One more 5e3 in the works.

Well I was able to sell my first 5e3 build to a local studio so I was able to buy enough stuff for two more builds. They will be a 5e3 for me and a 5f2a for the wife.
One thing I wanted to be able to do with my new amp is have the option to use some old "Coke Bottle" tubes that I have, but they don't really fit the standard spacing of a 5e3 chassis.
Mojotone is selling some "blem" 5e3 chassis for $40.00 a pop saying the chrome is speckled. I bought 3 of them and the chrome looks great but they are missing the holes to mount the turret boards.
Marked off where to cut away the socket mounts, spaced them over, filled in the space with some scrap sheet metal, applied some heat with the electric fire wrench and presto, my tubes don't even come close to hitting anymore.
Now it's off to load up the board.

Now that is funky :wink:

Cool dude!!
That's some intense modding :)
Looks good. Did you get coke bottle 6v6s?

*edit* ps. I know you realize how jealous everyone is when you mention building an amp for your wife!!!?!! My wife plays the flute. We use a weird vocal fx pedal and run her flute through that and call it the Floog (flute/moog).

Well had some time so I thought I would build my cabinet.
Cut up some 1x12 pine from the local lumber yard.
Got out the trusty home made joint jig.
Decided I would go with a wide panel front this time.

I built my wife a lot of amps and guitars over the years.
I was so shocked that when she left she forgot to take any of them with her.
I've had a lot of time to think about everything since she left, I just wish that I had built her more amps, maybe none of this would have happened.

It's been lonely in the saddle since my horse died.

Got out the Hi-Tech Circle Cutter 2000 to make some baffle boards and then started on the chassis.
Trannies and heater wires first.

That is sure looking good. Great work!

Got so wrapped up building this thing I failed to take pictures of a few of the steps.
Loaded the board up and put it in.
During my re-engineering of the chassis to use fat coke bottle tubes, I failed to take into account clearance of the speaker bell(hey, I'm not perfect). Oh well it comes off easy enough.
Slapped on some tweed, sprayed it with heavy coats of nitro, added grill cloth and a speaker and put everything together. Went through a final inspection and found 2 crossed wires and a bad solder joint on a heater wire(I told you I'm not perfect).
Turned on the switch, no smoke or sparks. Started stuffing it with my start up tube set and she's a winner! What a beautiful sound!
With the coke bottle 5y3 and 6v6s, a EH 12ay7 and a no name 12ax7 it reads like this:
V1
1= 114v
3= 1.87v
6= 119v
8= 1.87v

V2
1= 146v
3=1.25v
6= 185v
7= 17.6v
8= 46.3v

V3
3= 347v
4= 320v
8= 18.4v

V4
3= 344v
4= 321v
8= 18.4v

V5
2= 361v
4= 270v
6= 268v
8= 361v

Last bit of mojo is the screw for the power cord hold down is an upholstery screw from a '57 Chevy I replaced the floors in.

Very very nice, I was going to say that the coke bottle might be a tight fit....vintage speaker?

It's a new 20 watt Weber 12A 125A. i may build another baffle and move the speaker over a bit more.

All I can sy is WOW!

Nice SFenn,

I like your method of getting heater wires in place before filling the chassis up. After doing a 5F1 the hard way, I will steal your idea next time.

Mark

Nice.

This is amazing!

My amp still looked like it was missing something so I decided I would make a name badge. Now it's done.

You definitely got some skills.
This amp reeks cool.
So what's next?

BTW, other than looking cool as hell, any advantage to the big bottles?

How did you make the name badge? I went to a trophy store to get one made, but it's not exactly what I wanted. I'd like to make my own.

I own a sign shop and a metal fabrication shop so I did some brown vinyl and sheared a scrap of aluminum sheet.
The big bottle tubes look cool but in a blind listening test having someone else change out tubes at random while I played with my back to the amp, I liked the new reissue Tung-Sol 6v6 tubes better.