Solarus reverb and foot switch question

[bwe243]

Hi all,

I just got a 69-70 Solarus and its a killer amp. The store where I picked it up said it was gone through and had about $400 worth of parts into it. But I have a question about the reverb. It wasn't hooked up at the store, so they gave me some cables for it, and sold me the dual rev/trem switch that is used on most old Fenders.

When I am playing and turn up the reverb w/o touching the switch the sound becomes much brighter and starts to add gain--this is about at 3, the further I go the harsher is sounds and the gain is more pronounced. If I have the reverb on 5 and trigger the switch, I get a pulsing/warbling effect and sometime the sound changes, but mostly remains tinny.

The tremelo effect seems okay, triggering the foot switch, it pops on usually without issue. I plugged in my EH Holy Grail, and its got that great spring reverb--but when using the tank in the amp is awful.

Question: Is this the result of user error, wrong footswitch, or bad reverb/internals? I have 30 days to use the warranty.

Thanks,

Eric

[Isaac]

My first guess is bad reverb. If the reverb is hooked up properly, then it will operate with no footswitch, as will the tremolo. The footswitch serves to turn those functions off. So, with no footswitch, as you turn up the reverb knob, you should get reverb. Nothing else should change. (As an aside, I don 't much care for the sound of Sunn's reverb - very bright and tinny. Okay for surf, but not much else.)

First thing I'd check is that the reverb is hooked up properly. Have you tried reversing the reverb connections?

[BassHog]

I recently fixed a noisy reverb problem on my 67 Solarus. It was driving me nuts for weeks as I had basically rebuilt the whole reverb circuit and it was still noisy and wrong sounding. What ended up being the problem was the reverb jacks that go to and from the reverb tank. One side of the reverb transformer grounds through the RCA jacks connection to the chassis. On mine, this had become corroded and the nuts holding the jack down were a bit loose. I removed the jack and cleaned the connection on the jack and the chassis side with some steel wool. I then made sure the jacks were bolted down tight. This solved the whole problem as the reverb transformer now had a good consistent ground connection. Sounds just like it should now.
YMMV of course.

[bwe243]

Well, thanks for the advice everyone. As I suspected, it may be the reverb unit, but more importantly am going to take it back to the shop and get it sorted out. I may try and check the connections before I do, but its there responsibility.