MOD 102 DIY Guitar Amplifier Kit

I will start by saying if you are pondering whether or not to buy this kit, you should definitely buy it. This amp sounds great when it is complete. Building this amp, however, is not a 2 hour project you can wiz through. I have been soldering my guitar, and changing components in my amps and pedals for years, but this was my first time actually building anything electronic from scratch. All of the directions are very clear and detailed, and they give you parts lists and diagrams and test points to make building pretty straight forward. I actually nailed it on the first try. However, building with two transformers mounted to the top gets a bit awkward at times. It won't sit flat and there are two tube sockets preventing you from stacking anything underneath on the one side. This amp is all point-to-point and no PC board is used. It does get tight and there are a few spots where about 5 components go into one point. The last two filament wires were particularly tight to solder. I would also like to suggest that you make sure the self tappers for the bottom plate actually screw in before you start mounting anything. Overall I give this 5 stars. For the money this is a great amplifier that you really can't get anywhere else. This is a great idea and design for anybody wanting to learn how to build amps or electronics in general. There are a few things that could be improved on like placement of a few components where it would be easier to get to to solder. It was also easier for me to place the Phillip's head of the bolts on the inside of the enclosure. Stripping the wires was a bit of an issue because there is a fabric coating that is hard to cut through, but the wire itself is great quality. I didn't use the cheap labels either. None of the cons are bad enough to drop my rating down. Take your time, make sure you read carefully, and you will have a very nice sounding tube amp.

This amp is awesome! I'm a Marshall guy. JCM and JMPs are my go to. This is close but you gotta back off the bass. If you can solder decently, this is easy. You need to fabricate a cradle for assembly. I recommend going through each assembly section and running all the white wires first. It will be easier and reduce the chance of burning components. Also sand the paint around the inside of the input jack hole. The hole is bigger than the jack and if it becomes centered, the amp will sound like crap and hum loud. Happened to me a couple weeks after I finished it. I know this amp is a bit expensive but the quality is all there. It doesn't have a ton of gain so some kind of dirt pedal is required if you want to rock. I plug my pedal board in, hook up my stage speakers and rock out! It is a little loud if you crank it. But not like a big bottle stage amp. Great tone awaits!

For the cost of this kit you shouldn't need to scrape paint off to ensure adequate grounding. Mask the paint. Or, actually be better (and more 'vintage') for the price with a bare steel chassis which would take solder. The sequence of assembly is not optimal at all - several areas are much easier to solder if done in reverse. Most importantly The circuit has residual 120Hz hum. If not for the hum this would be 3 stars. Maybe 4. If you have the skills to fabricate a chassis by drilling and/or punching then suggest building from scratch using the tube amp circuits widely available. Note that a drill down through internet search hits of this kit all apparently resolve to only a single build.

This was my second attempt at building this little tube amp from the kit. I am interested in old-school point-to-point wired tube amps so this kit is unique in the market in that it features point-to-point soldering and also includes extensive instructions and in a reasonable price range. There are many ways of purchasing the materials or an expensive Weber kit for say, a turret-board Fender Champ type of amp clone but nothing in this price range that includes instructions or support that I could find, at least that was not based on a pcb-type scheme. My first attempt at building the amp I had little-to-no experience in soldering or electronics and ended up with a totally dead unit. I neglected a very important part of the instructions, which was to remove the paint from the chassis holes in the unit and my first efforts soldering this difficult project were not pretty -- I had made a lot of wiring errors in mounting components to the turret strips and tube sockets. I did rewire some stuff to no avail and then eventually damaged a couple of components removing them. So it was very frustrating. Eventually I ordered up another kit for this amp after undertaking a couple DIY pedal projects, which were not so successful either. I did gain soldering skills and a better understanding of electronics with the help of youtube videos, etc. One of these projects was a MOD pedal, a very difficult build which I am de-soldering and will attempt to rebuild as it seemed somewhat close to working but I believe I left too much wire on the capacitors, etc and the whole thing too crowded and totally shorted out. Anyway, after carefully and meticulously building the MOD102 a second time, I was left with a unit that seemed wired correctly, but made no sound even though the light and tubes did come on, albeit dimly. Resoldering a couple of tricky tube connections to be sure they were sound had no effect. Then I realized that even though I had filed away the paint in the holes in the chassis I had neglected to remove the paint from the tiny screw holes that mount the terminal strips with which the amp is wired and that this was probably drastically affecting grounding. After removing the screws and reaming out the paint, I replaced the screws to the strips upside down and cranked tight for maximum connectivity and, to my immense surprise the amp fired right up plugged into a 8-inch, 8 ohm speaker. The sound is good for a practice amp, not real loud but I haven't tried it through a bigger speaker or with hum buckers. It sounds the best with my Strat with the tone controls around noon and the volume about 3/4 of the way up. There is practically no noise, so my efforts to keep extra wire to a minimum and really weld the small components in seem to have paid off. There is some crackle in the volume pot but to be fair it does suggest in the instructions to lubricate the potentiometers which I did not do due to not having the spray needed. Like another reviewer, I decided to forgo the homely stickers for the controls and used a sharpie instead. If you are experienced in electronics and soldering this kit may not be too difficult for you. I personally found out that all the guitar chops in the world make no difference in the electronics world. But having decent hand-eye coordination helps as does keeping an open mind, following directions and doing your homework via youtube, books, etc. I still have worlds to learn about circuits, schematics, troubleshooting, better skills etc but after finally assembling a working tube amp I find a good sense of satisfaction in the skills and knowledge I have gained. It just took a little more than I expected. If you are inexperienced like me, I would hugely urge to you start out with a hand-wired pedal kit from this company, and one which is rated easier on their build scale. If it says it's difficult then you can believe them, and the pedal I am attempting to rebuild is every bit as challenging as this amp was or even more considering the limited space available and its use of tube technology. I hope all this helps somebody out there, and maybe saves you some from the expense and frustration of failed builds. Instead I would have focused on starting with a simpler item, as I said a point-to-point pedal and on having the proper tools and watching some soldering videos first.