Hey Guys,
I thought I'd share a few pics of my newly refurbished amp... it has been an on going project to try and get her back to showroom set-up so to speak, but the journey is now complete!
I bought the amp along with the 2x12 cab about a year or so ago, she was ok, but needed some TLC. She has the 'Blackface' AB763 circuit, with a very strange faceplate, it seems all original, but the colours are inverted from the standard 'Blackface' look and has 'Export Model' on the rear with various power taps.
Over the past few months I've restored her back to her former glory, recapped with Sprague Atoms, put in a full set of new JJ's and replaced a few resistors here and there (though notice those oh so juicy 'Molded' blue mallorys, all original!).
Along the way I also found the amp had been modded with a 'Hi-Fi' amp output transformer driving a mismatched pair speakers at 16 ohms... originally the amp would have driven a 4 Ohms load.
I knew Karel was experimenting with winding his own transformers so 2 months ago I commission him to wind me a Bandmaster 'clone' and ordered a pair of 8 Ohm Jensen C12N's, the speakers originally used in the amp, then paralleled into 4 Ohms.
I collected the bits on Monday after having a great lunch (cooked my Karel nog al!) and some great amp talk (got to play around on his new little 5 watter as well and give him my feedback) and then drove back to my workshop and proceeded to finish up the job.
She sounds great and I couldn't be happier, nice and responsive, VERY loud... not a bedroom amp, at least not at break-up levels.
I'm encouraging Karel to keep working at winding his trannies, I can easily get them in from the USA, but they cost alot to ship and I believe he is just, if not more capable of offering great iron!
Next up is my rework of the '69 Bassman I just bought... it never ends!
Cheers
Matt
