Fender Amps; The First Fifty Years; Teague and Sprung

capnjuan

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Decent review of the history of Fender and it's amps; from the early days of Leo Fender to the modern FMIC. Excellent array of pics assisting in ID'ing some of the amps on sight, good balance between generic descriptions; example - tube count and whatnot versus the overly technical; B+ voltages at the power supply. The meat of the book is organized by model; from the earliest to the last days of that model's production.

Editorially, the authors refrain from dissing much of anything; early Leo models, the CBS days, and generalized 'MBA-itis'; regardless of design, commericial success, or who owned the company at the time. I didn't know this but apparently no stinky amps have Fender logos. Some coverage of keyboard and related musical gear.

$20-25, paperback, Hal Leonard Corp, publisher.

Finally there are acknowledgements and photo credits to a Gent named Craig Brody .... zat you KentuckBlue?

Good reading, good pics, good book. cj
 

Kap'n

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That is a good one.

Just got The Soul of Tone, which is a great companion piece - the hows and whys. Decent tech info. Even if I did find an error in it. :D
 

capnjuan

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Kap'n said:
That is a good one. Just got The Soul of Tone, which is a great companion piece - the hows and whys. Decent tech info. Even if I did find an error in it. :D
Thanks Kap'n, I'll look for it ... the book of course, not the error ... I might not know it was a boo-boo anyway. cj
 

Kap'n

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capnjuan said:
Kap'n said:
That is a good one. Just got The Soul of Tone, which is a great companion piece - the hows and whys. Decent tech info. Even if I did find an error in it. :D
Thanks Kap'n, I'll look for it ... the book of course, not the error ... I might not know it was a boo-boo anyway. cj

The error is in a picture of a "6G2 Princeton" on the bench. See if you can find it. :D
 

capnjuan

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Kap'n said:
capnjuan said:
[quote="Kap'n":742e6]That is a good one. Just got The Soul of Tone, which is a great companion piece - the hows and whys. Decent tech info. Even if I did find an error in it. :D
Thanks Kap'n, I'll look for it ... the book of course, not the error ... I might not know it was a boo-boo anyway. cj
The error is in a picture of a "6G2 Princeton" on the bench. See if you can find it. :D[/quote:742e6] Hey Kap'n; thanks for the hint; I'm on it! cj
 

jp

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Thanks for the posting, capn. I've been wanting to look into that one after I'm farther along with my remedial electronics studies. Then maybe I can understand a little better what the heck they're talking about! :oops:

I'm currently reading a really meaty, but basic electronics book which is answering all the questions I've always had. I've tried digging into the amp classics by Darr and Pittman, but I've found I need more basics, especially about how basic electronics components work, i.e., tubes, amplifiers, rectifiers, etc. This one is the companion book to the one that taught me the basics of electricity referred to me by an electrician friend. Electronics One-Seven, by Harry Mileaf

Although I've never seen the other basic electronics books with high recommendations (Basic Electronics, by U.S. Navy, and the AARL Handbook), this one is extremely accessible with the right balance of tech spec and pretty pictures for me to grasp the concepts. Hopefully, soon I can understand my gear a little better.
 

capnjuan

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Hi JP: at the risk of putting another info source in play, I recently (finally?) bought Dave Hunter's 'The Guitar Amp Handbook' (Backbeat Books, 2005, 240 pages, paperback). The book is a well integrated and blended (schematics and pictures) approach to the general subject of why amps sound like they do. There is some general discussion of ampology, characteristic sound, and underlying electronics expressed nicely as 'worked examples'.

Starting w/ early Fenders and finishing w/ Dr Zs, Mesas, and Soldanos, Hunter - having laid out why amps sound hot, crunchy, distorted, clean, woofy, or many other 'sound flavors', takes as many as 12 circuits, integrating schematics and pics, and allows the reader to follow along; paraphrasing: "...people like these because of the early breakup..." and then proceeds to tell you why they break up early. Further paraphrasing: '...wanna be Ted Nugent?...here's what it takes to produce that sound..." but with both schematics and pics so you can 'see'; either diagrammatically if that works or just tracing the circuit in the pics: 'signal comes in here, goes there ...'

Excellent discussion of 'Class A' amps; why they sound the way they do and Push/Pull amps and how they are different without beating the electronics to death. The book expresses these disinctions by kind of putting it back on the player: what kind of sound do you want to make? Blues, rock-a-billy, C&W, classic, 'Guitar-God', and so on, and, under what circumstances are you going to make it? Recorded w/ your pals, small venue, or before 25,000 screaming fans nicely making the point that, as with instruments, there is no amp that will do everything and that trade-offs are inevitable.

He leaves it at if you want vintage tone at high volume, get a vintage amp and use a PA. If you want/need a 'wall of music', go get a whopper Marshall stack but don't kid yourself about getting the them both in the same place. FYI, he didn't reference any 'classic' Gibson / epiphone amps directly :evil: but the venerable GA19 RVT rated a passing wave :wink: .

For my part, I liked Hunter's discussion of tweaking the older, smaller Class A amps and early cathode-biased Push/Pulls (sorry, didn't mean to start techno-breakdancing on you) but his point is that older v. newer and 'Class A-sounding' v. 'Clean-sounding' amps generally break nicely along the 'bias' fault line; that Class A amps and smallish-output push / pull amps (typically twin 6V6) that are cathode-biased sound like Class A amps (even though technically they are not) and 'fixed bias' amps - fitted with bias pots - tend to be louder and cleaner.

Finally a very fine discussion along the lines of where Kap'n was trying to take us here: LTG Thread Voicing Amps talking about cathode caps in the pre-amp, bias, and negative feedback. Hunter generally indicates that with just these 3 principles, anything from Kalamazoos, Premiers, Champs, Silvertones, or any other smaller, 'browner' amp can be made looser, cleaner, gainier, grittier and so on providing a chance to implement some of these ideas w/o carving up museum pieces or scratch-building. cj
 

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Thanks for the enlightening rundown, capn. I've got the Hunter book on my list too. It's gotten lots of raves. Sounds like an interesting and helpful approach and a much more enjoyable read than my current immersion. I do feel that I need to "catch up" a little so to speak. Along with the Hunter book I've got Dan Torres and Gerald Weber in the bullpen. When I'm finished, I'm gonna dive in head first into my pile of amps.

Someday I hope to understand how my mysterious magic box Mesa Boogie DC-5 functions. Schematics are not for the faint of heart. This marvel is truly meant more for the tone sohphisticate, than the "go get'em," left-thumbed savage that I am.

Didja see this beauty that some lucky punk snapped up for a mere $600? $200 in cargo, though. Great deal for someone in your neck of the swamp.
 

capnjuan

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Hi JP; if'ing I was your librarian, I'd say Hunter then Weber ... wish I'd done it that way. Gorgeous Ampeg .. signed and all; that's quite a price! cj
 
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