The Deluxe Reverb Club

[BigD]

I had a 68 CPR and now have a 64 CDR HW and tone wise the 64 is much more lush and responsive. I loved the 68 CPR and should have kept it but didn’t. I just piddle around at home and mostly enjoy a thick clean tone. My wife even commented out of the blue about the 64 and it’s great tone and has never done that before. Myself I would prefer a 65 RI over the 68 CDR but I’m no pro and the extra early grit of the 68’s might be more useful to a pro player.

 

[Tenderfoot]

The 64 Custom Deluxe Reverb is outstanding! It reminds me of the Fender amps I purchased back in the sixties. All-around better build quality, especially the tolex covering and pine cabinet (and it is lighter than the DRRI). The mods incorporated in the updated design are really nice (normal channel with reverb and tremolo and voiced to sound like the Bright Channel with the bright cap cut). For home I found I prefer the Normal Channel 2 which sounds best (to my ears) when playing classic country at a Vol 3, Bass 4 Treble 3.5 and Reverb at 3.5 using my CS Telecaster (Postmodern) with Pickup Wizard 1965-1968 pickups. For Bakersfield I use the Bright 2 input with same settings as the Normal channel input 2. If I should gig with the amp (haven't done this in 25 years with the exception of a couple of open mikes) I would probably use input 1 for Normal and Bright depending on the music being played. IMHO Fender has listened to the consumers and taken note of the most desired end user mods over the past years.

I have updated my Avatar to show my CS Tele & 64 CDR Hand Wired. The Tone King Imperial (previously pictured) was a great amp and there were no other Blackface sounding amps that I liked until the 64 CDR Hand Wired came out.

For those seeking a schematic of the 64 CDR Hand Wired the following is Fender's response to an email I sent to their Customer Care asking for one and bias voltage:

Pete Reilly (Fender)

Dec 4, 07:42 MST

Hello Edward,

We are not at liberty to send out complete schematics on a current production model. The bias is 30 millivolts. Thank you

Regards,

Pete Riley - Representative,

Consumer Relations /U.S. Direct Sales
Fender Musical Instruments Corp.
17600 N. Perimeter Drive, Suite 100 Scottsdale, AZ 85255
Telephone: 480-845-5644
Fax: 480-367-5262

Fender Play: The easiest way to learn guitar. Start playing now.

 

[moosie]

No schematics for repair people to reference when servicing the amp? That seems very strange. It's not like it's gooped... I wonder if there's a user-drawn schematic online somewhere.

 

[Steamroller]

Hi

It's possible to use the tremolo without pedal in a 64 HW using a shorting jack plug or something like that?

Thanks

 

[Tenderfoot]

The Footswitch jack is dual input requiring a dual channel male input jack plug (like the one on the footswitch that comes with the amp). If you have such a jack plug then you will be able to control the reverb and tremolo using the amp knobs.

 

[Bill Moore]

Reverb is defeated by shorting the signal to ground.
Vibrato is engaged by shorting to ground. You can engage the vibrato by jumping the connections in the plug.

 

[Tenderfoot]

The 64 Custom Deluxe Reverb is outstanding! It reminds me of the Fender amps I purchased back in the sixties. All-around better build quality, especially the tolex covering and pine cabinet (and it is lighter than the DRRI). The mods incorporated in the updated design are really nice (normal channel with reverb and tremolo and voiced to sound like the Bright Channel with the bright cap cut). For home I found I prefer the Normal Channel 2 which sounds best (to my ears) when playing classic country at a Vol 3, Bass 4 Treble 3.5 and Reverb at 3.5 using my CS Telecaster (Postmodern) with Pickup Wizard 1965-1968 pickups. For Bakersfield I use the Bright 2 input with same settings as the Normal channel input 2. If I should gig with the amp (haven't done this in 25 years with the exception of a couple of open mikes) I would probably use input 1 for Normal and Bright depending on the music being played. IMHO Fender has listened to the consumers and taken note of the most desired end user mods over the past years.

I have updated my Avatar to show my CS Tele & 64 CDR Hand Wired. The Tone King Imperial (previously pictured) was a great amp and there were no other Blackface sounding amps that I liked until the 64 CDR Hand Wired came out.

For those seeking a schematic of the 64 CDR Hand Wired the following is Fender's response to an email I sent to their Customer Care asking for one and bias voltage:

Pete Reilly (Fender)

Dec 4, 07:42 MST

Hello Edward,

We are not at liberty to send out complete schematics on a current production model. The bias is 30 millivolts. Thank you

Regards,

Pete Riley - Representative,

Consumer Relations /U.S. Direct Sales
Fender Musical Instruments Corp.
17600 N. Perimeter Drive, Suite 100 Scottsdale, AZ 85255
Telephone: 480-845-5644
Fax: 480-367-5262

Fender Play: The easiest way to learn guitar. Start playing now.

Got an update on the biasing of the 64 CDR Hand Wired.

Called Fender Consumer Relations today to see if I could convince someone to send me the schematic for this amp. No DICE! According to the CR Rep Fender will not release the schematic to consumers while the amp is in production (only Authorized Service Center will receive the schematic). When I asked him what the bias parameters were he told me the Service Manual stated 23ma's (this is different that what was quoted in the above email from Fender Consumer relations). He was not able to give me the Plate Voltage as he had no schematic saying there were only pictures in the Service Manual with captions stating the heater & pilot light voltage and the 23ma's bias current (in the same breath he also said he didn't know how to read schematics very well). I told him that knowing the design Plate Voltage was important as I might be installing a set of NOS 6V6GT's. He said he would research and send an email with the plate voltage information (so far I not received anything). I will update this thread once I hear back from Fender.

 

[moosie]

Got an update on the biasing of the 64 CDR Hand Wired

Is Fender this restrictive with schematics of all current production? Players are supposed to schlep their amp all the way to some unknown guy, because their long time tech can't get a copy of the schematic?

Yet they release guitar wiring diagrams, which are much, much easier to reverse engineer, quite readily.


That said, biasing is not normally done with one fixed number. It's done with a combination of listening, and measuring plate voltages (or similar) in real time to determine the max dissipation of the tubes, so you can stay out of redplate zone. Respectfully, whomever is biasing your amp should be able to do that, or I wouldn't trust them to try.

 

[INFANT]

The last Fender amp I bought was a little over 10 years ago. I recall that in the package with the owners manual was a copy of the component layout and a schematic. My son's little Bronco and both my Blues Deluxe and HR Deluxe amps had them. I take it that they have stopped doing this now?

 

[rdwhitti]

The last Fender amp I bought was a little over 10 years ago. I recall that in the package with the owners manual was a copy of the component layout and a schematic. My son's little Bronco and both my Blues Deluxe and HR Deluxe amps had them. I take it that they have stopped doing this now?

I was thinking the same thing.

 

[gridlock]

Well I sold my 1974 DR last September and yesterday I bought another 1974 DR.

Hope to keep this one for awhile.

 

[drbryson]

For the Fender 64 Custom Deluxe Reverb hand wired amp this is biasing info I found on the web.

BIAS current is 23mA per Power Tube and the Plate voltage is around 405 volts. There are 1 ohm resistors (with a diode in parallel) mounted on terminal strips between the power transformer and main board. These 1 ohm resistors are between each 6V6‘s cathode (pin 8) and ground and the bias measurements can be taken across the 1 ohm resistors along with the plate voltage measurement at pin 3.

.023A x 405V = 9.3 Watts or 77.5% for 12 watt 6V6 or 66.5% for 14 watt 6V6GTA

6V6 (Sylvania) = 12W
6V6G (Sylvania) = 12W
6V6GT (GE) = 12W
6V6GTA (GE, RCA) = 14W

 

[drbryson]

Fender 64 CDR hand wired bias 1 ohm resistors measurement area near the bias pot.

 

[Snommisbor]

Just found a 67 BFDR. Had to get it since we are the same age. The guy had a 68 Drip Edge SF that he wanted to me to try said it had some good mojo,and it was nice but the birth year 67 just called out to me. All original except front cloth was replaced and not an original speaker but it has a Jenson that is dated 66. Everything else is original.

 

[gridlock]

Really liking my SFDR, the original Utah has holes in it, I may send it to Weber eventually for a recone.

I have a Jensen C12N RI in the amp currently and it sounds good. I'm thinking that I will purchase a new Alessandro speaker this week to try in the amp.

 

[gridlock]

View attachment 586276 Just found a 67 BFDR. Had to get it since we are the same age. The guy had a 68 Drip Edge SF that he wanted to me to try said it had some good mojo,and it was nice but the birth year 67 just called out to me. All original except front cloth was replaced and not an original speaker but it has a Jenson that is dated 66. Everything else is original.

Congrats on the BFDR. I've never owned a BFDR, maybe some day I'll buy one.

Enjoy.

 

[gridlock]

Well, I did it again, my latest SFDR lasted almost a month. Gone...

Replaced with this.

 

[The Blood]

I got a 1990 DRRI a few weeks ago and am loving it. I got it to handle the gigs where the princeton is too small. The prior owner had installed a Weber 12F150 and JJ tubes. Mostly I'm using channel 1 with pedals.

 

[gridlock]

Put an Alessandro in my BFDR. Very happy with the results so far.

 

[cincyguitarplay]

I love this thread,,,,now if I can only find a pic of my 65 DR to post....maybe best amp I have...