

Soldano Hot Rod 100 Plus
Soldano Hot Rod 100 Plus


Soldano Hot Rod 100 Plus rear
Rear panel and FX loop


Soldano Hot Rod 100 Plus - output transformer
Mercury Magnetics output transformer



Soldano Hot Rod 100 Plus - chassis


Soldano Hot Rod 100 Plus - rear view
Rear view


Soldano Hot Rod 100 Plus - Sovtek 5881 tubes
Sovtek 5881 tubes


Soldano Hot Rod 100 Plus - circuit board
Circuit board


Soldano Hot Rod 100 Plus - XL mod
XL mod


Soldano Hot Rod 100 Plus
Soldano Hot Rod 100 Plus – Revised cosmetics and Depth control



8 thoughts on “REVIEW – SOLDANO HOT ROD 100 PLUS

  1. Hi Don,
    Very interesting review. I have used Koch amps for a very long time but i recently bought a five year old HR50+. In find it hard to get the right sound (using a prs). What are your settings?
    Musical regards, Gerwin (Holland)


    1. Eventually I took the XL mod out. Then I found it easy to get the right sound with everything at 6! I could crank Bass to 10 if I wanted and no flub. Gain at 6 too, it gets flubby if you any higher – I’d use a boost instead for metal. With Gain at 6 I could get the perfect SRV sound when switching back to the Normal channel. Great amp 🙂


  2. Hello there. I would like to move the loop. Of my hot rod 50 after the master volume. My delay just sounds drowned in it. It just sucks, it’s a strymon and its. Not using its full potential.

    I took it to a local tech,he did it and added a second master level as he installed a preamp and a new valve to amplify the fx loop but I do need. To. Find the right mix for master volume of the amp and the second one. Is there a easier way to do this? Where can I find the shcmeaics for this mod? Thanks a lot.


  3. I recently acquired a late 90’s Hot Rod 100+. I have been a JCM800 user for years, and thought I was done searching amps. Mine is a 1982 2204, and it has a tone that is amazing.But I saw the Soldano used for a decent price, and went ahead and gave it a shot, simply because of Soldano’s reputation of excellence. I am NOT disappointed! It is a wonderful amp, with a high gain tone that is crisp, harmonically rich, not fuzzy at all, string definition is great, and it has the immediate attack like my JCM800. Another winning factor is that the amplifier is a completely different animal than my JCM800, so I did not buy a redundant amplifier. It IS kind of like a JCM800 with a Tube Screamer or Klon in front, but still has a different harmonic structure. I feel guilty lately, because my JCM800 has been collecting dust on the tubes, due to my choosing the Hot Rod 100+ over the JCM800. I love this amp.

    Liked by 1 person

  4. Ah you got to also point this.

    The single channel hot rods which were then named avengers are different to the hot rod + which follow the SLO preamp.

    Not wildly different, But different enough to have a less compressed and less smoothed out tone and less gain.

    First of all a tube is missing and with the rest of them only a distortion channel is realized and on the versions with no loop, half a tube was unused. In the versions with a loop the half tube became another gain stage (so different yet again) and fed the loop with a way that it was lower signal (but still not so pedal friendly) and high impedance (so hi end processors needed a buffer, what the missing tube does). No biggie as the loop still plays great with any effect with hi impedance and won’t overdrive it like the normal loop but you lose gain and compression vs the SLO and you have a bit less raw vs the hot rod no loop version.

    Then the power has a bit less filtration but this is not a bad thing I think…

    Another key difference is no vactrols. Meaning no switching system. The SLO clean/crunch channel bleeds into the lead all the time. It is drowned out the higher you play the amp (gain and volume) but it is there somewhat. Plus vactrols suck but mike won’t do relays to not lose mojo and the original design or whatever and this is not a bad thing again.

    Also two other companies made transformers for the non SLO amps. All good by the way.

    A hot rod 100+ can come very very close to the SLO and practically (for me) what is left to be different is the layout, super hum of the SLO and different transformers. Which on their own are reasons enough to hear differences. However not always in favor of the SLO.

    And military pots suck. They are sealed and when they start getting rusty and old you can’t do anything but change them. See what randall aiken says on the matter, I think he is right!!!


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