Great addition to my collection
"This kit was my first ever amp build. I had some electronic technician experience in my distant past, but that was many, many years ago. The kit showed up with every part present and accounted for. Parts choices seemed just fine. Before jumping in I watched a few videos about building tube amp kits to get an idea of what I was going to be doing. I also bought proper tools to do the job. I did: 1) attach hardware, 2) laid out turret board, 3) attached turret board, picked a spot and then went clockwise around the inside of the chassis completing the wiring. I went slowly and checked my work as I went. I took me about 2 hrs per day for 5 days in all. Could have done it more quickly but I had no hurry. Happily, this kit has ample room in the chassis to work so it never felt cramped. Then I pushed it away for a couple of days. I came back and rechecked everything again. I never actually found any mistakes other than a few questionable solder joints. When satisfied, I powered it up and it worked straight away. I live in an apartment which is what drew me to the 1 watt amp. 1 watt is still pretty loud for an apartment so at the same time I built an attenuator. In practice, since the lead side has a master volume it really doesn’t need an attenuator. But the 5E3 side does need one if you want to push it. It works well too, to change channels I just hit the foot switch and either turn the attenuator on or off. It has an excellent sound, both sides. I’m very happy with it. I have also built a Mojotone Tweed Deluxe kit for my son and I have to say it probably sounds better than the Studio One, on the clean side that is. Can’t put my finger on it, just a bit more shimmer, maybe it’s the 6v6s. But I’m fine with that. I put the amp in the Blackface head cabinet from Mojotone. It sits on top of a Suhr Badger head and I have to say the cabinets look identical other than the Suhr badge. I play the amp through a Celestion Blue speaker which sounds great. Was a very satisfying experience. One day I hope to build a Deluxe Reverb amp, probably from Mojotone."