Marshall 5002 Time Modulator

Posted: Fri May 23, 2008 4:10 pm

These things look awesome. Has anyone ever used one?

http://studioelectronics.biz/sunshop/index.php?l=product_detail&p=2

What do you guys think?

Posted: Wed Jun 11, 2008 11:18 pm

Hi, I've owned but not thoroughly used both the 5002 and 5402.

Stevie is said to have used it on Secret Life for -all- of the vocal harmonization. I can't confirm that. It's said to have been accomplished by using the deep notch in the marshall (high feedback) to cancel the fundamental of the voice and to use the CV ins to play the harmony on a synth keyboard- effectively moving the harmonics by shifting the comb around.

The Marshall has something like an 80dB deep notch, which if true, is extraordinary. There are three DBX boards in it with discrete VCAs, the same boards used in the early Eventide harmonizers, Instant series effects, etc. I'd once talked with Steven and he said that he'd had custom transistors made for the expo pair; I don't know if it's true or not.

Here is a pic as I have a few of these boards from an Eventide:

http://i6.photobucket.com/albums/y222/mpeake/sale/DBX.jpg

They are very high quality effects with wide bandwidth, supposedly 15KHz at any delay time. The LFO has the slows down/speeds up character of the MXR "117" flanger. The feedback can kill speakers if you're not careful. It can slam on and oof! They are quite likely the finest-sounding flangers ever produced. I have owned many models excepting some of the Roland "JET" types and the Marshall has "IT".

The 5402 didn't seem to flange quite as nicely as the 5002. The 5402 does have a very clean delay out to what, 400ms with 15KHz bandwidth? The problem is that the static and fixed delay lines aren't series, they're parallel, and you get flutters when mixing in the fixed delay. This is too bad as a pair of 400ms delays in series would have sounded killer.

The two delays in the 5002 seem to have different feedback phases. It's an impression and I haven't confirmed it.

There are different versions of the same model, IIRC with a green paint dab showing the presence of a mod, using improved opamps etc. I forget the exact change in the noise floor from this mod, but it wasn't tiny.

I have a 5002 with a dead static delay and didn't know both that Steven had passed away, or that these were going for such money these days.

I hope that helps.

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