Classic Bass Amps…
Hi Today Gents:
I reluctantly returned the Ibanez Ewb Series Acoustic Bass I’m in the process of acquiring…
It was so tough to return it and walk away from the music shop without it…
sighThe instrument is fine…
except the preamp in it is the earlier version SST electronics…
The latest version Fishman SRTc Preamp is all the rage now…
SO…
I am on the quest for an Ibanez 4-or5 string version Acoustic Bass with the latest version Fishman electrics…
However, they are not available just yet…
SsOo…
Today was Classic Bass Amp Saturday,
Restore Day…
Last weekend
Bob (the owner) of these amps and I made up a parts list and during the week he rounded up the parts for the Big Project…
We checked the areas of both amps the need attention and went right to work on them…
In the time he took to take the photos we did the amps and had them back up and running…
These are beautiful amps…
The nullFender Bassman 135 Amp was the first one to come off the bench…
Then the Sunn Senora Bass Amp was set up and run…
However, it still blows fuses whenever the standby switch is turned off…
We’ll need to spend some more time to figure out why…
This Ibanez Acoustic/Electric Bass was awful tough to leave behind at the music shop… 
Bill…
Go get it back Bill! I bet you can fit the newer elec’s.
Then you could pop over here and do the cap’s on my amp:-)
Hi Tony:
Aren’t those nice amps…
I think so…
That Bassman 135 if it’s the same one…
was used on Chet Atkin’s stage when he was here back in …
I think it was in '80
or ‘81…
We the (Musicstop) used to supply stage gear for concerts…
The guys would come to town with just their instruments…
We would supply the amps and all or their requests…
I remember, replacing the output transformer on that Bassman amp…
There was a bass player, a drummer, and another guitar player on that stage…
I remember retube’ing a Peavey Artist single 12’ combo amp as well…
I don’t seem to remember the other amp we supplied for that stage…
Anyway, I remember being third row “Apex” to the stage, that night…
All the Chet Wanttabeeee’s
were there…
The concert hall sat about 1500…
It was jammed…
Live show…
couldn’t have been better…
Anyway, too many years ago…
BUT…
what a treat it was to work on those amps last saturday…
That Sunn Amp, is beautiful…
However, I’ve not seen a Sunn Amp using EL 34’s…
?
in the final stage…
Any Sunn Amp I’ve seen uses 6550’s/KT 88’s in the final stage…
Bill…
P.S.
Seemes to me…
The bass player that night was Billy Moore…
Could he have been ?
[EDIT] MaN… I gotta go back to work… 
I like the Fender.
I wish I had those skills - I’ve mentioned the old Kay I have. Works, but needs lots of work.
Bill! I’ve been offered 4 matched, original, 20yr old, still in the box (pre Phillips)EL34’s for
£160. What d’you reckon?
Hi TonyR and TomS:
What a treat it was to do those two amps…
This weekend we’ll be looking at that Sunn Amp again…
I suggested that Bob (the owner) of all that stuff …
he get a Bias Tool for all those tube amps he has…
SO, this weekend we’ll be replacing the EL34’s in the Sunn Amp and set the Bias according to the specs of that amp…
The grid bias is now at some -37 volts…
It sounds close, however we want to see what the bias tool says and we don’t want to stress those new Groove Tubes that he paid a fortune for…
I suggested he order the 9’s for that amp…
I know you are aware, you can order a series of matched tubes from Groove Tubes…
When you go to music shops you can generally get 4’s-5’s and 6’s of GT Tubes…
But you can’t get the extremes of them…
IMO…
you don’t want to buy the lower end matched pairs of any GT’s…
Let the amp naturally distort…
TonyR…
That’s an awful price to pay for a set of NOS Phillip EL34’s…
I don’t know…
Somhow, I’d try to keep my money in my pocket…
You know…
during the War, they made those tubes by the thousands…
Now that there’s no call for them, kids who want them will pay anything (out-of-ordinary) for them…
If they were Mullard Tubes, I’d MaBeY
consider them…
I’d still think pretty hard…
BoY…
?
What a way to part with hard-earned money…
In this Day-and-Age…
Must be the Scot commin out in me…
What do you think?
TomS…
?
Bill…
That Kay Amp sounds fascinating…
What’s the model called. ??
What does it have for output tubes?
I’ve got several Amps that harp players would die for…
They are what they call
AC/DC driven amps…
Generally, they had three tubes in them…
35z5 Rectifier 50L6 or something for the output stage and a 12AX7 preamp tube…
They had a 6" or 8" speaker in them…
in a cheep box…
They made about 1.5-2.5 watts…
and distorted like mad when you connected a piezo mic to them…
All the harp players would bring me their amps and tell me not to do anything to them that would make them sound different when they got them back from me…
Bill…
[EDIT] AaHh…, Do I have to go to work ?
Bill, if I ship my Kay to you, will you fix it?
Hi TomS:
Post up a photo of it…
See if I’ve seen one of them before…
From what I recall…
Kay made some pretty nice amps…
Get the chassis out of the cabinet Lets see it…
a bunch of photos…
I got a Gibson
LG-6
??
or something…
It cam from a yard sale… It’s owned by the last guitar player I worked with…
It has a pair of 6V6’s in the output stage…
Makes about 10 watts…
Very common amp…
But I’ll bet it sounds like a million bucks if it was workin right…
I just need to get motivated to get-at-it…
Yea know…
there’s so much of that stuff in the land fill sites…
It soo
bad…
to see it go there…
No wonder the landfill sites are polluted…
Bill…
p.s. Maybe, I’ll come over to Flint in the new truck and fix it for you… hehehe…
Bill! Would you knock me up a nice tube preamp with wireless in time for my birthday?
Hey, Tony, get in line!!!
It looks like this (mine is worse shape):
http://www.regiscoyne.com/kay720/
By the way, I used to have a little silvertone like the small one in this picture, and I am the worst fool in the world for selling it:
http://i261.photobucket.com/albums/ii73/mrmuzikhead/IMG_2124.jpg
Anyone remember the Silvertone with the amp in the guitar case?
I sure wanted one of those when I first saw it. Probably a Sears catalog.
My buddy has one. He uses it for harmonica.
Wow I just saw a couple of YouTube’s showing it. Now that was thinking
outside the box. But somehow it ended up inside the box.
Hi sevenOfeleven:
If you still have it somewhere, can you post up that YouTube link…
It would be interesting to see it…
After we got through with building our own guitar and bass amps, way back when…
the first amp I bought to use with my Ibanez bass was a Sears 2 X 12" combo amp…
It had two output transformers in it’s design…
One for each of the speakers… It had 4 6L6 output tubes in the final stages…
This was a nice amp…
However, it wasn’t long after that and I had a '61 Fender Jazz Bass…
Shortly after that I bought a '64 BassMan Amp…
SO, the guitar player (Russell) bought the Silvertone amp from me…
Here’s his Page in present times…
He don’t live up here anymore, in the cold and all…
He lives in Sarasota Florida… Where it’s
NiCe…
most of the time…
That Kay Amp should be brought back from it’s agony…
Don’t be tossin it out…
O.K. ?
That one you got pictured looks pretty nice…
The tubes are pretty close to the tubes that Ampeg used in their early amp productions…
I never liked the Ampeg People for using odd numbered tubes…
However, I like all those Ampeg Amps…
The VT Series are so heavy …
though…
That VT-22 Ampeg Amp is one of the nicest guitar amps they made…
If you start talkin AmPS…
I’ll talk you head offf…
SoRRy…
lol…
I gotta get my head into Friday mornin Work.
Where did the week go
anyWay ??
Bill…
Hi Again:
TomS…
That two piece Silvertone Amp you posted up, looks like the combo 2 x 12" amp I had…
However, I’d like to have a peek at the back side of that amp…
to see if it has 4 6L6 tubes in it…
and two output transformers to go with them…
I think that was the best amp Sears ever built…
I think it cost me 425.00 back then…
That was a lot of bucks back then…
My Dad was some ugly at me for spending that kind of money on NOISE…
Bill…
[EDIT] Do you know what ?? It wasn’t a combo amp… That was the silvertone Amp I had…
We didn’t get back to that Sunn Amp this weekend…
The Olympic Games got in the middle of completing the Amp Restore…
Among other things…
Maybe, next weekend we’ll get to replace the output tubes and use the bias adjustment tool…
The GZ Rectifier tube was replaced by the Solid State Plug…
That fixed the amp from blowing the Mains Fuse at intermittent times…
I expect the GZ34 rectifier tube is somewhat faulty…
Bill…
Anyway,
The phone rang…
There appears to be some rush to finish that Sunn Amp Restore…
We’re gonna do the EL 34, GT # 9’s tube replacement and check the bias with the Bias Tool…
tonight…
I’ll see if I can get Bob to take some photos of the process…
I’ve never used a Bias Tool before…
SO, that’ll be something new for me…
I’ve always used the “Old School” method…
Darkness-and-Eye-Sight…
Watch how the tubes look in darkness, under operation…
Anyway, we’ll see what happens…
All I want to do is…
Not Stress his Brand-new EL 34’s…
Hehehe…
These things cost a fortune…
Bill…
Wellll…
if the weather holds, we’ll be working on those amps again tomorrow… I want to play with that BIAS Tool he ordered… I hope to get some photos of the project… I am gonna check the resistor tolerances in the Bassman 135 amp’s preamp stages…
Bill…