We are working on a new amp design which is a nice simple hand wired amp. It is a vintage style traditional valve ( tube amp) . It is early Fender style. I
While it is really good to have an original vintage amp ( I have one) , I saw someone ( I cannot remember where) I read it ) making the comparison of owning an original vintage amp to having an old classic car. Both need continual maintenence, both break down a lot , and they are very expensive to buy. Classic cars and vintage amps do have one thing in common is that they are relatively simple and use easy to find parts so they can be kept “on the road” for decades to come.
I am not sure the latest generation amps with digital processors and the like will be become vintage as the “micro-chips” will go out of production in just a few years. Like all modern electronics will end up being re-cycled in about 7 years from now.
So a great compromise is to have a NEW amp built exactly the way they were built in the ” old days”.
Being hand built means they are not exactly cheap but they when the break down in seven years time they can be fixed by any amp technician and the faults are easy to find !
So our prototype amp has been designed and built to re-capture the amp of around 1960.
Of course it has a valve rectifier which is a GZ34 . This will provide the “sag” of those original amps. One ECC83 is used for the individual channel pre-amps. There is a bright channel and a normal channel. The other ECC83 provides further amplification and one triode drives two 6V6 output valves providing about 20 watts into the Eminence speaker.
It is built in the traditional way using hand wiring and turret boards. It is a simple amp with no reverb and is in a traditional combo case. The first prototype should be finished by late June.
I am sure what looks good on paper as a design will need some tweaking once it is up and running.
Once this one is built and fully tested ( both from a safety and ans what it sounds like ) , we will be able to build the first 10 and have them done by September.
I will be writing more about this amp once we have it in our lab for the expected surgery to make it sound “right”
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