Hammond organ experts

Amp parts for cheap... or kill a classic Hammond?

I am constantly seeing tube powered Hammond organs for sale for either dirt cheap or free.

Not knowing what the "good" models were or which ones aren't so good - I'd really like some help knowing which Hammonds aren't the best so I can gut them for guitar amp parts.

... of Hammond organ playing in all sorts of musical genres. There is a market out there for organs and parts; some parts aren't available any longer, and can be used to make one good organ out of parts from unfixable ones.

The most famous is of course the B-3, 400 lbs. of Hammond mojo. The other professional organs were the C- Series, which are pretty much identical to the B's, except they were marketed as church organs, and the A, D, & E-100 Series, all of which featured full keyboards and from 25 to 32 note pedalboards. The better home organs include the L-100 Series, and especially the M-3 model. The M-3 is sometimes referred to as the baby B-3. If you're interested at all in the Hammond sound, you should try to get one in working condition for yourself, especially at the prices you've evidently been able to find them. I bought an M-3 about 25 years ago, played it for fun, and recently had it refurbished for a couple of hundred bucks by a guy who made house calls. He rigged it up to connect to my Leslie speaker and now, for a basement picker, it sounds pretty terrific. Supposedly, "Green Onions" was recorded on an M-3.

That's just a bit of general information, there are Hammond web sites that could surely be of more help. Try to check out "The Hammond Organ - Beauty in the B", by Mark Vail. I think you'll have a gas if you can get one in working order; all those songs you've heard your whole life are just waiting for you to figure out the organ riffs! Good luck, and enjoy.

In case anyone is interested, Native Instruments makes a software organ simulator called B4-ll, which is as cool a Hammond simulator as you can imagine. They have a trial version that's pretty addictive --- check it out!

It's pretty simple... if it has tubes and tonewheels it's worth saving. Then you get into solid state crap like the Concorde, still worth some bucks in parts. Even individual keys are worth having, they get broken in storage and when organs are moved.

Hack up a Wurlitzer or a Baldwin.

I have no room for an organ and I'm not too good on the keys. I was considering mainly for guitar amp parts.

Michaal, as far as the organ simulator, I'm definitely going to check that out! I've been trying out a lot more VST plugins and amp sims for fun, and some of this software is VERY convincing sounding... if I can find a good Hammond B3 sim, that'd help my homestudio, though my keys playing will still suck. HAHA

I have no room for an organ and I'm not too good on the keys. I was considering mainly for guitar amp parts.

Yeah, no sh... umm, foolin'.

And when the last AO-35 becomes a "Carmen Ghia" musicians will start referring to passenger pigeon / dodo bird analogies.

I have two Wurlitzer amps I use for doorstops. The third is too big... :lol: for a doorstop, anyway. Big ol' laydown PT, just the thing for a low buck "JTM45". The OT is a little wimpy but WeberVST imports a fresh boatload almost every day... :lol:

I chimed in on the other Hammond Hack thread, and honestly guys, I mean no disrespect.

On Hammond Organs, Tubes and Tonewheels pretty much say restore or rehome when ever possible.
Once they are beyond restore quality, " Recycle/Reclaim "

Parts are drying up on these legends, Mechanical parts, pedal plastics, shafts and cams and even keys and knobs are sought after by guys who restore & repair Hammonds.
All to often ( And Yes I Even Did It at one time) Guys pull the electronics, and toss valuable & expensive parts in the land fill.

If you are going to gut these things just for tubes, transformers, speakers, at the very least you should try to save some of the other goodies and post them on one of the Hammond user forums.

In some countries, gutting a B3 even in semi-funtional condition carries serious jail time or execution.

Hi - new guy here, just dropping in to agree with <b>muchxs</b>.

The smaller Hammonds (I have an L120 and an M101) are 15-20 watt power amps. The M101 has 2x 6V6 for the main and 2x EL84 for the reverb amp (OK, so that's 45 total).

I also got a Wurlitzer 4150 with 37 or so preamp tubes and a pair of 6L6s. I want all that heater current, 'cause I have a mess of preamp ideas I want to mess with. $70 at Salvation Army. The L120 was $65 at a pawn shop and the M101 was $80 from craigslist.

Anyway, if it's got tone wheels, restore it. If it doesn't have tubes, don't bother with it.

Hope this helps!

Oh - hey, do any of y'all have one of those tablet switches to spare - a 7- or 8-pole one? I smashed a contact in one of the Drawbar select switches on the L120.

I chimed in on the other Hammond Hack thread, and honestly guys, I mean no disrespect.

On Hammond Organs, Tubes and Tonewheels pretty much say restore or rehome when ever possible.
Once they are beyond restore quality, " Recycle/Reclaim "

Parts are drying up on these legends, Mechanical parts, pedal plastics, shafts and cams and even keys and knobs are sought after by guys who restore & repair Hammonds.
All to often ( And Yes I Even Did It at one time) Guys pull the electronics, and toss valuable & expensive parts in the land fill.

If you are going to gut these things just for tubes, transformers, speakers, at the very least you should try to save some of the other goodies and post them on one of the Hammond user forums.

In some countries, gutting a B3 even in semi-funtional condition carries serious jail time or execution.



This is exactly why I asked the question, especially after that other thread.

I have always heard from other musicians how reverred the B3 was, but knew little else about other Hammonds. Now dead ones are all over the place for $50 or free and DIY amp builders are happy to take the parts.

If EVERY tube Hammond is good, I think I'll try my hand at repairing and selling them. BUT, if there are "bad" models I could gut, I wanted to know which ones.

I'm glad that other thread started up, because now I've changed my view... which could mean more fixed Hammonds, or at the least, more parts I can make available for Hammond fans looking to repair/restore theirs.

Now I'll only reserve my parts-gutting for the unrestoreable.

Im Far less passionate about Baldwins, Lowery's, and especially most Wurlitzers.
There is one model Wurlitzer that should never be destroyed, at least in the historical sense. These were actually electronic piano's in the early 50's The model 100 & 200 were made famous by Ray Charles, but also made their way into later decades with the Doors, Steely Dan, the Doors, and Queen as well as others.

I saw a cleaner than mint 200 go for $3,000 last summer at a local auction. It now resides in a Studio in Chicago. The buyer told me he would have easily gone double that amount.

Cheap Hammond musings:

Grace Potter (of Grace and the Nocturnals, coming soon to a town near you. Whether you live in Oklahoma City or Brussels... :lol:) used to tour with a Porta B. A Porta B is a cutdown "L". Not exactly roadworthy, the amp is in the bottom of the unit just like a regular "L" only with less protection. Gracie would take that poor thing out and beat on it like it was a top fueler or something, unlike a drag racer this thing didn't get rebuilt between rounds. We installed some switching exotica in it so it would do everything short of givin' ya a foot massage as ya played, techs out on O.C. would get confused by the "extra stuff" and rip it all out. We'd get panic stricken calls from somewhere out on the road, "My organ doesn't work at all..."

So, you can tour with an "L". An "M" we knew about, Keith Emerson used to abuse an "M" on tour.

ANY of these things can be cut down to make them more portable.

Eventually Gracie signed up for a "B" and what a "B" it is. Lovingly massaged by nuns (it's out of a convent) it's had a full cap job and fresh buss bars among other things. It lives in a road case, oh, the size of my living room. Haven't seen it lately so it's safe to say it never breaks...

Gracie will never ever get rid of her Porta B. Never. :lol:

Hammond organs are cool.

an interesting site, in German, but the pictures are cool:
http://www.orgelsurium.ch/index.html

a rare and little known, but very cool hammond:
http://www.discretesynthesizers.com/nova/intro.htm

An NPR interview with Moe Denham, who is in "The Beauty of the B," and who is a fantastic B3 player:

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5561037

My folks sold their mint condition M3 for $150 twenty years ago. It probably needed new tubes. I never forgave them for that; I wanted that thing.

steven

I cheaply scored a couple of AO-44 Hammond organ reverb amps locally.
They use ECL86 tubes, in a PP configuration.
I figure around 11/12 watts per channel?
Anyway, I gutted them out, and rebuilt them.
I'm using them as a pair of mono blocks, in a stereo system.
Unlike many guitar amps, they have a wide enough frequency range, to sound really good as audio amps, with those nice beefy OPT's!

Steve

I cheaply scored a couple of AO-44 Hammond organ reverb amps locally.

Those two Hammonds are going to sound crappy without their reverbs... :roll:

If you run across organs on Craigslist, etc., this site should help you identify which specific amps will be inside...
http://www.captain-foldback.com/Hammond_sub/hammond_schematics.htm

Richard Goodsell has made a small fortune turning AO-35's into guitar amps... but he had an insider source for tons of them. His newest AO-35 converts are amongst his highest priced amps.

Dr Z did well with his first run of Carmen Ghia's that used the AO-35 as well.

I've got two that I'm saving for a couple of builds...