Ric-O-Sound Thingy?

[sleeperNY]

It will only work with a guitar that has a stereo output on one jack

Thanks for explaining how it works Jon. I've always wondered how 'stereo' could be gained from electric guitars -they all seemed to give off a mono signal anyway, but now it is clear to me. I was thinking (wrongly) that strings 1, 2 and 3 had possibly one channel allotted and strings 4, 5 and 6 the other...

Veenture, that is how Gretsch guitars with stereo are setup. I had a stereo White Falcon many years ago and you could send the bass strings to one amp and the treble to another. It was a blast to play around with but was a pain when playing out live.

Jim

[Veenture]

Hey Jim, thanks for helping me 'rehabilitate'

Talking about plugs and such, I have a sort of "Y" adapter-plug for two guitars -for when an amp has only one input for a guitar. Strangely enough, when the plug is indeed used to facilitate [or is it 'accomodate'?] 2 guitars in one amp input, each of the guitars can now influence (i.e. control!) the other guitar's level of volume! It's like having a remote volume control on your own guitar for the other guitar...
I reckon for me, simplicity is the best route to take in this kind of business

[jfine]

Another '60's guitar that was wired for the bass strings on one output and the treble strings on the other was the Vox Phantom XII Stereo. It had three split pickups, with each side of each pickup having its own volume and tone controls, for a total of six volume and six tone controls--and if that weren't enough, each pickup had a three-way switch to select bass side, treble side, or all six string pairs! Must have been a nightmare to operate. There was also a three-way toggle to select mono, stereo, or reverse (whatever that was) output--and no master volume! No wonder virtually no one ever used those things. Seems like I also remember an Ovation electric/acoustic with the option of running strings 1, 3, and 5 through one output and 2, 4, and 6 through the other, or bass strings on one and treble strings on the other. It's giving me a headache just thinking about it...

[Veenture]

Jon, you make me smile ...man, with all those overkill options on a guitar like you describe, the song would alreadty be over by the time you're ready to go...

[Sarah93003]

Jeez, isn't that the truth!

[Tronman]

Isn't it just a fancy one of these? I've never used one, but besides two amps, you could potentially use it to run two channels on a single amp, like a Bassman or a Showman. Not sure how much you gain from it, but it's kind of cool just for the wacky factor. Wouldn't work on any of the Fender _ Reverb amps as the channels are out of phase.

Why wouldn't it work? You are not jumping channels but rather sending a signal straight from the guitar as if you had 2 guitars plugged in to it.

Jim

I have a couple of Rick-O-Sound kits for my '74 4001 bass; an old one given to me by a friend and a new one that I purchased a couple of years ago. I've tried a stereo splitter and the results are not anywhere near as good as using the Rick-O-Sound kit. The Rick-O-Sound kit has better stereo separation, resulting in crisper highs and deeper bass. But you have to run the pickups through separate amplifiers. If you use a single two channel amp, the result sounds no different than if you use a stereo splitter.

[jfine]

Mel's right. Fender two-channel blackface (and I'd assume silverface too) amps have the channels wired out of phase with each other--why, I don't know. Years ago, I knew a guy who played his Gibson ES345 through both channels of a Twin Reverb, and the two-pickup setting was out of phase, but it was the amp rather than the guitar. It made for some interesting sounds, as he could control the amount of "out-of-phaseness" by turning one pickup up or down, but he couldn't get the normal two-pickup in-phase mix. When I had my 345, I got around that by cutting the split section off the Y-cord and wiring both hots together, and both grounds--well, someone else did the work, as I'm solder-challenged, but it enabled me to run the 345 through effects on both pickups without rewiring the guitar.

[sleeperNY]

Fender 2 channel reverb amps are setup with another gain stage in the vibrato/reverb channel that the nornal channel doesn't have. It has to do with the reverb.. That is why they are out of phase.

Jim

[MWaldorf]

As mentioned, the extra gain stage in the Fender _ Reverb amps puts the two channels out of phase. The non-reverb amps don't have this issue and you can jump channels with no phase issues. As for using one amp for both sides of the stereo, you'd be able to set different vol/tone controls, but it wouldn't be as dramatic as two completely separate amps.

For the _ Reverb amps, you can re-wire them to put both channels into the reverb/vibrato circuit and they'll both be in phase. I did this with my Twin Reverb. If I remember correctly, it's a matter of moving one wire.

[Dennisthe Menace]

I know I'm gonna 'light a fuse,' but I always thought the 'Stereo' guitars
by the different manufacturers were as useless as watching grass grow .