![carvin guitars sacramento carvin guitars sacramento](https://cdn.lessons.com/profile-pro/579ac34706d7f66d701db0c1_profile.jpg)
Probably not a fair fight though, as I had some pretty nice Fender and VOX amps for comparison, all of which are still with me.
![carvin guitars sacramento carvin guitars sacramento](http://kieselguitarsbbs.com/userpix/13884_kiesel_aries_ebony_2_1.jpg)
My amps have to get along well with at least some of my pedals, and it didn't, so down the street it went. Neither channel responded to my liking with the dirtboxes I had around at the time - Klon, Fulldrive II, Stamps Drive-O-Matic, Crowther Hot Cake, and some more that I'm forgetting. While I'm not generally a fan of channel-switching amps, I actually thought that the "overdrive" channel sounded pretty nice - with gain set low to moderate, I got some pretty cool "woody" sounding tones with P90-loaded Gibsons. I couldn't believe the amp was rated at 50 watts. I found the clean channel to be one dimensional and lacking in character, and severely lacking in output volume. Well built, great looking amp at a nice price that I truly wanted to love. I owned a new 4 x EL84, 2 x 12 Bel Air for a couple of months. cause everything I own now says Fender on it. Hope I don't sound like a Carvin salesman. Carvin has been making tube amps for a very long time and shouldn't be overlooked. IMO the Nomad/Bel Air is a very high quality American made amp. The quality of build appeared to be top notch. The clean channel is about as clean as I have ever heard on an amp and the Accutronics long tail tube driven reverb was really nice. I was also running out to a 2x12 Carvin cab with the British 12's in it and that amp could wail in 4x12 config!! It has selectable impedance on the back, a nice feature, and a presence control. The Nomad and Bel Air are the same head in 1x12 and 2x12 config.
#CARVIN GUITARS SACRAMENTO MOD#
I actually have his mod kit (unused w/full instructions) PM if interested.
#CARVIN GUITARS SACRAMENTO MODS#
) These mods were to brighten up the soak channel and add a channel indicator LED on the front panel and much more.
![carvin guitars sacramento carvin guitars sacramento](https://lh4.googleusercontent.com/-SnSNksCytKY/U_5uMyBwhEI/AAAAAAAAA0w/oyAQ-eg2iIc/w652-h435-no/ct7m-qdc6-wal-5wm-tn-stjf-r20-ivn-tcw-ak-abl-bmf-bc-726-fph-7pth-50controls-123470_3679-fb.jpg)
I was going to mod it with the Hasserl mods (see the link. The soak channel sounded too dark and muddy for my taste. I changed the Sovteks out for JJ EL84's and that helped it sound better IMO. Biasing it was very easy when changing tubes. The amp was way more powerful than anything I would ever need. I had a Bel Air and it had 2 CarvinVintage VL12 speakers in it.