Lead 12/lead 20 combo?

[cjs42079]

I have been told the greenback speaker is really good in a 12 watt lead amp.
I have seen some pictures of 12" greenbacks put in a 12w amp, but a 10" would be easier to put in.
There are a few different versions of the Lead 12 out there.

I’d agree. I put a 10” greenback and a creamback in my lead 12 stack and it was a noticeable upgrade. The blend of the two is nice, though I second guess all the time if I shoulda done two greenbacks. Anyway, it rules. It’s my favorite little practice rig.

 

[AlvisX]

All pretty good sounding amps, but the Lead 12, is still basically a small practice amp.

...There's your man with a Lead 12 , "practicing" with Mike Campbell & Chris Holt



Sometimes , I'll jack the Lead 12 into a 1965 cab at a gig .....It's ALL there !
Truth be told , I like the Lead 12 , head or combo , BETTER than I like the SV20

As for the mini stack ,unfortunately they put the same shit speakers in 'em as the combo



The newer mini stack heads suck (MG ?) ,but mine has Ten 30's in it which sort of sound OK with a Lead 12 .
Kinda muffly though , no so efficient i suppose
I can't say I was that happy with Greenback type 10 inchers in there either
But again ,I can't say enough about how good that Fender Eminence sounds in there .....like a hit record

 

[fitz]

I put G10-30 greenbacks in my Lead15 (G15MS) and VT Jr's in my MG15HCFX
Sounded WAY better than the junk stock speakers.
Kept the speakers, put the stock one back when I sold the little fellas.

Put those speakers in my 2x10 columns for my 5010 head conversion.

 

[jcm800gridlock]

...There's your man with a Lead 12 , "practicing" with Mike Campbell & Chris Holt



Sometimes , I'll jack the Lead 12 into a 1965 cab at a gig .....It's ALL there !
Truth be told , I like the Lead 12 , head or combo , BETTER than I like the SV20

As for the mini stack ,unfortunately they put the same shit speakers in 'em as the combo



The newer mini stack heads suck (MG ?) ,but mine has Ten 30's in it which sort of sound OK with a Lead 12 .
Kinda muffly though , no so efficient i suppose
I can't say I was that happy with Greenback type 10 inchers in there either
But again ,I can't say enough about how good that Fender Eminence sounds in there .....like a hit record

Very cool. I see the little Lead 12 miked up on the stage in the back. An impressive three guitar players.

I’m going to have to get my Lead 12 out more often.

 

[DirtySteve]

I put a G10 greenback in my Lead 12 just last week and I wasn't impressed at all. I'm just not a greenback guy I guess, I've never liked them in anything I've put one in.

So... I have a Fender Eminence V1030 on the way per Alvin's suggestion earlier in this thread. Hope it works out for me.

 

[AlvisX]

I put G10-30 greenbacks in my Lead15 (G15MS) and VT Jr's in my MG15HCFX
Sounded WAY better than the junk stock speakers.
Kept the speakers, put the stock one back when I sold the little fellas.
View attachment 137917

What were the stock speakers in that era ?
The purple mini stack I got ,has these in there
They're not bad...not stellar either
An improvement ,certainly, over the G 10 D from the 80s .....but still no cigar




^That may be the head I have , in purple. Im not particularly fond of it
I gave a young friend a bunch of speakers & project guitars when I was moving
In turn, he gave me a PV Delta Blues, a Bassman Ten and the purple modern mini stack
It's just nowhere near the tone machine that the Lead 12 is IMO

 

[paul-e-mann]

I put G10-30 greenbacks in my Lead15 (G15MS) and VT Jr's in my MG15HCFX
Sounded WAY better than the junk stock speakers.
Kept the speakers, put the stock one back when I sold the little fellas.
View attachment 137917View attachment 137918
Put those speakers in my 2x10 columns for my 5010 head conversion.
View attachment 137919

You do nice work fitz!

 

[fitz]

What were the stock speakers in that era ?

The Lead15 had these gold frame 25w.

MG had these black frames - labeled for the MS II series.


At one point I did get a pair of Ten-30's for the Lead15.
An improvement over the stock, but nowhere near as nice as the greenbacks.

 

[jcm800gridlock]

The Greenback in my Lead 12 improved the tone at higher volumes.

I just played my Lead 12 with my Les Paul Custom. Plugged into the low input using my J-Rocket Dude OD, a little reverb and delay. I forgot how good sounding this amp is.

Seemed plenty loud with volume and gain set at 7 and the Dude’s volume at a little over 1/4 the way up.

 

[AlvisX]

I put a G10 greenback in my Lead 12 just last week and I wasn't impressed at all. I'm just not a greenback guy I guess, I've never liked them in anything I've put one in.

So... I have a Fender Eminence V1030 on the way per Alvin's suggestion earlier in this thread. Hope it works out for me.

It was just one of those happy accidents .
I had been using Celestion G 10 S 50 in the combos

I had bought a Pro Junior in England . The next time I went over there I took a blue Eminence alnico with me, to stick in the Pro Junior ......giving me an Eminence V 1030 with no home
That same trip I found a Lead 12 ....stuck the Emi in there , straight away
It was a perfect match

What I like about the way that speaker reacts , the highs are not brutally piercing , the mids are not overpowering and muffly like I found a couple GB types to be , the bottom is real ,present and more than I thought I would get from such a rig

The real thing ....what I look for in any amp rig , is that it makes every guitar sound the way, that individual instrument is SUPPOSED to sound . The strats n teles are vibrant n chimey, the Les Pauls .....meaty
What more do ya want ?

 

[NumbSkull]

I have just been playing mine,
Lead 12 with reverb.
Sounds great with a fuzz pedal,
I probably will not do a speaker swap, just add an speaker out jack.
Mine has a Celestion G10D -25 that is useable for practice but I have better cabs so I may as well use them.
A very friendly amp, comfortable size,
not too many knobs and channels so I just play rather than twiddle knobs.
And I dont have to worry about overheating, worn out tubes or cathode poisoning.

 

[AlvisX]

I put G10-30 greenbacks in my Lead15 (G15MS) and VT Jr's in my MG15HCFX
Sounded WAY better than the junk stock speakers.
Kept the speakers, put the stock one back when I sold the little fellas.
View attachment 137917View attachment 137918
Put those speakers in my 2x10 columns for my 5010 head conversion. View attachment 137919

Here the 15 min stack I was given. I really haven't found "the tone" in it yet .........if it's there at all
We'll see

 

[fitz]

Here the 15 min stack I was given. I really haven't found "the tone" in it yet .........if it's there at all
We'll see

Lead15?
Try Gain1 & Gain2 on zero, Master on 10.
Bring up Gain1 as volume & add Gain2 for OD.
Bring the Master down to back off the total volume if the little fella is getting too loud.

 

[LessPol]

What is the difference in the low and high input of the lead 12? Looks like reverb 12 only has 1 input

 

[SteelLucky]

In the past, I've just added female/male jacks to the internal speaker cable so i can easily disconnect them and run an external speaker. I did this to a reissue Fender champion 600 and it works well.
I like the tidiness of the little head version though

That’s a good idea.

 

[fitz]

What is the difference in the low and high input of the lead 12? Looks like reverb 12 only has 1 input

Kinda like the high treble / low treble inputs on a JCM800.
High input is a bit brighter tone, low is a bit more mellow.
When I had a 5002 Lead20, I tried an A/B/Y switch for comparisons and wound up just getting a Y cable and running with them blended.
My 5010 Master Lead 30 is the smaller chassis single input version, but it has a line out and HP jack.

 

[Gutch220]

Kinda like the high treble / low treble inputs on a JCM800.
High input is a bit brighter tone, low is a bit more mellow.
When I had a 5002 Lead20, I tried an A/B/Y switch for comparisons and wound up just getting a Y cable and running with them blended.
My 5010 Master Lead 30 is the smaller chassis single input version, but it has a line out and HP jack.

is that what it is? high treble and low treble? I always thought it was higher gain and lower gain

 

[Matthews Guitars]

Going to wander slightly off track here....much as the discussion is about the smallest Marshalls I'm going to take a moment to sing the praises of the lead 12's younger, slightly bigger brother, the MG15MSII Microstack. I have one of these and sometimes I like to plug it into my 1960 cabs. I did that this evening as a matter of fact. And, as always, I'm left with this "Wow, this thing is seriously FUN!" feeling, because it IS. It's got a reasonable volume range, from bedroom practice to small club gig capacity, and it's just an awesome, fun amp to play, it has pure rock tones in it all the way up to heavy metal gain ranges, and there's practically zero tweaking to get a good tone out of it.

I dare say, it's more fun than any of its more serious "real" 100 watt Marshall brothers. It's really an astonishingly good sounding and fun little thing, and based on what I've seen in the way of resell value of this model on reverb and ebay lately, people are starting to realize it.
It's no longer something you can expect to find for 99 dollars for the head or 200 for the whole stack. More like triple those prices.

If you run across one at a cheap price, seriously think about adding it to your collection. Try it, and you WILL.

 

[fitz]

is that what it is? high treble and low treble? I always thought it was higher gain and lower gain

Ok, I pulled up the manual...
They call it high powered input and low powered input.



On the next page, they refer to it as sensitivity.



Not sure what the electrical stuff means to the signal.
Sounded like high treble / low treble to me...

 

[TassieViking]

What is the difference in the low and high input of the lead 12

The amps with high and low have a few resistors at the input that basically works like a set volume pot, one input is volume set at 4 and the other input it's set at 8.
It does not change the tone, just the level of the signal going into the pre-amp.
You could do the same thing with the volume pot on the guitar.