Fender made to Boogie

[M Fowler]

A guy said this amp was dead and probably will never work again see what you can do with it.

I said what the hell is it and who did this modding? It turned out to be a guy from Fargo that past away a while back Mark ? and Ken?
They were experimenting between Mesa Boogie and Metaltronics M1000 this was back in the 90's I believe.

Not sure how anyone could have played this amp there was no filament center tap and buzzed like crazy so I put in two 100R resisters and quieted it down.
Replace all the filter caps and the two bias caps.

Made a dollar store door stop foot switch and grabbed a box of used tubes and fired the bitch up. Took a while to figure out the controls. Has volume 1 and 2, Master vol 1 & 2 labeled MAS 1 & 2,
Filter switch, presence and resonance. Lots going on the back side too.

Fixed all the broken front panel and made a wood strip for the back to protect the tubes.
Broken bear claws, no tube shields man what a dog. It went home to a happy owner all dressed up. He doesn't gig anymore rides around in his 1930 Ford 5-window coupe for fun now!

Mark

87479030_10215185011330194_5741574755887087616_n.jpg

87984873_10215185011570200_3626493779982155776_n.jpg

88014861_10215185013010236_6422302788557996032_n.jpg

89070310_10215209364098998_4947588624599220224_n.jpg

87765512_10215209364379005_3108394997506899968_n.jpg

[M Fowler]

More

Made my bias and plate volt checker from a piece of angle aluminum and added Velcro to keep the trio on.

87794801_10215209364659012_1608711989633220608_n.jpg

88992570_10215209365219026_7675916030438277120_n.jpg

88982182_10215209364899018_4566037310709170176_n.jpg

[fredfretter]

WOW!
You have your work cut out for you.

[martin manning]

Rat rod amp!

[bmx]

Good job! It's a gift to the world to get old amps running again!

[Mark]

The Mesa Boogie logo on it is hilarious, it's a silver faced Fender that had a valve rectifier replaced with a SS rectifier.

What sort Fender do you think it use to be?

You're lucky it wasn't a rats nest in there, but it looks like there are enough wires floating around for possible instability.

Good work getting it up and going.

[M Fowler]

Yes it's fun to see these old amps working again and know it wasn't me that converted this amp which I believe was a Bandmaster since the OT is small.

Mark

[Guy77]

Very nice bias and plate load checker Mark!
I like those Bandmaster output transformers. I have used them on several 6L6 and 6v6 builds and they sounded great! Great bang for the buck.
I think some of them have 6K primary as well (older Bandmasters) which works great for 6V6 tubes too.

Cheers!

Guy

[Stevem]

Unless it was a silver face Bamdmaster with reverb, all other black face and silver face bandmasters had SS rectors, not tube.

[Doug R.]

Back in the 1980's you could pick up a Bassman or Bandmaster head for $100 bucks. I modded a couple dozen...sort of wish I had left them stock and kept them in my closet. That head looks like a Bandmaster. Measure the length and I will check it against my Bassman head which is shorter. I would post a pic, but I can't figure out how.

[Stevem]

A BF Bassman chassis is 20.750" wide, a BF Bandmaster is 22.500" wide.

[MakerDP]

<<<reply with quote not playing nice... imagine the "dollar store door-stop foot switch inserted here>>>

This right here is brilliant! What a pedalboard space saver!

[Mark]

Very nice bias and plate load checker Mark!
I like those Bandmaster output transformers. I have used them on several 6L6 and 6v6 builds and they sounded great! Great bang for the buck.
I think some of them have 6K primary as well (older Bandmasters) which works great for 6V6 tubes too.

I find this quite interesting as Guy has found a transformer that nails his needs. HAD was one to ditch the Bandmaster etc for the Bassman output transformers. I have a Bassman transformer in my Bandmaster and I could imagine them being brighter and mid heavy, opposed to being bass heavy like the Bassman output transformer.

[M Fowler]

I don't have the head with me anymore to measure. The owner didn't know what it was he bought it many years ago and thought he had blown it up so he asked me to check it out.

The only reason I thought it was a bandmaster was it's length, the number of pot holes on front, and the small size of the OT.

It can clean up but very hard to dial in and the clean was way too low of volume compared to the high gain side. Both have master volume controls but still darn hard to dial clean in.
It was basically used as primarily a high gain fun machine which is what the owner is doing with it.

The door stop switch thing I saw on Brad's The Guitologist you tube video.

Mark

[didit]

Based off ~1.2” knob diameter and a 30 second peek with photoshop it’s 22.5”.

Best .. Ian