Over Christmas I put together Stephen's Deluxe kit and have been very happy with its tone quality and performance. As many have done before me, I made some downward adjustments on the tone caps to brighten up the bottom end on the 1st two caps (from the right), namely changing the .1's to .022's. That of course made a very nice improvement to tone range control. I went a few step further and halved the other two .1's to .047's (which I had seen published and recommended from other sources) - again a very nice improvement. So, all in all, a terrific improvement in tonal range control and to get away from the big bottoms. All very satisfying, and I used Sozo Blue Vintages for the caps.
However, what blew me away was the significant increase in output power - this I was not expecting! I am usually playing around 7 or 8, now I can't go higher than 3 as it gets too loud!!! What happened? The caps should not have done this. Was there a poor solder joint before the swap? It sounded just fine before the swap. Any thoughts? I now have one very powerful tone machine - it is like a brand new amp!!!
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