Impulse Responses Speaker Emulation etc.

[rogerbayliss]

I have recently gotton into Impulse Response Technology and gear that makes use of it. I started off by searching for a great, but inexpensive speaker emulation pedal. I wanted one because my Wampler Thirty Something pedal did not have speaker emulation built in, but was a great pedal for the AC30 sound.

I came across IR and the Mooer Radar Speaker emulation pedal on YouTube demos and also found out that Celestion had done lots of IR for their speakers including the Blues and under a variety of miked up scenarios.

The IRs are essentially a .wav file with the response sound of say a speaker setup reacting to a sound sent through the setup and recorded. You can get say a Greenback Miked centre cone etc and import it into a piece of gear that uses IR.

So I got the Celestion Blue IR pack and put them in the Mooer Radar pedal. I built a new pedal board utilising a Way Huge Rhino Tubescreamer, into Stanly eTap, into Wampler 30 something , into Mooer Radar.

I tried it out on the headphone Jack on the Mooer Radar and got a cracking Shadows sound. I settled on the Celestion Blue single speaker open back cab bright sound out of what I had. The tone controls on the Wampler 30 something act like a real AC30TB with cut control. There is also a AC15 type of sound.

The Mooer Radar comes with speaker and microphone sim , power amp sim eg EL84 , and EQ section with graphic and parametric adjustments.

Just using the eTap , Wampler and Mooer Radar gives a great sound. If I use the rhino tubescreamer pedal with gain off, but boosting with volume it adds something else to the sound and the Rhino has a knob to adjust bass 100hz frequency which when cut to 9 o clock makes a great Shadows sound .

I can take this pedal board anywhere and plug into pa and get the sound and it's quite small and light. Another lightweight solution for that sound for sure.

There are other pedals out there that use IR including Line6 Helix topend floor and rack units. IR tech is used for amp sim as well I believe. I think the pros are keen on the Two Notes Torpedo for amp sim but its 3 to 4 times the price of the Mooer.

Definitely something you will come across as guitarists so if you have not heard of IR, hopefully now you will know a little about it. You can get lots of Impulse Resonses for free on the internet and they can also be used in your favourite DAW.

Hope you find this interesting.

Ps I also have the popular ACTONE pedal by Joyo which has speaker emulation built in which is very good, but the new system is better in my opinion.

Also the Mooer comes with AC30 AC15 emulation built in but they are not as good as the Celestion IRs IMO.

youtu.be/t4oR13iZbFk

youtu.be/8Mn9116AxiE

[Steve Reynolds]

Hi Roger.

I recently brought a Two Notes captor with the intention of recording my AC30 in my flat and it comes with the wall of sound plugin that gives access to lots of speaker sims etc and you can change mics and comrpession etc. It is an interesting piece of kit and does sound good but must confess i found myself spending so long messing around with sounds that i didnt actually record anything!

I think it is too much these days with all the editing etc we can do on a sound recording. In an ideal world if i could mic up my ac30 and crank it up i would and it would be a lot easier for me but living in a flat makes it impossible so amp modelling etc becomes the next best thing.

[George Lewis]

Dec 4, 2018 23:36:11 GMT Steve Reynolds said:

Hi Roger.

.......

I think it is too much these days with all the editing etc we can do on a sound recording. In an ideal world if i could mic up my ac30 and crank it up i would and it would be a lot easier for me but living in a flat makes it impossible so amp modelling etc becomes the next best thing.

Hi Steve,
You have highlighted the issue.
Even more so for "newbies".


Unfortunately if you want to record a real amp, it becomes ... as per the Jaws movie ... "You're gonna need a bigger flat !!!"

Or a better AC30 emulator ... whew which one ?

A decent sounding amp simulator is the first piece of software required for those who can't support the "cranked up" sound of a real amp in full flight.

Plenty to choose from !

Cheers
George

[rogerbayliss]

There is a lot to contend with Steve. Cranking amps to high levels in the home is only possible using power soaks as Pete Thorn demonstrates in those uTube vids. That's one way, but there are plenty of quality AC30 emulations as well and I have got good results with POD Line6. Their new Helix sounds brilliant but very pricy , yet it has all you need to get around your problem in the flat. There are some demos on Utube where they get close to some artists sounds. Very good.

Whatever method you select to go about this, you should be able to focus down and chose what parts you want to use just like you chose your live gear.

Same with speaker impulse responses, there are good ones and there are bad ones and you have to pick some you like to get the job done. In my case the AC Thirty Something pedal gives me the Amp sound, without cranking an amp.I know Robby gets his amp sounds from a Vox Tonelab and he gets great results, so it can be done.

[rogerbayliss]

I have used the Mooer Radar a bit more now and tried the pedal board through several amps and a pa setup. Results were very good to my ears. As previously stated there is an headphone Jack for quiet practice too.

The Mooer Radar has an eq section which is very good including graphic and parametric eq both with high and low cut filters. The frequency and gain and q values are all variable and shaping the sound is easy. So it has speaker emulation, power amp emulation , and eq all in one small pedal.


I looked at the spec on the two notes CAB pedal and that has similar features but is 3 to 4 times more costly, but it's the one the pros tend to go with.

[sheendigs]

Hi George and Steve,
You should build one of those...nicely isolated:
youtu.be/0tjpNza5kwo
Sheendigs

[George Lewis]

Hi Sheendigs,
Using an AC30 or any tube amp that doesn't have a separate cabinet might be problematic as regards overheating ?

No problem for me as I rarely use a guitar amp, preferring the ease of a simulator .... but in any case lucky enough to live in the middle of 40 acres with the nearest neighbour over a kilometer away. The kangaroos and Wallabies never complain. Mind you, my wife sometimes does !

Cheers
George

[rogerbayliss]

Dec 6, 2018 6:57:38 GMT George Lewis said:

Hi Sheendigs,
Using an AC30 or any tube amp that doesn't have a separate cabinet might be problematic as regards overheating ?

No problem for me as I rarely use a guitar amp, preferring the ease of a simulator .... but in any case lucky enough to live in the middle of 40 acres with the nearest neighbour over a kilometer away. The kangaroos and Wallabies never complain. Mind you, my wife sometimes does !

Cheers
George

Correct you should never use an amplifier without speakers load connected and you should get a load box if you need to such as using amp with DAW and interface. It is covered in Pete Thorns videos above.

[George Lewis]

Hi Roger,
I was referring to enclosing a tube amp such as the AC30 which does not have a separate speaker cabinet into a fully insulated box.
Since this would also trap the heat generated by the amp, particularly when cranked up, the question was whether this might cause damage from overheating ?

Any amp with a separate head and cabinet would be OK since only the speaker cabinet would go in the box.

Regards
George

[rogerbayliss]

Dec 6, 2018 20:29:10 GMT George Lewis said:

Hi Roger,
I was referring to enclosing a tube amp such as the AC30 which does not have a separate speaker cabinet into a fully insulated box.
Since this would also trap the heat generated by the amp, particularly when cranked up, the question was whether this might cause damage from overheating ?

Any amp with a separate head and cabinet would be OK since only the speaker cabinet would go in the box.

Regards
George

Rick Parfitt of Status Quo had an AC 30 in a box with microphone for his stage sound fully cranked of course . He does not mention overheating in one of the utube videos about it. I recall it was an aluminium case with a lid and some foam . I would have thought the amp would run hotter in there .

EDIT I have since looked it up on utube and the tech states it's just a AC30 with speakers in and power amp is outside. So that explains how it's done. Power amp outside box and speaker cab inside is way to do it.