Orange AD5 - NSAD

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F15hface
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Orange AD5 - NSAD

Post by F15hface » Wed Feb 28, 2024 5:49 am

I woke up this morning, dropped a bid on eBay, won a small amp, and am picking it up tonight. A couple of you have them, I’ve been told one of you forgot to bid on this one, and I’ll post what it is when I’ve played it a bit this evening. Should pair nicely with my other 5W combo, a 68 vibro champ reverb, though space constraints might limit my stereo dreams.

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F15hface
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Re: Orange AD5 - NSAD

Post by F15hface » Wed Feb 28, 2024 2:43 pm

After three tubes and a fair bit of walking, it’s home. I forgot how dense orange make things.

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So now I’m up to 10 watts and 20” of speaker combined. That’s about all these amps share. The Orange is way louder, way more cutting, and has surpassed the VC’s maximum level of natural overdrive by about 1 o’clock on the volume control. It sounds great. It’ll need an attenuator, but that should be easy to sort out even with the speaker currently being wired directly in.

Image

When I picked it up it was a little grimey but everything came straight off with a gentle wipe down and it’s looking good.

I’ve also realised that I can at least try chaining from the VC’s second input to the AD5, so I’ve got a noisy weekend ahead.

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JSett
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Re: Orange AD5 - NSAD

Post by JSett » Wed Feb 28, 2024 10:06 pm

Congrats! Welcome to the (small) AD-5 gang on here.

I put a NOS Telefunken EL84 and some old RCA 12AX7's in mine and it smoothed off the overdrive nicely. Also, I put an Eminence Legend in that was a nice upgrade over the stock speaker. I found the speaker made the biggest positive difference over the stock sound.

The last two records my band put out, this actually ended up being the dominant amp for all the guitar tracking (we tracked this, my Bassman and my VibroChamp all at the same time for options). They're great little units, and I know you got yours for a solid price too so that's even better :-*
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Chippertheripper
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Re: Orange AD5 - NSAD

Post by Chippertheripper » Wed Feb 28, 2024 11:52 pm

If you find it too fizzy on the high end, try a 5751 in the preamp. It went a long way towards smoothing my tt out. Enjoy.

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Re: Orange AD5 - NSAD

Post by i love sharin foo » Thu Feb 29, 2024 5:47 am

Nice! I’ve had mine at least 15 years now and still use it a bunch. They are great little amps. I can’t remember what tubes I put in mine but the speaker is still stock. I replaced the original knobs with the old Orange style, the middle size, same as Dunlop used on the blue Silicon Fuzz Face. That was the best change :D
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Re: Orange AD5 - NSAD

Post by Dr Tony Balls » Thu Feb 29, 2024 6:40 am

F15hface wrote:
Wed Feb 28, 2024 2:43 pm
After three tubes....
This was confusing to me at first but then I took a ride on the NYC valve to think about it and it all made sense.
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Re: Orange AD5 - NSAD

Post by JSett » Thu Feb 29, 2024 7:26 am

Dr Tony Balls wrote:
Thu Feb 29, 2024 6:40 am
F15hface wrote:
Wed Feb 28, 2024 2:43 pm
After three tubes....
This was confusing to me at first but then I took a ride on the NYC valve to think about it and it all made sense.
:D :D
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Re: Orange AD5 - NSAD

Post by Chippertheripper » Thu Feb 29, 2024 9:39 am

Dr Tony Balls wrote:
Thu Feb 29, 2024 6:40 am
F15hface wrote:
Wed Feb 28, 2024 2:43 pm
After three tubes....
This was confusing to me at first but then I took a ride on the NYC valve to think about it and it all made sense.
Is that more or less confusing to get around on than the T-ransistor in Boston?

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F15hface
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Re: Orange AD5 - NSAD

Post by F15hface » Thu Feb 29, 2024 5:11 pm

I'll keep all these upgrade suggestions in mind, first impressions sound a little piercing but I also need to play it a bunch and find the tone sweet spot. The first upgrade will almost certainly be whatever is needed to get an attenuator in there so it can overdrive naturally without causing noise complaints. Looks like it should be easy enough.

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hulakatt
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Re: Orange AD5 - NSAD

Post by hulakatt » Sun Mar 03, 2024 9:14 am

I keep seeing posts about these here and have been keeping a search open for them on Reverb lately. ALmost bought one a few weeks back. I think I need to sell a few first.
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