Vintage amps

[fernieite]

Here's an updated photo of my amps.

I sold the '74 Pignose and Garnet Herzog, but picked up a 1970 Ampeg GU-12, a very early 1965 Traynor YBA-1, and an early 70s "black top" Echoplex.

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[Pepe]

Awesome collection!

[fernieite]

Thanks Pepe.

I recently found another local 1980s Marshall 4x10 cab. (1965B) I now have a full stack for my Traynor.

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[fernieite]

This is the current amperage. The old 1964 Fender Pro combo is behind the Traynor head and cab. (Or under the Marshall 18watt combo)

[bigtone23]

I have a few amps, most of which are pretty iconic and from the 80s/90s.
To keep it 'vintage,' I will only comment on those from 1980 or earlier...
1971 Fender Vibro Champ. All original, sounds and works great. It seems that it should get a cap job, but it's solid.

1973 Fender Bassman Ten. Got this 22 years ago. It was all stock. Cap job, repurposed the master volume to a variable NFB knob, and replaced the tired stock speakers with 1983 Celestion G10S-50. Killer amp!

1977 and 1978 Peavey Century 200 heads. These used to be <$100 scores in the market. I love them, they have a cool, 70s bass sound, and are pretty cool for guitar, too. The Distortion circuit needs to be made into a stand alone pedal! The 78 (with the black knobs) was fully recapped and modded to make a stronger, wider bandwidth connection between the pre and power amps. The 77 (missing the black knob inserts) is still fully stock and chugging along solid.

1978 Peavey Backstage 30. Picked up also for <$100. I wanted one of these as it's a 15W 1x10" combo that sounds great with pedals and just keeps on working. All stock (including the square back speaker).

1980 Mesa Mark IIA. Hundred watt, reverb, graphic EQ, EVM12L. Rescue from a UPS shipping destruction. Had it fully rebuilt by a local Mesa guy with the intention to flip it. Upon return from the shop and some play time, it stayed home. The clean channel is 100% a Twin/Showman in a smaller cabinet. Plus, it has a dirty channel that does edge of breakup to classic rock perfectly. I'm also a Mesa freak, so this fit in nicely with my others...

[laurie]

Some very nice amps there!!

[Pepe]

Oh yes, indeed!

[Dirk]

Wow, that Mesa is awesome!

[bigtone23]

Some very nice amps there!!

Oh yes, indeed!

Wow, that Mesa is awesome!

Thank you!
My favorite Mesas are the IIC/IIC+/III. I would have never gave a IIA a chance, except that it was in my possession at home. After it got back from the resurrection procedure and I played it for a bit, I was blown away. I have always loved my 50W Bassman Ten and would like to have a Twin/Showman/Bassman 100 or 135 head for that 100w Fender awesomeness. This 100W IIA has it. Have never played another Mesa that gets that Fender BF/SF clean thing so well.
With each subsequent revision of the Mark series, the clean channel loses this tonality in favor of the dirty channel getting much better. It's a trade off of sharing pretty much all of the controls between the two modes. The IIA dirt channel is really cool when considering that's it's from 1980, but compared to the dirt channel revisions of the next 4 years, it's not so great. By the late IIB, Mesa was well on their way to nailing that legendary dirt tone.

Heck, though these are arguably 'vintage,' I'll share. They are damn cool, legendary amps, though. It's also funny that they are mostly favorites of high-gain, metal players, but I use them all in a medium gain way. Plus, a couple of these are go-to amps for testing pedals.

10/1987 Simul Class Red Stripe Mark III. Best sounding III I have ever played or owned. This could be my only amp and I'd be happy. Got it when they were overlooked and dirt cheap.

3/1985 60W Mark IIC+, Mesa MC90 speaker. The Legend. The reissue of the IIC+ has been quite the buzz. Got this in 1991 when they were just 'used Mesa amps.' Didn't know what I had until a Vintage Guitar article from around 1994 helped me nail down the model. The IIC+ hype is real. This is where Mesa nailed the best possible dirt mode and still had a decent clean mode with the shared controls. It only wins by a nose over the III above. However, the III just does more.

3/1998 Rev G Dual Rectifier. Custom ordered, the only one I bought new. I had a friend that worked for Mesa, so he gave me his employee deal, which allowed me to get the green suede, chrome chassis, black diamond plate and a set of beta test Winged C EL34 tubes for less than what a typical customer paid for a stock head. Great amp, I'm so glad I went for the options, have not seen another like it. Kinda cool that it was delivered on Friday the 13th of March, 1998. Mesa is reissuing the Rev F Dual Rec, so the hype is gonna hype again...
1997 Marshall DSL50. Also procured when it was an under the radar amp for the price of a nice pedal. I had a couple awesome Marshalls in the 90s and missed them. This one's green channel can do 85% of what a typical JCM800 2204 can do. It also has the red mode with more gain. I did a small cap clip (C12 mod) to make the red mode less thin and tight sounding at my lower gain settings. Now it's a usable mode, too!