a 4-channel amp. While I don't really need any more amps at this point, if I found a used RG50TC for a good price, I'd pick it up just on principle.

Anybody else given this amp a try?

--B
 
I owned one of these for a long time.
I thought it was a great amplifier. I bought to use as the second amp at a jam session I hosted. The Marshall guys loved this thing as did the Mesa guys. I wound up modifying it a bit for my own use. I changed the power tubes to 6L6's and had it rebiased and I changed the phase inverter to a 12AU7. This made it quite a bit warmer with less of the grainy mid range. The clean tone was capable of getting some very Fender like sounds. The clean boost is where I lived, very much like a driven low wattage amp. The first gain stage was beloved by many a local Marshall player and with my mods, the second gain stage was more than capable of pulling off some credible Carlos tones.
 
Good 2 know... when I saw the bias points, I wondered if it could handle all the tube options that the MTS amps can handle. Cool to know that 6L6's will round it out a bit... I grew up in Mesa land so I tend to gravitate to the 6L6 tone anyway.

--B
 
Well, I pulled the trigger tonight... managed to find an RH50T (the head version of the RG50TC) for sale locally, so I picked it up. So I'll be spending the rest of the evening wiring it up and dialing it in with my Boss GT8.

Quick question... when you did the tube swap, did you re-bias it yourself? If so, do you remember what values you used with the 6L6's? The only bias chart I have is for the RM50... the EL34's in the RH50T were running hotter than recommended for the RM50, so I'm assuming the 6L6's would run somewhat hotter, too, though I really don't know where to begin.

--B
 
i had been wondering if hte EL34 tubes could be replaced with a different kind.

how would the 6L6 sound differ to the original tubes?
 
Sorry to hijack this thread (and drag it up), but I was wondering if anyone could post a couple of soundclips of this amp in action? Looking for a new amp, this ones on the list. Cheers
 
Just dug this thread up... wish I still had the RH50, but I returned it so I'd have the money for the Egnater amp-building seminar. The RH50 was a lot more versatile than the JTM45 clone I built, but the clone sounds awfully good (plus I get the satisfaction of having built my own amp).

--B
 
Well, I own RH50T with R412CX cab and for me it rocks, but i didn't have the oportunity to compare it to any other all tube amps. Also, I aked Randall for biasing instructions but they didnt send me anything so far. I just wish that this amp had a little more 'recto' sound ;)
 
Hi. I bought a used RG50TC a couple of weeks ago. I am happy with it except for the reverb. This seems to fade when using the overdrive channels even when switching back to clean, the reverb can barely be heard. I find if I unplug the guitar lead then re-insert it the reverb comes back on. Is this normal?
 
Hey , ya i have played this sucker and its not your average randall amp its got that marshall feel to it . if any one knows how to get a bit more umph out of this baby let me know ! i personally love the the dirty on the G3 amps that low end is nuts if i could get that with this amp id be laughing!
 
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