RickV
Junior Member
Got it from a guy that had it in storage (garage) for at least 10-12 years. The baffle had been hacked from a 2x10 to a 1x15. No grill or logo. Original OT was replaced with a 1962 Fisher 800B trannie. Missing a couple tubes. Cabinet is solid and fairly clean for its age. Power cord had been replaced with a 3 prong. I replaced the missing tubes, made a 2x10 baffle loaded with two Weber smooth cone Sig10 ceramics, covered with silver cloth (Fender clone) and fired it up. I could only get a faint signal when in the standby position only. Took it to one of the better techs in Dallas. He said the trannie was the wrong type (ultra-liniar?) and wasn't even wired up correctly. The power tubes didn't look too healthy. He replaced the OT with MM trannie. New EH 7591 tubes. Replaced missing plate resistor on preamp and replaced the cathode resistor and cap on the power amp. Cleaned the pots and checked the bias (cathode biased). The verb is OK, but I think the tube may be tired (microphonic). The trem isn't working, but I may need a footswitch to turn on.
The amp sounds really good, especially with single coils (G&L S-500 and a couple of P90 loaded guitars). The tone controls seem to be somewhat interactive, kind of like the Fender tweed circuits. The Webers actually sound really good with this amp. Lots of punch and crunch at higher volumes. I'm surprised how loud this thing gets. I think I read somewhere that these were rated at either 50 or 60 watts. I wonder if two 7195's are really capable of that output. I'm guessing it puts out more like 25-30 watts.
Got one problem. The tech informed me of this before I picked it up. The amp sounds really good, but when cranked all the way up with humbuckers, it tends to distort in a not so pleasant way. Doesn't seem to do it with single coils. The distortion is hard to explain, but more like a clipping from signal overload. I haven't tried any pedals though it, yet. My LP has Classic 57's and are set on the low side for lower output. I get the same clipping with that that the tech got. Doesn't seem to be quite as bad if I trim the tone knobs back a tad. The tech said he tried several different OT's to see if that had an effect, but didn't make any difference. He thought it might have something to do with the power supply design, as he couldn't find anything wrong with components or wiring. Any ideas? Not that big a deal, as I don't see a need to crank it to 10 (8 will be plenty for me).
This is a very cool amp. Can't wait to gig with it. It's so funky looking, it's kind of cool.
RickV
The amp sounds really good, especially with single coils (G&L S-500 and a couple of P90 loaded guitars). The tone controls seem to be somewhat interactive, kind of like the Fender tweed circuits. The Webers actually sound really good with this amp. Lots of punch and crunch at higher volumes. I'm surprised how loud this thing gets. I think I read somewhere that these were rated at either 50 or 60 watts. I wonder if two 7195's are really capable of that output. I'm guessing it puts out more like 25-30 watts.
Got one problem. The tech informed me of this before I picked it up. The amp sounds really good, but when cranked all the way up with humbuckers, it tends to distort in a not so pleasant way. Doesn't seem to do it with single coils. The distortion is hard to explain, but more like a clipping from signal overload. I haven't tried any pedals though it, yet. My LP has Classic 57's and are set on the low side for lower output. I get the same clipping with that that the tech got. Doesn't seem to be quite as bad if I trim the tone knobs back a tad. The tech said he tried several different OT's to see if that had an effect, but didn't make any difference. He thought it might have something to do with the power supply design, as he couldn't find anything wrong with components or wiring. Any ideas? Not that big a deal, as I don't see a need to crank it to 10 (8 will be plenty for me).
This is a very cool amp. Can't wait to gig with it. It's so funky looking, it's kind of cool.
RickV