History
I received the amp chassis and electronics from my late brother-in-law, Phil, back in the mid-1990's. I have no idea where he got it. All it had was the chassis, faceplate, circuit board with electronics, and knobs. No tubes, cabinet, speaker, etc. At the time, I built a decent cabinet (it's lasted this long), hung a 12" Peavy speaker off of it, plugged in some tubes, and off I went. Unfortunately, as the amp warmed up, there was a low hum, and the gain dropped way down, to the point where it couldn't really be played. It sat under the stairs up until October, when I was discussing with my train buddy, Simon, that I had this amp, and it was not in the best shape. He asked if I knew what the amp was worth, and I said I didn't know. He suggested, behind that sheepish grin, looking up some auctions for the same amp on eBay, and let him know what I found out. He also suggested a cap job. So yeah, looked it up and I know what I've got sitting here, now. Did the cap job back in October, and the difference was amazing. It sounds so beautiful, that I got bit by the bug, and now I have to restore it. So this is just a short page describing the journey from coal to diamond.
Issues identified:
- cabinet is missing
- speaker is missing
- capacitors are not functioning
- knobs are chewed up
- faceplate has silver paint overspray
- footswitch is missing
- reverb tank is misisng
- No tubes
- One resistor is out of spec
- power cord is missing
Starting Point (~1994)
Ths is what I received. I am pretty sure all of the internal parts are original, possibly with the exception of the bright blue capactor on the right 1/3 of the circuit board. Look close on the left side of the faceplate, and you can see the silver overspray on the plate and on some of the knobs where some previous owner likely tried to spray the gill cloth silver (*sigh*).
Cabinet #1 (~1995)
So here's the cabinet I built in the mid 90s. It's a basic pine box with 3/8" ply front and back, covered with vinyl, and chorome corners. It doesn't look great, but it was better than nothing, and it is really solid - no wobbling, squeaks, or anything after roughly 20 years.
Capacitor Repair (2015)
After opening the cover, it was clear that this thing still had the original capacitors. So, I ordered a kit online (ran about $25 as I recall), and swapped them out. This made a world of difference in the sound, and stability over time. The circuit board is not shown, but I replaced a number of capacitors there, also.
Dating the Amp
One of the objectives of the restoration is to try to get the amp back in its original state (within reason). So before I go further with purchasing replacement parts, it's probably a good time to try to date the amp. The definitive answer is not available, as the original cabinet is missing, and along with it, the label on the inside with the manufacture date. No numbers on the chassis are of any help either. I'm confident it's from the 60s, as it's a blackface, had the cardboard circuitboard, and contains the blue capacitors that were used by Fender before CBS purchased the company. The next attempt was to look at images of similar (and dated) amps on the Internet, which gets me as close as 1965 - 1968. Then, I started looking at actual components. It turns out, many electronic components are stamped with a code that is defined by the EIA, and contains date information. One of the transformers came back with a manufacture date of 1967. Looking at the aging of the parts, it did not seem to be a later replacement, which would put the amp in 1967 or 1968. Since silverfaces emerged in 1968, I'll be going with the 1967 date.
Cabinet #2 (2016)
My awesome wife hooked me up with a Mojotone cabinet that I used to replace the old homebrew cabinet. The folks at Mojotone put a good deal of work into making this right. The tolex is perfect - no bumps, folds, etc., and the head fits into the opening perfectly. It came without straps to mount the chassis, so that's next on the list. I cleaned up the worst of the silver paint on the blackface plate. I used a Magic sponge from Arm & Hammer - it took the spray off without damaging the paint.
Adornments (2016)
In order to cart the amp around and play it, I needed to mount the chassis. You can see the mounting straps on the top. I also decided to pick up a period logo and fix to the grill. Finally, I did some rewiring of the input power to ground the chassis properly.
Other Posts in this series: PART 2 ~ PART 3.
