NAD - Marshall Class 5

[nemo_kost]

Hi folks!
Did I need another guitar amp? Of course not, but last saturday a super clean Marshall Class 5 dated 2010 arrived...

I was always interested in this little beast since they came out, but never even tried one or seen one around, last week I pulled a trigger on a used one and got it home with me.
The previous owner got the internal speaker connection out of the board, in order to use the headphone trick with the combo's speaker too. Inside it looks clean and untouched, I had ony to tighten up all the screws and that cured the little rattles I heard during the first run.
The seller said to me "even if it says C5 on the chassis, it's a later version because of the 3 piece back panel", what do you think about that?
All the inside wires seem to be grouped together and well far from the chassis, I read having them close to it and/or loose was one of the issues causing rattling in first editions...

I swapped the tubes with something I had laying around just to see if there were any differences, I was surprised to notice the amp is now really more open, and less "bassy" and muddy. It probably still had the original tubes on because they're Marshall branded (see pic), the sound was good with them, but It's simply better to my ears with the "new" tubes. I hope they'll live long, cause I don't think I have others like that around! I also tried a new JJ ECC83 in position 1 and the result was similar than with the Yugolsavian ones, so maybe the original ones were the main cause of muddiness.

I'm happy with the purchase, it's really a loud little beast, I hope to use it live in small situations. You can control the sound with just the guitar volume, so it's really a fun way to play it. Of course, not a bedroom amp at all!
Have a nice day!

 

[matt748]

You always need another amp….
nice score congrats

 

[DirtySteve]

Congrats! They are cool little amps for sure. I had 2 of them at one time. It's the amp that led me to this forum back when I bought my first one.

There were 3 versions. Version 1 with the one piece back had rattle issues. Version 2 had the different back panel and they put rubber o-rings on the tubes to fix the rattle issue. Version 3 had the low power switch added. The low power trick before the switch (like yours) is to plug the speaker into the headphone jack only halfway (because it's a stereo jack) to get the low power mode. The Class 5 has a built in resister that keeps a constant load that makes it safe to power up with no speaker attached at all, that's why the headphone jack trick works. It was Steve Dawson, the amps designer, that told us about it. When the switch was added it just does the same thing internally.

 

[Deftone]

Very cool. Congratulations and HNAD.

I remember the Class 5 being pretty popular back then. Cool amp for sure. The heads and the combos are both very nice looking.

 

[iron broadsword]

I own 6 tube amps, 3 of them marshalls, and the class 5 is my favourite amp. I’ve gigged the hell out of it and it has a sound that just pulls the notes out of me

I have modded mine with the lyle mods and added a knob to adjust the volume of the low power mode (thread here on this forum) so you can run it at any volume. It’s incredible, but the stock amp is too as long as you keep the bass at 2 or off, and treb and mids dimed. The amp shines best with the volume between 3 and 7 and you just goose it with a tubescreamer (volume up, gain off) or similar when you want more front end drive.

Jj power tubes sound great in it, and be sure to change them often because being a class A amp that you will probably be running really hot every time you plug in, you’ll go through them quicker than you might on other amps. I’ve never burned one out but I notice a real difference after 3 months of heavy use whereas 1.5-2 years is what I’d expect out of another amp driven as hard

I’ve got an origin 50c and a jcm900 4100 i modded for all tube gain and while they sound great nothing compares to this rowdy little amp

 

[nemo_kost]

There were 3 versions...

Thanks for the info!
Just out of curiosity, does "C5" written on the back panel have any meaning regarding which version is which?

 

[nemo_kost]

I have modded mine with the lyle mods...

Ehi man, thanks for the reply.

I saw some of your older posts about the mods and was thinking about them too (I probably could do them by myself, having experience in pedal building).
Following some of the threads here at Marshallforum, I got to the MyLesPaul one which summarize the mods done by "Goodguy":
Some Mods for Marshall Class 5 - Page 61, post #1,213
Are these the same steps you followed?

...adjust the volume of the low power mode...

Do you maybe have the thread with the instructions bookmarked?

I'll probably play mine stock for a while and see how it goes, cause changing the tubes really "improved" (to my ears) the sound, getting rid of the "too much bass" I had with the original tubes. But more info are alway much appriciated!

I’ve gigged the hell out of it...

Is it going to "survive" on its own in a three piece blues/rock band? I play Clapton, Beatles, CCR, Stones, ACDC, Lenny Kravitz and so on, we don't have a loud drummer, but you know...
I'm thinking about try it live next saturday, I got an indoor gig in a small bar and maybe it could work. Normally I use my SV20H, different beast and volume, but who knows? I could hook up the C5 to my 1912 to give the amp more "air", in the end I have to carry the external cab anyway for the SV20...

 

[DirtySteve]

Thanks for the info!
Just out of curiosity, does "C5" written on the back panel have any meaning regarding which version is which?

I've never heard of that before.

 

[iron broadsword]

Ehi man, thanks for the reply.

I saw some of your older posts about the mods and was thinking about them too (I probably could do them by myself, having experience in pedal building).
Following some of the threads here at Marshallforum, I got to the MyLesPaul one which summarize the mods done by "Goodguy":
Some Mods for Marshall Class 5 - Page 61, post #1,213
Are these the same steps you followed?


Do you maybe have the thread with the instructions bookmarked?

I'll probably play mine stock for a while and see how it goes, cause changing the tubes really "improved" (to my ears) the sound, getting rid of the "too much bass" I had with the original tubes. But more info are alway much appriciated!


Is it going to "survive" on its own in a three piece blues/rock band? I play Clapton, Beatles, CCR, Stones, ACDC, Lenny Kravitz and so on, we don't have a loud drummer, but you know...
I'm thinking about try it live next saturday, I got an indoor gig in a small bar and maybe it could work. Normally I use my SV20H, different beast and volume, but who knows? I could hook up the C5 to my 1912 to give the amp more "air", in the end I have to carry the external cab anyway for the SV20...

Playing in a band with it always comes down to your drummer’s volume, but I picked up an e906 mic and drape it over the top and it solves any volume issues while also spreading out the sound to the whole crowd instead of mostly the 5 people directly in front of the amp. The open back helps spread it out but if you can put it through a pa then you will never have problems ever. That said, it kept up just fine with most drummers I’ve played with.

About the attenuation pot, I’ll link the thread below. Basically you just drop a 5w pot into the amp and it lets you control how much volume it rolls off, meaning it can now go from full volume all the way down to nothing when in full power mode. It works in low power mode too which is nice to fine tune the volume for late night playing at home. I moved the pilot light over and put the pot in its place but there is also lots of room to put it on the same surface the tubes are on if you want to keep the top looking pretty

Simple Class5 Mod!!!

Good news for CLASS 5 owners!!!! It would seem that a good deal of us Class 5 owners would love to have better volume control. Most if not all have already heard of the Headphone trick....Do this it works great!!! I recommend the making a stereo plug for your internal speaker route, as this...

www.marshallforum.com

As far as helping get the bass out, you’ll get a lot of bang for your buck out of the preamp tubes if you put some bright ones in there, since they will mitigate how much bass goes through the circuit and therefore less will get distorted. A graphic eq out front might also be good. The lyle mods are def worth doing if you’re interested in getting more of that bright treble and clear bass that you expect out of a plexi, but it’s definitely not necessary cause it sounds great as is

 

[Matthews Guitars]

I had a Class 5 for a while, and nothing I tried could take it out of the muddy and muffled zone. Too bad, because it had potential, if I could have gotten past that. Rather than mod it I decided to move it along.

 

[iron broadsword]

I had a Class 5 for a while, and nothing I tried could take it out of the muddy and muffled zone. Too bad, because it had potential, if I could have gotten past that. Rather than mod it I decided to move it along.

A lot of people who fight with the mud are talking about the low power mode, which actually has a resistor in there to chop highs off for headphone play. If anybody is interested, clipping it solves that problem and there is info about it on page 3 of the thread i linked above

 

[nemo_kost]

Playing in a band with it always comes down to your drummer’s volume...

Thanks a lot for all the great info!

I always carry some mic to put the amps out front, cause you'll never know. It's true if it's a small place sometimes I don't use the mic, especially with the SV20! But I'll see at the gig how it goes with the C5.
I'll get back to you all next week after the gig with some comments on the live performance of the amp!

 

[iron broadsword]

Sounds good, and HNAD!

 

[jmp45]

Cool score Nemo.. I have a 2010 white Class 5 that I really like. It had the rattle. I tightened everywhere I could. tie strapped some of the wiring and did the silicone o-ring thing with the tubes. I don't notice it now. Great little amp, much much better that the Origin 5C combo. If you can find one on the cheap, pick it up.

 

[lespaul339]

I used to have a class 5 head. I sold that and my 2203 along with a 4x12 cab, a 2x12 cab, and a couple guitars to buy a Gibson Hummingbird. I miss the amps, but I do love my Hummingbird!

 

[iron broadsword]

Ehi man, thanks for the reply.

I saw some of your older posts about the mods and was thinking about them too (I probably could do them by myself, having experience in pedal building).
Following some of the threads here at Marshallforum, I got to the MyLesPaul one which summarize the mods done by "Goodguy":
Some Mods for Marshall Class 5 - Page 61, post #1,213
Are these the same steps you followed?


Do you maybe have the thread with the instructions bookmarked?

I'll probably play mine stock for a while and see how it goes, cause changing the tubes really "improved" (to my ears) the sound, getting rid of the "too much bass" I had with the original tubes. But more info are alway much appriciated!


Is it going to "survive" on its own in a three piece blues/rock band? I play Clapton, Beatles, CCR, Stones, ACDC, Lenny Kravitz and so on, we don't have a loud drummer, but you know...
I'm thinking about try it live next saturday, I got an indoor gig in a small bar and maybe it could work. Normally I use my SV20H, different beast and volume, but who knows? I could hook up the C5 to my 1912 to give the amp more "air", in the end I have to carry the external cab anyway for the SV20...

Oh i realized i didn’t answer you about the lyle mods. Im not sure offhand what exactly i did, but i am in that thread talking about it somewhere around half way through and i’m sure I mentioned what I changed. I think I did everything lyle had talked about up until that point, which was about 8 or 9 parts, nothing complicated. I put the bright cap on a switch but it’s always on, and I used another switch to change the bass back to stock in case i want more

 

[nemo_kost]

Oh i realized i didn’t answer...

Thanks again, I still have to go through th whole thing, I'm sure I'll find your post.

 

[nemo_kost]

I have a 2010 white Class 5...

It's really a beauty!

 

[nemo_kost]

Ehi everybody, a little update regarding the C5 used live last saturday.
I was really impressed by this little beast, it could do the job really really well, I did mic it up, but probably I could live without doing it, cause the bar was indeed quite small.
As you can see from the pic, the space was really tight for us too, you can imagine the rest of the room!
I run it on it's own, the 1912 was there just in case, but I didn't use it, volume on 5 was enough for everything I needed to do, I used some boost in front and the guitar volume and tone quite a lot.
Really really impressive little amp, I'm so happy to finally got it!

 

[iron broadsword]

Ehi everybody, a little update regarding the C5 used live last saturday.
I was really impressed by this little beast, it could do the job really really well, I did mic it up, but probably I could live without doing it, cause the bar was indeed quite small.
As you can see from the pic, the space was really tight for us too, you can imagine the rest of the room!
I run it on it's own, the 1912 was there just in case, but I didn't use it, volume on 5 was enough for everything I needed to do, I used some boost in front and the guitar volume and tone quite a lot.
Really really impressive little amp, I'm so happy to finally got it!

View attachment 149011

awesome. this is the kind of gig the class 5 is for