58Bassman
Tele-Holic
With a small anvil inside.
Anybody here fix up an old radio and convert it to a guitar amp?
- Thread starter Leonardocoate
- Start date
With a small anvil inside.
Rumble....the most iconic one chord playedThose and others like them are very cool AND useful. I bought a Stromberg-Carlson AU-33 when the stereo store I had worked for was closing and everything was half off. The service tech at that place had absolutely zero imagination and didn't give a rat's butt about much of anything other than himself, so he soldered a piece of speaker wire to the 8 Ohm tap & ground, then passed it through an opening and cut it about 4" long, so it would be easy to connect to a regular speaker- it originally had octal sockets for the speaker connections. It could be used with 4,8 or 16 Ohm speakers, as well as 25V, 50V, 70V or 100V speaker systems for public address, AKA 'fixed voltage audio systems'.
I wanted to use it for guitar, so I removed the octal sockets, cut the wires off and put heat shrink tubing on all of the speaker wires except the 4,8 and 16 Ohm. I cut a piece from a Stainless steel wall plate for the 1/4" jacks that replaced the octals- one was for the speaker, the other for the Marshall Style impedance selector. It originally had three Amphenol 1/2" mic connections which are generally obsolete, so I replaced two of them with 1/4" jacks, which dropped right in. I kept the third because I actually have a mic that uses the connector and i figured that if someone buys it, they might as well be able to use it.
After recapping, replacing the power cord and checking the voltages, I inserted the tubes and tried it- I should have used different speakers because with the Jensen C12R pair, it was only OK but the day I checked it out to sell it, I went through a 12" Eminence and HOLY CRAP! I hit one chord and the first thing I though of to lay was Rumble, by Link Wray. That was a killer amp and if I find another one, I'm going to buy it.
AU-33, only a few miles from here-
Stromberg Carlson AU 33 | Reverb
Recently re capped, tubes tested and a modern speaker output was added.These make killer guitar amps but I tried a bass through it into an old Altec PA speaker and was floored how rich and meaty the tone was!reverb.com
It does look cool...if you converted it to a guitar amp, it would be a surf amp
58Bassman
Tele-Holic
Had this old chassis kicking around for years, but never found the right project for it.
If that has a 6L6G for the output tube, I would guess that was made around 1937 and if it doesn't have any kind of EIA number, that would mean it was made before the US entered WWII, so 1941. The 6L6 became available in 1937.
If it has a #80 rectifier and yours is bad, I have two that I don't need- bought three and used one to restore an old Oahu lap steel guitar amp.
I am currently in the process of converting a 1959 Eico tube integrated mono amp into a Matchless Lightning. These sorts of conversions are a lot of fun, and you can easily build an amp that will perform equally as well as a $3K boo-teek amp. Since you're new at this, here is the absolute best primer on the topic.
Engine Swap
Friend of Leo's
Thanks for replying. IIR, it used four #27 tubes. Sold it over 10 years ago. Interesting piece.
Thanks, I will give it a watch. The restore project is back burnered until I get a better working knowledge behind me. I'm looking at a kit from Amplified parts as well as a couple of bread boards and components to make some basic FX circuits. A better working vocabulary would be nice. Got any book recommendation?
Here are a couple of links to what I will be ordering soon.
Electronic Projects for Musicians, A Comprehensive Guide | Amplified Parts
Electronic Projects for Musicians, A Comprehensive Guide - A comprehensive guide by Craig Anderton. Shows you how to build your own Preamp, Compressor/Limiter, Ring Modulator, Phase Shifter, Talk Box, plus 22 other inexpensive electronic accessories. Written in clear language, with hundreds of...
Intubator
Tele-Afflicted
Here's a 1949 Sparton Model 121 converted into a Robinette 5E3 Micro with EF80's. The grill cloth appointments came from an old console stereo and have gold threads intermingled in with the cotton.
Decided to leave the front clean and free of function indicators as it's easy and pretty obvious when playing.
From Left to right:
Master Vol, Normal Vol, Normal jacks 1&2, Bright jacks 1&2, Bright Vol, Tone. Great sounding amp, has a mid '60s CTS 6X9. Pushed, it sounds a lot like the guitar intro to Revolution by the Beatles. Pretty raw and raunchy tube OD... Nice cleans too!
Before (not my photo)
Modded
Decided to leave the front clean and free of function indicators as it's easy and pretty obvious when playing.
From Left to right:
Master Vol, Normal Vol, Normal jacks 1&2, Bright jacks 1&2, Bright Vol, Tone. Great sounding amp, has a mid '60s CTS 6X9. Pushed, it sounds a lot like the guitar intro to Revolution by the Beatles. Pretty raw and raunchy tube OD... Nice cleans too!
Before (not my photo)
Modded
Nice job...I like seeing the before and after photos
Intubator
Tele-Afflicted
Thank you!
JustABluesGuy
Friend of Leo's
Very cool!
Nextguitar
TDPRI Member
Please don’t hack up a restorable vintage radio. There are folks that actually care about them and work hard to restore them to functional museum pieces. There are several forums, Facebook groups, etc. where collectors and restorers congregate.
There are many old radios for sale around here. People that think they have gold and want $400 for a pile of junk. Talked some sense in a few people and they reduced their prices multiple times, down to $20 with no takers. Because really, who listens to AM radio? I have a fully restored radio that I bought because it was nicely done, never plugged it in after getting it home. Will I get the $80 I spent on it? Bought one small tabletop radio for $10 to make into a quickie head, the guy had it playing when I went to pick it up. Looks like it came off of the showroom display. Have not turned it on since it got home. I have a shelf full of chassis and stripped ones where I have kept the transformers and handful of parts. Never paid over $25 for them, some free as there were no takers. There are some that do restore old radios but most of the run of the mill radios are not of much interest to them.
JustABluesGuy
Friend of Leo's
Did you even read my post?
Too bad the Sparton logo couldn't have been worked in
Intubator
Tele-Afflicted
I agree, the face plate was just too worn to use. I may put some kind of a logo on the upper left side of the grill area at some point, maybe something vintage auto related. This radio was saved from the dump by the way, it was not working to those concerned.
