Traynor YCV40

This is an amp on which using the tone controls actually makes a big difference. You can actually get different tones by manipulating the bass, mid, treble, etc. That is not always the case, even with more expensive amps.

Great clean tone and great distortion. This amp has a great crunch to it. It's not a fuzzy distortion, but a true gain. People knock the stock Sovtek tubes, which kind of suprises me. Don't let that turn you off. They sound pretty damn good in my honest opinion. Only the most insane tone-o-philes would feel the need to replace them. I might do it at some point just because I'm curious to see how much better it can sound.

So far so good.

No problems with the amp so I haven't had to contact them.

This amp is the bomb! I've owned several Marshalls and Fenders over the years and have never felt like I've been able to get everything I wanted out of them. This amp does it all, giving you the best of both worlds. Nothing comes close to this amp in the price range. Period.

Purchased in 2004. I think it is that year's model. A tube amp, it is versatile and in fact perfect for my needs as a (non-gigging) musician. My playing style is a mix of blues, attempts at jazz, and Indian classical music in the northern (Hindustani) tradition, as I am also a beginning/intermediate student of the sitar. The amp has also delivered on the promise that it is "quiet" with a regulated power supply --an important consideration if you live with old-home electrical wiring and nearby sources of interference.

Two channels. The clean channel is very impressive, and the overdrive channel is also becoming more interesting as I learn to tweak it for the sweet spot, though for some reason it lacks the treble reach of the clean channel. Amp has channel switching by way of footswitch (supplied). Ditto effects loop. No headphone jack.
This amp has plenty of juice, and I will soon purchase an extension cab for fuller sound.

I wish it had a master volume, which I understand Traynor's new 50-watt "blue" amp comes with.

Sounds:

Getting a desirable sound from an amp obviously involves being able to ferret out its nuances. With this amp I have little need for extra gadgets. My Marshall Chorus pedal, perhaps a high-quality Delay pedal, those are the basic tools.

My one and only criticism is the slight rattling probably caused by the spring reverb.

As I treat amp and guitars with care (I used to smash cheap ukeleles as part of my high school era stage act), I can only guess that the Traynor is reliable. It does have a great two-year warranty.

My one question, concerning suitable extension cabs, got answered promptly and courteously by Mike H. Thus, stellar customer service so far.

I've been playing for 30 years but only four years ago bought my first electric guitar, a Guild Starfire IV. Since then a couple of Japanese-made Fenders and a Gibson Les Paul have been added. My sitar and my sarode (the world's most underrated instrument, in my view, with a killer bluesy sound even if you can't reach Ali Akbar Khan's stratospheric playing) hail from Calcutta, India.

I really like this amp. Can one retrofit a master volume to replace that dubious presence control?

All the features have been displayed prior to this, so I'm not going to repeat.

My main guitar is a USA Hamer Studio. To me, the stock amp sounded too bright... could be the JB and '59 Duncan pickups on my guitar, I'm not sure. I swapped stock tubes with a set of Blues tubes from Eurotube. Made a small difference. Smoothed the distortion channel a bit. Then changed the speaker to an Alltone 1250. Better tone and more noticeable than a tube change. Then upgraded that speaker to a Weber ceramic. That made a huge difference! I think the speaker upgrade will yeild much more noticeable tone than any tube change. Just my opinion. I still don't really like the overdrive channel all that much. A bit too harsh for my taste. Depends on what I'm doing in there. The clean channel sounds very good. If you can crank up the clean channel to just right around the break up point, that is where this amp really sounds amazingly awesome! You can then control some loudness with the guitar volume. The Traynor folks tell me that this amp is designed to sound its best at "stage volumes".

Seems well built, but I'm very easy on amps. Don't take them out much, just play at home most of the time at various loudnesses. I'm probably not going to knock anything loose by moving it around, as it sits in my music room most of the time. So, being as I do play at various volume levels, we'll see how well it holds up with playing vibrations.

Before buying this amp, I had literally months of conversations with several folks that were either dealers or employees. All were very professional, informative, and knew their products quite well. And they were patient with me, as I did pry for lots of info about these amps. If I have a serious problem, I'm hoping they are still nice guys. So far, so good.

Been playing many years, non-pro, mostly blues and classic rock stuff. Been doing a bit church music for a couple of years... some cool, fun chords! Just for fun stuff with a bunch of house parties and studio parties and gigs. Some recording. Been through many guitars and tons of amps. I change amps quite often just because I like a bunch of them. If I had some sayso in how to improve it, I'd like the boost to have a volume control. Also, if Traynor would put an excellent (Weber) speaker in as stock, most folks would not be changing tubes and speakers. But, for the price, a good amp. Best advice is to change the speaker first, if you still are not satisfied, then try the tubes. All my ratings are conservative.

It rocks

I bought it for practicing heavy metal at home. It is so loud that my balls ache when I turn it up. Anything over a 1 or 2 on the volume knobs will have people telling you it is loud. I play a Jackson Kelly mostly. I can make my balls ache it gets so loud in a home practice situation. I live in the country so I can jam with it full out. This amp thrives on running it balls to the wall. I like to get crazy loud with this amp, as it sounds in another league compared to solid states amps when you overdrive them.

I can't break the thing, and I turn it way up and distort it heavily for hours a day.

I think I may be getting a hearing problem, but I can now identify with Pete Townshend because when your amp sounds this good you don't want to turn it down. It is louder than 100 watt solid state amps I have owned, and sounds mucho better.

Well, this is known by now, clean channel with it's own EQ and a brightness switch, lead channel with it's own EQ and a boost switch, 40 watts, Celestion Seventy 80 speaker, FX loop which can also be used as a power amp in (return) or preamp out (send). Footswitch included that controls clean/lead channel selection as well as the boost switch. I just wish the second button controls the brightness switch on the clean channel like the YCV20. A detail, really. You can't get more versatile than this.

This amp sounds awesome. I used it with two different guitars equiped with many different pickups (SD 59s, DMZ Super Distoriton, Fred), namely an Ibanez SZ720 and my current Dean Cadillac Select with stock pickups. It sounds really awesome!

Clean channel : Excellent, compared it in the store with solid states and a Crate 50 tube amp and it blew them all out of the water. It's not as good as Fender clean but close enough unless you only play clean and precisely look for the Fender tone.

Lead channel: Now here you can get any type of crunch from mild bluesy breakup to really hard rock (think AC/DC, old Kiss and Aerosmith, Led Zep) to a T. If you want to go into metal territory, you simply have to hook your favorite booster to it (Boss SD-1, any flavour of tubescreamer, Rat, etc.). Even an OD-3 and a DOD-250 can give you good metal sound with it.

So basically, what I mean is that you don't need a MT-2 to play metal with this amp unless you go to extremes. If you're into Pantera or Slayer, I doubt you're actually reading this anyway.

Finally, I don't care too much for the boost switch. A little too muddy/farty for my taste. You're better off with a good overdrive pedal if you want to go beyond the lead channel.

It is a loud 40 watter that you used at 1 or 2 at home when you're alone and at 0,75 when someone's around. A little lound for a home use amp, but the 6L6 tube sound so much better than the EL84 that I prefered it to the YCV20. Besides, you never know when you'll need more power.

I will change the tubes for JJs soon, but I don't know about the speaker. It's loud enough for home use already, and the Seventy 80 is recognized as a good speaker in the generic market. I just think it lacks bass a little.

Bought it used and had it for 4 months, so I can't tell, but it's seems to be built like Fat Bertha.

Never dealt with them, but the warranty is amazing.

I've been playing for 23 years (eeeek!). I've been playing more seriously and regularily than ever before for 3 years now. I've own or rented many amps before this one, namely: Roland Cube 20, Peavey Special 130, Roland Cube 30, Peavey Bandit II, Marshall MDX50, Fender Deluxe 90, Tech 21 Trademark 10, Traynor YCV20, Roland Cube 60. In this exact order. So I've been a long way. At 450$ used, my YCV40 was a steal, because it is in perfect condition. After renting the YCV20 for a month, I concluded that I didn't like EL84 tube amps, so that excluded a lot of amps under $1,000. I would buy another one in a heartbeat, brand new if I have to. This is the best sounding distoriton I ever heard in a tube combo bar none in this price range. I hate to give all tens, but within its category and several others higher priced, you simply can't beat the YCV40.

Believe amp was made in 2004. Is a two channel amp, one clean one, one lead with a boost, clean channel has brightness switch too. Has EQ for each channel which is nice and they are useable unlike some amps. There is also a prescence knob, has nice reverb, effects loop, ext. speaker jack. only bad thing no headphone jack, but not that big of a deal.

This is the first time I have written a review here but felt the need to. I must say this is the best amp out there for the money, but you must swap out tubes with jj's ecc83s's for preamps and two JJ 6L6 for power will only set you back about 50 bucks through eurotubes. But believe me when you slap those babies in let em warm up you will be truly amazed! This amp blows away many boutique amps that i have heard, and cost twice as much. The clean channel is so crisp and chimey it's amazing, and the dirty channel just rocks so solidly you won't believe your ears! I still have the stock speaker in it a Celestion 70/80 which is nice for what I play has a nice chimey sound on cleans and dirty sound is crisp as well. But if you want to upgrade speaker i'm sure this baby would drip with tones that will never make you want to quit playing through it, I haven't put my guitar down for three days, i've just been in amp heaven!

Haven't had to deal with them yet but they have an excellent reputation for service, and the amp is solidly built, makes Fender Hot Rod look cheap by comparison, and sounds sooooo much better too.
Has grill in front of speaker too to protect it which is a nice feature. Easy to get at tubes too if you want to retube.

Like I said Yorkville/Traynor has excellent reputation for prompt, friendly service. Also comes with great warranty

I play a modded American Tele with Seymour Duncan Hot pup in neck, and Fralin Blues Special in bridge with four way switch and this amp makes my Tele come alive in all positions! It really is just amazing. I also own Washburn OE-30 which i love and is only $149.00 at Musicians Friend what a buy! and it sounds great too, but not as good as my tele, this amp really sings with single coils. I A'B'd this amp to Fender Hot Rod series and in my opinion there is no comparison. It is built much better, sounds better in both clean and dirty channels. And that's just with stock tubes and speaker. Once you upgrade tubes and speaker you will be amazed at the sound of this amp. If it were lost or stolen i would fall into a great depression till I bought another one! If you don't buy one of these you will regret it believe me. Great amp Traynor! keep up the good work.

Made in 2003, pretty versatile since I usually stay within the blues/rock/pop/country zone. Note - this is not the amp for you if you are shredding a thousand notes a minute with a heavily distorted 7-string. 2 channels, eq on both(!), the accutronics spring reverb sounds good to me - much better than the verb on my 4x10 Hot Rod Deville. Oh, and on that note, while the Fender sort of barks (ceramic speakers) the Celestions in this Traynor are smooth and sweet like buttah. Power-wise, I'm totally pleased. I've never had a 40W amp sound this loud and punchy. The master presence knob is a nice touch, as is the footswitchable boost, although it only works on the dirty channel. For that, and since it's clearly not a metal amp, we go with a 9 here.

Probably the quietest amp in terms of noise floor I've heard in its class. Playing it with a 1999 American Deluxe Strat (modified with a Dimarzio Air Zone in the bridge position) and a 2000 Mexican Tele with Rio Grandes. The Tele sounds great rockin', poppin', or doing the texas-twang sort of thing. The Strat sounds excellent doing anything. I even use my acoustics (Yamaha and Breedlove) through this thing. The clean channel dirties up just a bit (and nicely so, not a buzzy clipping) when you move the gain past 4 or 5 but that's so loud I'm almost never up there. Dirty channel is nice but gets a bit muddy in the upper pre gain settings. That's okay for me, I'm not looking for super saturated sound from the amp, anyway. I could find a vintage Plexi and spend a couple of thousand (if I'm lucky) and get that, but for me, a Rat, a Jekyll and Hyde, a Compressor and this amp are all I need for seven cascading stages of dirt (on up into the metallic spheres).

Gigged with it, moved with it twice, and it's taking what I'm giving. I do baby my stuff a lot, so others who aren't careful may have issues...but you gotta baby tube equipment anyway, and when it sounds like this amp does, I want it to last forever. I have another amp at home (Hot Rod Deville) that is way too heavy and doesn't sound nearly as good - and I don't bother to bring it to gigs as a backup.

Warranty is pretty much bumper-to-bumper, which is nice, and also transferrable, although it's only a two-year job. I'm giving no opinion here, since I've never had to deal with Traynor staff, but I do like the idea that they'll repair or replace it if YOU break the damn thing.

Playing 26 years, semi-professional. Have owned Marshalls, newer Fenders, vintage Fenders, JC-120s, old Randalls, Music Mans, and a laundry list of crap I wouldn't wish on Ashlee Simpson. IF THIS AMP WERE LOST OR STOLEN I'D RUSH TO THE NEAREST DEALER AND BUY ANOTHER THE SAME DAY. I compared this to the Devilles, the Crate tube series (which sounded horrible) and a number of boutique amps over a month or so, all of which were either sorely lacking in sweet juicy tone, or grossly overpriced in comparison. Other than the boost only working on the overdrive channel, I just can't find anything wrong with this amp. It is definitely, in 26 years, my favorite amp overall that I've had, including the '66 Super Reverb. If you're looking for kick-ass swamp boogie snarl, or warm, juicy, tubey-smooth vibe, it's definitely all here.

Brand new. 40 watt tube combo with 2 channels, bass, mid, treble, brightness switch, presence, reverb, channel switching pedal, etc.

My guitars are a Fender Strat Ultra and a new Korean made Lite Ash Telecaster. I play country (mostly Brad Paisley), blues, and rock of all types. This amp is amazing right out of the box, seriously. I bought it new from musician's friend a couple days ago, never hearing it and trusting the reviews on here that I would be happy with it. Thank you all so much, this is the best amp I've ever had and I've spent a lot of money over the years trying to find that tone and it's truly here in this amp. If I swap tubes like most reviewers say to do, I cannot imagine it being any better than it is stock, but I'll get some good JJ's and see what happens. I need backup tubes anyway.

The clean channel - It sounds like a Fender on steroids, just silly amazing. I don't use the brightness switch because it adds too much highs. The eq knobs are at noon, presence on 3 o'oclock, reverb at noon. I use an MXR super comp inline and it really adds the compression and balance needed to get the snappy country tone I like. I could go on and on about it, very addictive amp that makes you want to just keep playing.

The dirty channel (without boost) - Very useable for most basic rock and blues tones (SRV, Mellencamp, GA Satellites).

The dirty channel (with boost) - Kicks in extra gain and some volume. This is where you get into the ac/dc tones. Very nice smooth overdrive sound, not brutal distortion which I'm glad for.

I really have no idea. When I was ready to purchase a new amp, Traynor was not on my list because I'm just not familiar with them. Again, thanks to all the reviewers for posting high marks on this amp because that's what made me choose it. I hope it lasts until I'm so old I can't even pick up a guitar. I'm not worried though, it's very well built and solid. Tubes are the main issue for reliability anyway, so I'll carry some extras.

Never dealt with them, hope I don't ever have to because that would mean there is a problem and I don't like problems.

Easily, I give this amp a thumbs up for every reason. It's designed and built well, sounds perfect for my needs, and lightweight for what it is. If you plan on spending $600+ for an amp, go buy this one. Wow, to think of all the money I've put into amps, effects, and other miscellaneous gear over the years, it makes me sick. But I'm still smiling because my new tone monster is waiting for me at home and I'm gonna plug in as soon as the work day is over.

2 Channel, 1 clean, 1 overdrive - very basic AMP with the usual Bass, Mids, Treble, Presence and Reverb.

Great Sounding AMP. I was in the market for a Tube AMP in January 04. I bought a Peavey XXX because I didn't know anything about Traynor AMPS and Peavey was a reliable name. What a mistake, the Peavey has been in the shop and they can't pin down my troubles. I bought the Traynor due to desperation as a backup. Now it's my Main AMP. I'm gonna dump the Peavey XXX and by the 2/12 YCV80. This AMP is great. Plenty load, all kinds of tone.

Don't know, have only had it a few weeks. I can only hope it hold up better than the Peavey.

2 Year transferable Warranty - Unlike Peavey - 5 Years, but your stuck with the AMP.

Great Price - I was actually looking for a used AMP in this price range and end up buy new. Try finding a Marshall 112 tube amp for 500 bucks!

It's a real amp, not a box full of digital effects.

No kidding, this is a production amp at a decent price that beats some boutique amps at their own game. I guess Peter Traynor is still a great amp designer. I heard he died, but if this is his swan song, he went out in a big way and his last amp will make his justifiably famous in the amp world among real amp connoisseurs. Unless you have twice the money to spend, you really aren't going to beat this amp.

It's built a lot better than a lot of the production amps of today that are just crap in a black vinyl wrapper.

I needed a schematic and some advice, and I got them right on the spot. Schematics are on the website, and a real person answers the phone without punching in a lot of numbers.

Save a dollar a day for the next year and you can get a really clean used one like I did, plus have $15 left over for a case of beer to celebrate. You WILL celebrate. Man, this is a great sounding amp. I'm going to do some tube swapping when I get a bunch of tubes together, but for right now I am just letting the sound wash over me. It has been played with lots of different guitars, and they all sound good through this amp. Right now I'm mostly using an ES-335 and getting warm tones, but it also sparkles with my Ricky. It has plenty of bottom end for the ES-335. Its a 10 for the price when teamed with an ES-335. The Les Paul crowd may want something a bit more Marshally, and the Tele and Strat crowd may want something more Fendery, but this amp rocks if you want that semi-hollow gutteral growl from your semi-hollow axe.