Triple X Restoration

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DMscorn
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Triple X Restoration

Post by DMscorn » Sun Oct 24, 2021 1:47 pm

Hi everyone, first post here, my name is Damien.

Anyway, I got this Triple X a few years ago for only $250 bucks. The story the seller told me is that he mods amps all the time, but this one didnt go so hot. I just cant live with the crazy ass tone anymore. I want a real Triple X again.

How bad? In the add he mentioned that he took the gain stages away from channels two and three. It literally had 3 clean channels. I told the guy that if he "gave it it's balls back" I would buy it. Well, he did it. And i bought it, living and gigging with it for a few years. However, the tone of this amp is absolutely unrecognizable to what a Triple X should be. I should know, this is my fourth one.

It is extremely weak and it lacks a major amount of gain. I play metal, and never had to put the gain passed half on a stock triple X. But with this amp, i require nearly max gain and an overdrive just to get the palm mutes to ring out a bit. The EQ also isnt anywhere near as sensitive as a stock unit. I know these amps have more of a rolling EQ that makes big, major changes with small minor adjustments. This thing is more like a 6505 where the EQ adjustments make almost no tonal change at all :lol:

You can also see that there used to be even more knobs and switches. Who fuggin' knows what those used to be. By the time i got it there was just one 3 way toggle, and one knob with no limit to how far it can turn. Both of these things do almost nothing for the sound, and they become even lesser as the volume goes up.

Also, it has a really hard time switching channels. I know they all have that kind of lag or whatever when you first fire em up, but lately I can only get to the clean channep about half of the time. Ill switch to it and it will dimly light all 3 channels lights up, and give me this thin, light gain tone that i think might actually be all of the channels combined haha.

To make matters worse, I have absolutely no idea what is going on inside an amp. It might as well be black magic to me :roll: So its likely i might have to take this to a real tech. But if I can get an idea of what I need, I'll be that much further ahead. I dont care about the aesthetic at all, I can do those modifications no problem.

Thanks everyone, heres too many pics. I also have lots of closeups on anything someone might need, just ask and ill give.
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JamesPaul
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Re: Triple X Restoration

Post by JamesPaul » Mon Oct 25, 2021 10:11 pm

This reads and looks like it could be quite challenging. I would not want to attempt it.

You could try identifying the components he has changed, and replace them with the original value components. It will get tricky if he cut or jumped components. Here is the schematic and parts list.

triplexxx_schematic.pdf
Triple XXX Head Schematic
(1.4 MiB) Downloaded 93 times
Enzo wrote:I find if the amp is working, that is a good point to stop fixing it.
James Paul's Peaveys
Decade, Classics, Ecoustic, Windsors, VYPYR, Triple XXX, XXL, VKs, Bandit, JSXs, VIP, Piranha and a Penta.

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JamesPaul
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Re: Triple X Restoration

Post by JamesPaul » Tue Oct 26, 2021 6:29 am

An additional thought. You might try reaching out to the seller and ask if he has notes, or some kind of reference, for the modifications he made. That would make your task easier than trying to identify what was modified by just reviewing all the boards in the amp.
Enzo wrote:I find if the amp is working, that is a good point to stop fixing it.
James Paul's Peaveys
Decade, Classics, Ecoustic, Windsors, VYPYR, Triple XXX, XXL, VKs, Bandit, JSXs, VIP, Piranha and a Penta.

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Enzo
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Re: Triple X Restoration

Post by Enzo » Tue Oct 26, 2021 1:11 pm

Oh, we can tell a lot.

The pot seems to be wired to wher R3 was. R3 used to be in parallel with the two noise suppression diodes. SO the pot seems to adjust the noise ssuppression somewhat. Seems pointless to me, but...

The switch appears to be wired to C20 at V2a. Or close to there. I see small e-caps on the switch. SO I'd guess the switch serves to change bypass caps an thus response/gain of that stage.

All that crap sitting up in the air is just poorly done. I see glass diodes, and I SUSPECT they mistook the noise suppression diodes for clipping diodes and maybe put different types in there for different clipping level. (WHich it won't do).

ANyway, get the schematic and layout, and the altered parts are pretty obvious. Look them up and make them right.

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DMscorn
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Re: Triple X Restoration

Post by DMscorn » Thu Oct 28, 2021 1:35 pm

Enzo wrote:
Tue Oct 26, 2021 1:11 pm
Oh, we can tell a lot.

The pot seems to be wired to wher R3 was. R3 used to be in parallel with the two noise suppression diodes. SO the pot seems to adjust the noise ssuppression somewhat. Seems pointless to me, but...

The switch appears to be wired to C20 at V2a. Or close to there. I see small e-caps on the switch. SO I'd guess the switch serves to change bypass caps an thus response/gain of that stage.

All that crap sitting up in the air is just poorly done. I see glass diodes, and I SUSPECT they mistook the noise suppression diodes for clipping diodes and maybe put different types in there for different clipping level. (WHich it won't do).

ANyway, get the schematic and layout, and the altered parts are pretty obvious. Look them up and make them right.
Thanks for the reply, though I have to admit, a lot of that is gibberish to me :lol:

Ill have to do fiddle with the extra pot, maybe it has actually been an active surpressor this whole time and I never noticed. It would explain why its tonal change is so minimal.

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DMscorn
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Re: Triple X Restoration

Post by DMscorn » Thu Oct 28, 2021 1:37 pm

JamesPaul wrote:
Tue Oct 26, 2021 6:29 am
An additional thought. You might try reaching out to the seller and ask if he has notes, or some kind of reference, for the modifications he made. That would make your task easier than trying to identify what was modified by just reviewing all the boards in the amp.
Thanks for the replies, thats a good call. Ive been in contact with him before after a table collapsed that it was sitting on, thusly busting 3 power tubes. Hopefully he will have some record of what he actually did.

Thanks for the schematic as well, I'll take some time this weekend to poke through it all thoroughly.

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Enzo
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Re: Triple X Restoration

Post by Enzo » Thu Oct 28, 2021 4:01 pm

I wouldn't expect the little pot to change tone much, if at all. Those diodes are only active in th gain channel. They carve out the low level background noise. SOme of us can probably hear a small change in the texture of the sound if we short across the diodes. SO some folks clcip them out, some short across them, and even fewer people do this, make it "variable".

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