Some Stimer thoughts/questions

djadam

I was searching through the forums for info about Stimers and was interested to find references to the Stimer pickups sounding "muddy" or "thin" when combined with a Compact 60. When I saw Stochelo in September, he used a Stimer ST48 with a Compact 60 and I thought it sounded great. Perhaps not as growly as it might be with a tube amp, but not at all muddy or thin. Might he have had an additional preamp helping the tone?

Anyone else using a Stimer with a Compact 60? Any thoughts?

Where can one even find a Stimer these days? I saw a "Dupont reissue" on gypsyguitars.com - how close is that to the real thing?

MichaelHorowitz

I use a Stimer through a compact 60 from time to time. It works fine....but is pretty weak when compared to amps designed for magnetic pickups. the GypsyKat sounds much better with a Stimer. I've also used an Evans amp...holy cow! You can't beat that if you're using a magnetic pickup, be it a Stimer or humbucker.

The AER sounds small and overworked compared to these amps. But it's all relative...the AER still does a good job for what it is.

What the AER excels at is piezo pickups like the bigtone....if that's what your using then it's probably the best choice.

'm

djadam

Thanks for your feedback Michael. I'm using a bigtone, but I'm also interested in using a Stimer for a different sound. Makes sense that it will sound better in amps which are designed for magnetic pickups... I wonder how it would sound through my Compact 60 if I used a tube pre.

I've never played with an Evans amp - did the one you tried have the optional Evans tube pre?

Jack

One other thought is that if you're using a Stimer, you're probably not after an acoustic tone anyway, which frees you up to add other things between the guitar and amp that could improve the end tone (I think I linked in another thread to a youtube vid of Wrembel using an AER with this setup).

If you're going back and forth between a bigtone and the Stimer, I think the AER will do you right. (Or maybe a Schertler; I don't recall ever seeing someone play a magnetic pickup through one, except for my own experience messing around with my archtop at home.) It seems much easier to shape the sound of the magnetic pickup, rather than trying to make an amp designed for that sound good with the bigtone. Good luck!

best,
Jack.

MichaelHorowitz

djadam wrote:

I wonder how it would sound through my Compact 60 if I used a tube pre.

Maybe...but the problem with the AER is that the built in preamp is trying to compensate for the deficiencies of a piezo, so it boosts bass and cuts highs. So no matter what you do to the signal, the AER is still going to process the signal in that way. It's more pronounced in channel 1. The second channel is way better with the Stimer. But still not ideal.

When I plug my archtop into the AER I have to use 100% cut in bass and a 100% boost in treble to get it to sound anywhere near flat. The Stimer is a little less extreme..probably because it's a single coil so it's brighter to begin with.

Also, the speaker just doesn't seem to work as well as the GypsyKat...it sounds like it's working really hard to keep up.

But don't get me wrong..the AER still does a good job for what it is. I just read recently that archtop jazzer Russell Malone, who never used anything except insanely heavy and big Fender Twins, now uses the AER compact 60 with his L5.

I used to ask for Fender Twins until I showed up at this gig in France and all they had for me was this little amp. When I plugged in, though, I was amazed by the clarity and power it offered, so I’ve been using one ever since. Plus, it’s the size of lunchbox and I can take it on the plane. Now, wherever I go my sound comes with me.

http://www.guitarplayer.com/article/tak ... b-06/17770

I've never played with an Evans amp - did the one you tried have the optional Evans tube pre?

I tried one with the tube pre...but the transistor ones may actually be better. I'm getting two for the shop in a few weeks. One with the tube pre and one without.

Scot Buffington makes the Evans amps by hand in North Carolina. He's really cool...you can call him and he'll give you all kinds of advice with settings, etc.

'm

Stringswinger

I think I can answer Adam's questions.

I have two Stimers, an original and a Dupont reissue. The original is brighter sounding (possibly caused by the fact that its mounting system places the pickup a little further away from the neck). The original also has a more secure cable attachment system and the brand name is stamped, not etched into the cover. That said, I like the reissues warmer tone and ease of taking off better.

The Stimers work with the Compact 60 as do archtops. But Michael's comments are spot on. The small speaker is overworked and the EQ just isn't perfect. Stephane Wrembel uses a Compact 60 with his vintage Stimer. Mimi Fox uses a compact 60 with her Heritage archtop which has a Schaller humbucker.

Personally I find the Evans to be a little too bright and the Jazzkat way too thin (I have not tried the Gypsykat).

A Fender or Mesa tube amp sounds great with the Stimer but they are too heavy (and unnecessarily unreliable) for jazz/gypsyjazz gigs.

I like my Polytone Minibrute (with a 12" speaker) with the Stimer, The Acoustic Image Clarus combined with a Redstone Audio or Raezer's Image cabinet (again with a 12"speaker) sounds even better, but requires greater expense and more to carry.

The Compact 60 is perfect with the Bigtone. With the Stimer you can use it but will get better results with a more "jazz guitar" oriented amp. The one big drawback with the Stimer (other than the fact that you lose a lot of crunch in your rhythm sound), is that the B string is noticeably hot. Why Stimer never made a pickup with adjustable pole pieces like the DeArmond Super Chief is beyond me. Hey Maurice Dupont...now there's an idea!

Bob Holo

Here's an acoustic recording of a reissue Stimer on a lightly built Selmer style guitar into an AER C60 with the controls set pretty much to center in a very good & quiet venue. It sounds great - but as Mark & Michael said - the C60 runs out of gas if you push it. This seems to be a big source of confusion as most people think that getting an amp with more power (More Watts) will give them more volume even if it is smaller - and this is often not true. For most guitar amps - the speaker limits the output long before power does because the laws of the physics of sound are absolutes. I get asked the "amp question" a lot because I used to do audio design. So, Here's the "nerd/engineer" answer to "How big does my amp need to be" so now it's on Djangobooks and I can answer the question by pointing people to this post [And if you're an audio engineer please don't flame me for glossing over some things - my goal here is to cover some of the main points without turning this into a long boring whitepaper on the subject...] Consider the following:

_______________________________

WHY DRIVER SIZE MATTERS IN AMPS:

- When you double the distance between the audience and your amp, you lose roughly 6db of volume.
- When you drop frequency one octave it requires four times the power to produce the same volume... Now... it's been too long since I've done any real math but if I remember correctly this works out to having to move about twice the amount of air.... IE, twice the excursion from the speaker.

What all of this means, is that the farther you are from your audience and the lower and/or louder you need to play - the demands on your amplifier grow exponentially.

Let's take a 5" speaker and look at the challenge it faces. Consider that after you remove the frame & surround - your average 5" speaker has an effective diameter of about 10cm... which means it has an effective surface area of about 80cm.sq. ... and most relatively efficient 5" speakers like the ones in the AER C60 and other small acoustic amps have a max of 6 mm peak to peak excursion (though many have less than this) and long story made short... there's your limit... 80cm sq multiplied by 6mm... and you could bet the farm that your five inch speaker can move an absolute maximum of just less than 50 cm^3 of air before it starts to break up & distort. This equates to 92db max (at one meter) on the lowest note of the quitar (about 80hz)... and if you're playing a room that is 20 feet deep.... the sound reaching the people in the last row about 12 feet away from you - is about 80db.... which is maybe a little quieter than a vacuum cleaner and a LOT quieter than a loud pub. Now, granted - for higher frequencies that little 5" speaker will do a lot better... if you go up to the 12th fret of the high E string and crank on it with your amp volume maxed you can easily reproduce rock-concert volume over 120db on a 5" speaker - but distortion from excursion is determined by the demands placed on the speaker by the lowest frequency you produce because that low frequency is what causes the speaker to wag the most.

So - how much does a larger speaker improve this? Well... considering that Pi*r^2 is the formula for area and "r" is the speaker diameter... it makes a LOT of difference. (triple the square of the increase in radius) Even if you don't increase the excursion capability of the speaker - simply going to a larger size gives huge increases in volume displacement... an 8" driver such as the one in the Unico with 6mm exursion can move about 120 cm^3 of air which can give you about 110db at 80hz which lets you put nearly 100db back to the "cheap seats" if you need to. (but please don't - you'll give people hearing damage) Now... in the real world, excursion is only one of many sources of distortion... but suffice it to say that you have a whole lot better chance of playing a loud venue with at least an 8" driver - and I've heard it done. I went to one of Josh's shows last night and he filled a large room with a LOT of loud partying people with his 8" Unico amp - the thing wasn't even breaking a sweat. Going up to a 12" speaker more than doubles the volume displacement of an 8" speaker... what does this give you? Well, it means that your amp & speaker are working less to get the same results. This all translates into lower distortion, less compression - which give you increased clarity & increased dynamic range. Much above 12" and you really start to increase directionality at higher frequencies and you start to dramatically increase distortion from things related to the size/rigidity of the speaker... to make a very long story short - for large or loud venues - guitar amps in the 8" to 12" range are probably best. As for how much power the amp needs to have... well... there are a lot of ways for amp manufacturers to fudge the numbers so unless you know how impedance load affects power rating or the difference between peak & RMS - don't worry to much about the "rated" power... just listen to the amp and how it performs....

MichaelHorowitz

Thanks Bob...that's great info!

Bob Holo wrote:

and most relatively efficient 5" speakers like the ones in the AER C60 and other small acoustic amps

AER specs say the compact 60 has an 8" speaker. Did you actually open one up and check?

However, there's no doubt the Unico's 8" provides a lot more low end then the AER.

'm

Bob Holo

Seriously? wow... I would never have guessed it for an 8" - as the box is way too small to support that size of driver - but actually that explains a lot. All things held equal... the smaller you make an enclosure for a speaker of a fixed size/volume displacement, the more you have to equalize the bass to make the response linear. The challenge in doing that kind of design is that power requirements go way up and the speaker has to be designed in such a way that it is buffed enough to deal with the pneumatic pressure inside the small box (even if the box is ported... strange but true) The things you do to buff up a speaker (stiffen the suspension, add mass, etc..) make it more difficult for that speaker to handle mid & high frequencies - and generally make its breakup distortion harsher. Hearing the C60 in quite a few environments, this sort of makes sense. It definitely sounds great in smaller quieter venues (cafes, small concerts, coffee houses) but turns to worms pretty quickly in large harsh environments (large loud pubs, auditorium swing dances etc...) Maybe I'm too old school. I respect the engineering involved in making a subminiature amp, but -- give me 15 to 30 tube watts and a big'ol paper driver in a big'ol cabinet and I'm in hog heaven... as long as I don't have to carry it too far from the van to the pub!!

a

i think a lot of the frequencies that we recognize as timbre occur above 300hz. so, you don't actually need to use that much energy to make your statement...all that low stuff is implied if you squeeze out the overtones when you are playing.

a

also, about the paper driver...

i think there is something to be said for trying to find instruments that have this sort of dry, papery response. aren't the yamaha ns10s made of paper?