Help me with SPRING REVERB please

[Providence]

I want a real spring reverb for vocals, drums, guitars, ect ect ect.... Can you guys recommend one? Also, would it be cheaper to build one? If so, I would like some recommendations for reverb tanks ect ect ect.. Thanks

[springreverb]

i don't know about wich one sounds best
but i just ripped out a springreverb off a cheap fender amp and used it with a second little mixer as reverb"amp"
main mixer aux send to reverbmixer channel to headphone out to reverb, reverb out to reverbmixer mic-in, channel direct out to aux return on the main mixer
on the way out to reverbtank, reducing the bass and boosting treble, and on the way in the opposite.
works well for me

don'T know if that gonna help you in any way

[paul999]

I have tried a ton of reverb tanks from expensive to lining into a cheap fender amps. When A/Bing them there is no real difference on sources like vocals etc. I used an AKG spring reverb at another studio one time and it was a little smoother but not night and day better. If you have any amp with spring reverb line in and out of it setting the reverb on 10. You'll need to eq a little and often times compressing spring reverb is very nice. I still do this even with my lexicon PCM 70 and 90's doing the bulk of my reverb work. It adds another dimension.

[beingmf]

- for "clean", I'd go for AKG BX series, Peavey Valverb, Vermona, Demeter
- for "character" Fostex, Master Room, Fisher Space Expander, Tapco (Dual Mono )
- ITB there's quite a big choice in the Nebula library world (sounds really good)

I don't know the D&R, the Korg, the various Dynacords and the Orban (which is quite nice from what I've heard).
The Boss one is boring and muddy, a waste of time.

If you know someone who has the knowledge to build a proper (tube?) preamp and makeup stage, you could choose any old Accutronics tank and start from there...

[theblue1]

Originally Posted by springreverb

i don't know about wich one sounds best
but i just ripped out a springreverb off a cheap fender amp and used it with a second little mixer as reverb"amp"
main mixer aux send to reverbmixer channel to headphone out to reverb, reverb out to reverbmixer mic-in, channel direct out to aux return on the main mixer
on the way out to reverbtank, reducing the bass and boosting treble, and on the way in the opposite.
works well for me

don'T know if that gonna help you in any way

Hopefully you did a better job of integrating and matching the impedance of the reverb circuit than Fender often has in their amps. I like my original Blues Jr pretty well -- but turn the 'verb up the tiniest bit and it sounds like someone running a close-miked air conditioner through the amp.

[springreverb]

Originally Posted by theblue1

Hopefully you did a better job of integrating and matching the impedance of the reverb circuit than Fender often has in their amps. I like my original Blues Jr pretty well -- but turn the 'verb up the tiniest bit and it sounds like someone running a close-miked air conditioner through the amp.

i don'T really know
but there is almost no noise

[beats workin']

I've got a bunch of springs that get used regularly:
BX20- the best of the springs. must be tuned correctly and will give you a very smooth lush verb that sits in the mix beautifully. Generally not for drums, but most everything else. I mostly use it on guitars and vox.

Intersound PRV-1 is a great inexpensive unit from the 70s or 80s (also their IVP is excellent)
this one has eq and is mono.

Old Fender tube spring from the 50s- very short reverb-- almost ambience and very dark. used mostly for gaseous textures........

Spring reverb in my old Lowery Venus with Genie Organ. Pick one of these up for nothing. 1970 technology- 5 speaker Leslie etc. Great spring tone. Has a Line in and out.

Lastly I use a Mesa Boogie Studio preamp (2 rack space unit) from the 80s. has 6 tubes with line and buffered outs. great spring sound.
Boingingly,
Myron

[Steffmo]

Lotsa choices.

AKG: The BX20 is the Cadillac. super nice...so nice some folks don't think its springy enough. The BX10 and 15 are funkier and less expensive.

I used to use the Mastersound at one place....similar to the cheaper AKG.

I've used Fostex, Furman, and Tapco with some success. Even a Fender. Not for drums.....

I still have the Orban and love it. Has a limiter you can swith in befre the spring to cut down the '" on transiants.

Never tried the Intersound, British Spring, a few current offerings.....but there are plenty to try.

[Karloff70]

Check out Zerotronics.

[ericstadium]

I have a Master Room XL121 spring and it's really cool. There's an EQ on it that's ok, although I tend to EQ it myself for more control depending on the source.

It obviously sounds great on a clean guitar, and I love having it as a send or 100% wet printed track so that I can pan it off the guitar a bit. as much as I love the sound of a Fender spring, sometimes it feels a little 1-dimensional in a mix when the reverb is sitting right on the track. If there's enough space in the song, a 1/16th or even 1/8th pre-delay on the spring makes it sound incredible.

It really shines on a vocal in a song that has a spacey-vibe and allows for some cool reverb. The fact that it has so much midrange and stands out a lot let's you fit it into a mix without having to use too much.

I've had good luck with a few reverb plugin springs, but I always tend to need some creative EQ, and the pre-delay really makes it comes to life. I'd love to try out a few more of the mentioned springs and compare them to the Master Room.

[FFTT]

Check out the Jule Amps Santa Cruz Reverb

Can be built stand alone guitar head style or rack mount.

Santa Cruz Reverb from Jule Amps

[atomicohm]

The Acutronics reverb tank is a very good one, and you can make your own spring reverb, the stage spring reverb is a nice proyect is very easy, i made one and the sound is good, you can make some mods to improve the sound. Here you have some pics.

[RusRant]

Originally Posted by atomicohm

The Acutronics reverb tank is a very good one, and you can make your own spring reverb, the stage spring reverb is a nice proyect is very easy, i made one and the sound is good, you can make some mods to improve the sound. Here you have some pics.

I agree, build your own. I made a stereo tube powered spring reverb. Basically a simple tube powered amp and some accusonic tanks. Took a few days to build.

[initialsBB]

I bought a spaceexpander with no tank on ebay then bought a new tank from accutronics and it was much cheaper than any of the complete amp+tanks sell for on ebay. I think this approach makes sense because you get the vintage tube amp to drive it, but the springs they make now are probably pretty similar to what they made 50 years ago but not all old and stretched out.

[Karloff70]

Or you go Zerotronic and use any pre of your choice for an amp......

[FFTT]

On a budget, you might look for an ART FXR Elite, single space rack mount,
digital reverb unit.

It has some very useful patches and a used one should be very affordable.

[12ax7]

.

The Tapco 4400 can be had dirt-cheap (and has TWO channels per unit):

True, they're a little on the noisy side...

...But then again, so are MOST springs.

I got mine for FREE! (...But that was a few years ago, before springs started catching back on).


Here's a pretty "naked" sample of it:

Tapco4400Sample.mp3

(Sorry, but couldn't get a .wav file to upload.)

.

This is a Mosrite guitar, NO AMP (plugged strait into the Hi-z input of a Mackie 8-buss).

There's a modest amount of EQ from the Mackie, and a little compression from an Aphex 106.

The resultant signal was sent to the 4400 from the Mackie's aux buss, and returned through two channels for the mix.

...Nothing "Hi-End" about anything in the chain, but it gives you a pretty good idea what you'd get from a 4400.

.

.

[Marcocet]

Sound workshop 242s are also a really good deal for a very "springy" spring. In subtlety world the best thing I've heard is a zerotronics Mini LE.

Have you seen the new radial tanker? If you have a 500 series rack that may be the answer. You can plug raw spring tanks in to it, so you could keep a couple around for different tones/decay times.

[12ax7]

Originally Posted by Marcocet

[...]

Have you seen the new radial tanker? If you have a 500 series rack that may be the answer.

You can plug raw spring tanks in to it, so you could keep a couple around for different tones/decay times.

That sounds like a great idea!

Got a link to any info about it?

...A quick Google search turned up nada (except for THIS thread!)

.

[initialsBB]

Originally Posted by Karloff70

Or you go Zerotronic and use any pre of your choice for an amp......

This seems like a way more expensive way to go. It's just some accutronic tanks plus transformers in a rack.

[Donpepperoni]

What about Telefunken Echo Mixer? My friend has one but we've not hooked it up yet as not sure about the power supply. Anybody know about this?

[Amun Ra]

Radial is announcing an API 500 series unit that will allow you to use any regular spring reverb tank with it for mixing and recording purposes. I will certainly buy one :-).

[wakestyle]

I got myself a TankDriver, and a accutronics type 9 spring tank on order. I will let u all know how it sounds when I get it.

[tomdarude]

Anyone tried THIS one for mixing?

Reverbamate two channel spring reverb pedal

[Amun Ra]

Originally Posted by wakestyle

I got myself a TankDriver, and a accutronics type 9 spring tank on order. I will let u all know how it sounds when I get it.

Looking forward to this...

[MisterMark]

+1 on the Orban 111b... It's a stereo unit with the exact same decay times. To add a bit more versatility to it, I've opened it up and wedged a bit of foam into one of the spring tanks to dampen it. So now I have two different reverb decay times to choose from.

Also for those entertaining the the idea of getting an old school spring for their studio... Be prepared for excessive noise. The springs act like attennas and can pick up all sorts of noise and electrical interference from your studio. Couple this with the less than ideal input and output gain staging of these units and you might be a bit disappointed with signal to the noise ratio (however some people actually like the noise as it can be considered as part of the 'vibe').

The good news is there are a few things you can do to reduce the noise if it seems excessive. The cheapest and easiest one is to put your spring unit in another room where there is less EMI present. In our studio we have it in a closet in the hallway. It's was a bit of a pain to run cables to it and it's inconvenient to run back and forth when setting up a sound, but it is much less noisy than having it in the control room.

For some other more complicated noise reducing options check out this thread:

Tape Op Message Board :: View topic - Orban 111b noise..........jeeeez

Hope that helps,

Mark

[UPRYZ]

Some might scoff, but for a lot of things this is really killer:

Mr Springgy Reverb Pedal by Lee Jackson Metaltronix

Dan

[Granny Gremlin]

AKG BX series is $$$ but pretty much the best (with the possible exception of the Demeter RV-1 and a few more esoteric devices - The Great British Spring for example as well as the Grampian 666 Ambiophonic wich is mono).

I have an AKG BX25 and it is awesome, even for drums. I also have the Tapco 4400, which is not anywhere near as hifi or lush, but still plenty useful (just not for drums). The EQ on that is pretty usefull. I like this thing on dirtier or lofi tracks within a mix, but have also used it cleaner (not driven hard) on vox. This is nearly the cheapest 2 channel reverb you can get.

Other good units I didn't see mentioned above include:
Accutronics Accuverb
Klark-Teknik DN50
BiAmp MR 140
Master Room xl 305
Sound Workshop 242
Vesta Kaza RV-3 (or 2)
London Power 3-D (kinda pricey - you can get an AKG BX series cheaper)
Zerotronics Coolsprings (completely passive and transformer coupled I/O IIRC - designed to be used with your console so the driver and makup stages are your aux send and a free input channel).

[Jim Williams]

I built my own back in the early 1980's because I couldn't afford a 224.

I used 2 Accutronics type 9 tanks per channel. They custom built them for me, they still do. One was made with reversed pickup coil magnets. That creates a hum cancelling pickup when wired in series. That removed the common noise pickup problems. These were medium tanks, not the long tanks. The extra tank added double the density of one tank, 6 springs total.

The drive coils were stock, yet also wired in series, one out of phase. That cancels the fundamentals a bit. It reduces quite a bit the attack "sprong" sound of strings.

The drive coils were placed into the feedback loop if the drive circuit, an opamp with current boost transistors instead of one leg connected to ground as is commonly done. That creates a constant current drive and smooths out the impedance of the drive coils. Any errors are also cancelled by the opamp's feedback loop for lower THD.

Lastly, I designed an one knob compress/expand circuit I used on the return pickup preamps. That allowed adjustment of the reverb time, a clever way of adjusting that.

Doug Sax did my mastering back then and always commented on the quality of my reverb sounds. Most never suspected I used cheapo springs. They ended up sounding more plate like than spring like.

Now day's it's the Bricasti M7, I no longer use springs.

[thechrisl]

Check out Vermona too. I have the RetroVerb though it's no longer available. They have a few other spring based units including a sexy tube powered reverb w/ balanced I/O.

I agree spring verb can be cheap to diy but keeping things quiet (electrically & mechanically) can be a challenge.

Of course there's always the Ekdahl Moisturizer if you want to get silly...