Great to hear that your Tele guitar you built is doing well, when I finished the
1953 Fender Deluxe I rebuilt is like your brownface both are something special,
the sound that comes out of those are a bit darker and warmer than today's bright
amps. I would like to hear that amp with Weber speakers in it or original Jensen's
that came with it, the reissue Jensens (the ones made in Italy) are known not to be
the best, just a thought.
Bob,
Is your wide panel Deluxe a 5B3 or a 5C3 circuit? I had a 54 5C3 that had raggy tweed that I bought as a car-cuss for $200.00 about 15 years ago. It came with a missing speaker and a blown power tranny.
Back then Mercury Magnetics was kinda new, unknown, and not many people knew that cloned trannies were available. I ended up rebuilding the Deluxe as a 5B3 with the grid leak bias inputs on the pre-amp.
This type of input clips the leading edge of the attack, and kinda creates a slight time delay in the response. The effect is playing a guitar is more like playing a sax. The tone I would say is mighty throaty and pretty much the amp is very touch sensitive.
I miss this amp and on my list is to build a clone. This amp I bought from Main Drag Music in Williamsburg when they first had a small store front on Bedford. When I sold it back to them nearly a decade later they had a monster loft on Kent Avenue, and they sold my amp north of $2K. My friend Pat the amp tech replaced the intact circuit I removed as an assembly.
Funny story is when our loft was broken into they left the amp behind thinking it was a ratty piece of junk.
The original Jenson P12R was only rated for 15 watts and the reissue is rated at 25 watts. My friend Richie has an original 4-10 tweed Bassman. Pretty much it was re-tweeded (new covering), had the power supply caps replaced, and reissue P10R's speakers installed.
Richie is a great player and he played loud. The old speakers pretty much had been played out. The cones were so soft and mushy that the bass was kinda farty and not so tight. The headroom also was lower.
I'm under the opinion that for a "player" amp that reissues with modern kapton voice coils that can handle higher power is the way to go. For a recording amp in a studio though I would favor original vintage speakers.
These tweeds are great amps for players that want to just plug-in and play that just use their hands to get their sound. The more modern higher gain amps I find rely on processing (effects) and layers of distortion for their voicing. Not all players favor touch sensitivity, but for me a guy who is not a speed demon, I rely on great tone and dynamics.
BTW I watched an episode of "God Friended Me" that used Main Drag Music as a shooting location. When I lived in Williamsburg Main Drag Music was just two blocks away, and the result is that I would buy gear all the time.
Photo related I have a 94-95 Matchless Spitfire and a 94-95 Matchless Lightning in "Shower Curtain Black" (Mark Sampson era) that I bought long ago. These hand built amps were really the start of the boutique amp market.
Interesting back story is that Mark Sampson was a drag racer, and the reason why he started building Matchless amps was because Vox AC-30 amps had a reputation of catching on fire. He started building amps as if they were military black boxes with mil-spec materials and severe overbuilding.
Matchless amps were in very high demand at the same time there was "Stratmania" when Japanese collectors hoarded Fender strats. That all ended badly with the Asian currency crisis in the later 90's. I bought my Matchless amps around 2004 for little money. Today these amps are infrequently listed around $2.5K, but as of late I see none listed for a while.
Matchless was restarted and survives today. Pretty much they are still the same high quality amps. Mark Sampson went on to for another amp company called "Bad Cat," But I don't think it survives today.
Because of the mint condition of these amps, they are of investment value and are "hard assets" that I expect will continually appreciate in value. Kinda like having a boxed M3 and a boxed M2, both in mint condition. The Brown 1960 Super is my player.
So your post is timely. I realize today that I'm kinda at a saturation point. As far as guitar amps, guitars, bass's, cameras, printer, and bikes I'm kinda fully stocked. I don't really need any more, and to be truthful I have more than is practical, yet all these treasures could fit in say two mini-vans if I had to. Any more and it becomes a liability and becomes senseless.
Now I have to find something new to obsess about. LOL. Perhaps it is anti-social behavior to place so much identity and value into in-add-I-mate objects?
It seems its all "Rock and Roll" except that I don't share the wear and tear of say Keith Richards.
Read a feature about Rob Lowe and how he hasn't really aged much in 3 decades. Formally, when young, he was an alcoholic, but he left that behind. He claims he maintains his youth by a low carb diet, strength training, and cardio workouts.
I would say the article is a bit conflated because the boyish body he once had in say "Youngbloods" is now a thicker and broader older man's body. Don't get me wrong, he looks good, and certainly is fit and well cared for, but the body does age and change over the decades. The other day I measured my chest and fully inflated I'm approaching a 39 inch chest. I never use to be so big. The drop (Proportion/differnetial) remains about 8 inches for Paul Smith clothes, but my chest and waist are getting thicker.
Cal