FOR SALE GRANDMEISTER 36 with 7 premium accessories and Free Shipping

I have decided to move on and sell my Grandmeister 36 amp along with all the accessories I had purchased for it, some have not been used yet. In the quest to find "my sound" I found this amp and it opened the doors for me to learn a lot about tubes and how to setup equipment and guitars to get the most of them for your playing style. Coming from almost 30 years of solid state amps and digital multi-fx processors into this amp was night and day difference for me. Yet I found myself looking back to the past and the days of tube amplifiers and analog fx pedals working together. And I had long abandoned using pedals altogether in favor or rack mounted power amps and programmed pre-amp units.

Yet, my quest kept deepening me further into the vintage sounds of Classic and Hard Rock band's live performances the likes of Woodstock, California Jam, and Day on the Green. Yes I went back to my roots. The search led me to brands that were there then, albeit modern renditions of that equipment yet true to their original approach to getting the sound right. I found my tone coming from Orange Amplification, so I bought two all tube heads to use with my Marshall 412 and Blackstar 112 cabs. The pedalboard I've been building for months now from the Behringer PB600 consists strictly of analog pedals mostly made by hand here in the good old USA.

I was attracted to the GM36 for many of its features, namely powerful and loud, the lit up front panel where its shows its insides, and the built-in fx, controllable by software and PCs, 2 features I was accustomed to from my days with racks and patch programming and presets. But  I still wanted a warmer tone with a more simplified setup with less controls needed to get the sound. Orange amps and individual analog pedals made it easy for me to just dial a few knobs and go. I couldn't be happier!

So it leads me to here selling the amp along with all the accessories I got for it listed here, you can look them up and get more details along with their current prices. I am offering free shipping securely packed, I do not have the original box or printed materials, but yes the carry case and power cable. I wish to sell this complete as a package and welcome reasonable offers, you can go to my ebay and reverb listing here so see it, but if someone from this forum makes me a good offer I will accept it. Please no picking or choosing from these items, they must all go. Any offers email me thru this site or @ amalito@planetworking.net.

Visit these links to see pictures of the accessories, the photos are all stock, the amp is in pristine MINT condition, has never been gigged or left smoke free home for rehearsals.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/201712583748?ssPageName=STRK:MESELX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1586.l2649

https://reverb.com/item/3366148-hughes-kettner-grandmeister-36-tube-amp-bundled-with-7-accessories-free-shipping

I am asking $1099.99 for the Hughes & Kettner Grandmeister 36 bundled with these 7 accessories, a total value of $365:

1- NEW Complete spare kit set of JJ Tubes, 7 in all (3x 12AX7 & 4x EL84 specifically picked for this model amp) = value of $105
2- NEW Tech 21 NYC MIDI Mouse 3 button foot controller (alternative to the costly FSM432 MKII MIDI foot switch by H&K) = value of $110
3- NEW Roland UM-One Midi to USB connector = value of $40
4- 1x Hosa Premium 20' MIDI cable for use with the Tech 21 Midi Mouse = value of $10
5- NEW Palmer PCABM Cabinet Combiner (a passive box that allows use of 2 speaker cabinets from the 1 speaker out on amp can be used in Series or Parallel) = value of $50
6- 2x Fender Premium 3' 14AWG Speaker Cables California Series Clear = value of $30
7- 1x LiveWire 20' Instrument Cable Straight to Angled = $20

I thank all on this website for their endless support and invaluable information and suggestions I found extremely useful.

Sorry to see you go from the fold Stargazer.  I don't think you will be the last, in fact I am absolutely certain of it!  

I can sense a wind of change blowing over the site and over H&K in general.  We have been very loyal to the H&K brand, our criticisms have always been positive, and we loved our GMs and probably still do.  But the new GM40 shows they have a mission statement and are not going to be swayed from that by customer feedback when sales are still good.  You will notice that reporting of my own work on dissecting the GM36 has gone quiet.  It is just that I now have a very good view of how this amp does what it does and it's too set in its ways for me to be bothered to fight it to make it do something different.  It's good, well designed and put together, but it is very specifically aimed at one particular sound, just as we've all said before.  It's a high gain metal type amp and it does that brilliantly, but that is all it is.  I could revoice it to my own taste but as someone else here said to me recently, if I can go to a cheaper more basic amp and get exactly the sounds I want out of the box why am I fighting the GM36 to get it to give me that?  Incidentally if there is anything specific anyone would like me to look into in the circuitry modelling, I'm still happy to do that.  I'm curious as to how we could improve things, even outside of my own musical taste.

The frequency responses of the different channels show that they lean further and further towards a lack of depth and weight as the gain goes up both by channel and on the control.  Bass and lower middle are removed in successive stages and upper mid/treble are enhanced.  This is to the extent where I can honestly say that what I see in the plots for the Bass control and what I hear in the higher gain channels are totally different.  On screen the bass control reacts in a perfectly normal fashion, in my ears it is weak and ineffectual.  When you have so little bass within the signal an increase via the control is virtually inaudible in amongst the other overpowering frequencies. (Unless you have ears tuned into high gain sounds where the level of increase is all you would want).

You only have to look at the reviews on YouTube.  I've pointed out before that almost all of them start with a little bit of metal type noodling on the clean channel to show the artistic depth and versatility of the metal player    and immediately jump to all out high gain chugging and shredding on the Lead and Ultra.  And this is usually mixed in amongst a plethora of raspy giggling and a liberal sprinkling of "dood"s and "radical"s amongst the other indecipherable banter. Where is the guitarist just showing the amp's ability to offer a believable rendition of a number in the style of Free/Bad Company or Humble Pie (my own favourite) or The Allman Brothers or thousands of other bands of that era playing through much sweeter equipment?

It is a wonderful Clean amp!  The sound of that channel is immaculate.  After that my own feeling is that it becomes increasingly compromised for many types of music, specifically classic rock originally played on older Marshall/Fender class of gear.  In truth, I have a confession to make.  Last weekend I came across a silly deal on an immaculate Marshall JVM205H and I went out and snapped it up.  So I've been playing through that for a week and I love it.  The JVM does what the H&K doesn't, it offers not a range of voicings but a range of reformatted configurations of a number of valve stages reflecting the changes in Marshall models over the years.  With the exception of the clean channel which switches out one triode, H&K chose mainly to fiddle with the frequency responses and adding in the effects of solid state stages of signal shaping to thier basic valve amplifier.  Marshall chose to remain exclusively valve and just switch in or out various stages to reconfigure the JVM as their original models had been designed.  It produces something much more authentic for my sort of music and it's a breath of fresh air.

I won't be selling my GM36, I still love its programmability which far outstrips the JVM, so I prefer to keep it as a back up amp.  But the TM36 which was my backup is on its way out as its sale will more than fund the JVM, and the GM will not be my first choice of gigging amp from here on in.  They could have sorted this out with the GM40, they have a lot of customer feedback saying the same thing, but as I've said in a thread elsewhere on our site (against the prevailing thought) they backed off and stayed true to their original mission.  (They are German after all! )

I hope you can pass on your treasured little beast and its associated gear to a good home where it will fit the bill.  Come on guys, those of you who love this amp for your metal work, tell your friends and see if we can rustle up a buyer for Stargazer.

Bordonbert, thanks for plugging. I think the amp is a phenomenal piece of engineering, there are so many features besides the great lit up looks, the smart rotary dials, the onboard FX, 4 channels, incredibly loud for performance, programmable and inter-connectivity, what's not to love? You have delved into it with tenacious details gaining extremely helpful hints and overall know-how on this amp. If I kept it for the rest of my guitar playing days, I don't think I would have exploited all this amp has to offer. Its just that I warped out and took a time travel trip (all pun intended) back to my roots and wanted to get back those vintage tones that got me to pick up the guitar in the first place. Plus I wanted a more simplified rig, I left all that solid state, digital rack stuff, and multi-fx processing behind for the warmth of tubes (and that mild scent of hot tubes emanating from a metal enclosure). I would say this amp got me to appreciate a lot that I never would have looked into originally, and I am grateful for that.

I got myself 2 Orange amps; small, loud monsters with simple EQ, just dial what you want and go. Paired up with my Marshall 412 and Blackstar cabs they are true to the vintage tones. My FX has moved from rack mounted, to on board within the amp, to the floor; a pedalboard I have been buying and building for months now consisting of 13 independent analog effect pedals, half of which are hand built here in the USA. I guess you can say I have gone full circle! But there are still plenty of areas in music of all types where the GM36 and its new successor the GM40 are extremely useful and enjoyable. I only hope I can sell mine to someone that will get as much pleasure from it as I did the little time I've owned it.

I wanted to check in and let you all know that my GM36 sold but I still have a lot of accessories that can be of value to anyone here. I would like to sell them off complete and not as individual sale.

What I have left for a total of $175 (FREE SHIPPING):
1- NEW Complete spare kit set of JJ Tubes, 7 in all (3x 12AX7 & 4x EL84 specifically picked for this model amp) = value of $105
2- NEW Roland UM-One Midi to USB connector = value of $40
3- NEW Palmer PCABM Cabinet Combiner (a passive box that allows the use of 2 speaker cabinets to be used in Series or Parallel from an amp with only 1 speaker output) = value of $50
4- 1x Hosa 20' Premium MIDI cable = value of $10
5- 2x Fender Premium 3' 14AWG Speaker Cables California Series Clear = value of $30
6- 1x LiveWire 15' Premium Instrument Cable Straight to Angled = $20 (I have so many more guitar cables)

All these items are essentially new, never leaving a clean smoke free home and never gigged with. Some still have original packaging. Anyone interested, please email me. We can handle the transaction thru paypal and I will ship securely packed immediately after payment clears. Thanks to all.

Interesting summary Stargazer. I've just gone the same way, GM36 sold and I have to say there was a lot of interest.

In the end it became surplus to requirements, but while I thought the concept of the whole thing was brilliant, I longed for Marshall to have made this and had their clean, crunch, lead and ultra equivalents. It's back to the rack with the JMP1, 20/20 power amp plus fx.

Over and out,.

Auf Wiedersehen H&K, hello Milton Keynes!

Interesting summary Stapletongas, there seems to be a growing movement with exactly the same feeling.  The classic guys are wanting their smoother or deeper throatier sounds and H&K haven't come up with them in either this or the new baby.  I have both a '69 Marshall Super Lead 100 and a JVM205H now as well as the GM36 and both are so much better tonally.  Of course the GM bounces all over them operationally!  The JVM gives me control over which of the 2 channels and which of their 3 voices each I select, the Reverb on either of the two channels which is its only effect, and which of 2 Master Volume controls I put the channel through.  It gives me some control but nowhere near the H&K concept.  But the tone....  It's to die for and makes the GM sound raspy thin sharp and spikey on Ultra and to a degree on Lead too.  I still maintain that for me H&K is a metal dream but a bit of a classic rock let down.

Sorry to see you go guys but I at least understand fully, pop back and see us now and again.

All that remains of the accessories I had with my GM36 is new complete set in their original packages of JJ Tubes refit kit consisting of 3x 12Ax7/ECC83 (1 balanced triode) & 4x EL84, I paid around $105 on amazon when I still had the amp. Asking $75 with free shipping, if anyone is interested please contact me. Thanks.