Soul Tramp
Member
A few years ago my brother-in-law gave me his beat-to-crap 66-J that had been in storage for 30(ish) years. The trem circuit never worked and when the amp completely died he packed it away with other gear he had in storage, never to see it again until he moved 30 years later. He was going to throw it out, but I claimed it. The speaker was completely trashed, the amp was dead, dead, dead, and looking like it was stored in a barn. The good thing about the amp is that it had never been touched by a tech and still had all the factory components.
I tore the amp apart, deep cleaned the guts, fixed all the cold solder joints, replaced bad components, and had Weber re-cone the factory speaker. I went to extremes to keep the amp looking factory original on the inside by re-stuffing the failed caps with new components. It's not that difficult to do with the electrolytics, but the Sangamo coupling caps were an absolute nightmare. The speaker basket had quite a bit of rust, so after stripping it apart I sanded and painted the basket but I masked of the all the factory numbers and markings. The color was an almost perfect match making it difficult to tell it was painted.
I had no plans for the amp and didn't really know what to do with it. So tonight, much to my brother-in-law's surprise, I gifted it back to him. He was beyond surprised. He never imagined seeing the amp again, and certainly not working better than at any point he'd owned it.
So here's a guy who has many guitars and amps (some of serious value), smiling 30+ years later....
I tore the amp apart, deep cleaned the guts, fixed all the cold solder joints, replaced bad components, and had Weber re-cone the factory speaker. I went to extremes to keep the amp looking factory original on the inside by re-stuffing the failed caps with new components. It's not that difficult to do with the electrolytics, but the Sangamo coupling caps were an absolute nightmare. The speaker basket had quite a bit of rust, so after stripping it apart I sanded and painted the basket but I masked of the all the factory numbers and markings. The color was an almost perfect match making it difficult to tell it was painted.
I had no plans for the amp and didn't really know what to do with it. So tonight, much to my brother-in-law's surprise, I gifted it back to him. He was beyond surprised. He never imagined seeing the amp again, and certainly not working better than at any point he'd owned it.
So here's a guy who has many guitars and amps (some of serious value), smiling 30+ years later....
