Ep. 142: "Paul Jerky"

Summary

The Truth About Vintage Amps with Skip Simmons – Episode 142: "Paul Jerky"

Released on December 24, 2024, "Paul Jerky" dives deep into the world of vintage tube amplifiers, blending technical insights with the podcast’s signature humor and community spirit. Hosted by Skip Simmons under The Fretboard Journal, this episode continues the tradition of addressing listener questions while exploring various facets of amp restoration, repair, and collecting.

---

The Baffle: Unraveling the Musical Mystery

The episode kicks off with Skip and Jason dissecting a captivating piece of vintage Christmas music. Skip muses, “[00:28] 'That's some pretty cool jazzy rockabilly Arch top guitar on that. I wonder who that was. Probably Barney Kessel or somebody.'” The playful banter sets the tone, inviting listeners to engage with the podcast’s unique blend of music appreciation and technical discussion.

---

Listener Questions and Expert Insights

1. Joe from Culver City: Tackling the Tick

Timestamp: [14:17]
Joe’s Inquiry:
Joe, a new listener inspired by the podcast, reaches out with a technical issue concerning his Princeton Reverb-inspired amp. He describes an unwanted ticking sound when using a quarter-inch TRS jack for his vibrato and tremolo footswitch, suspecting a grounding problem.

Skip’s Response:
Skip suggests, “[21:11] 'I think that if you separated those, that tip ring sleeve jack into two separate jacks, and then you ran two separate foot switches, you wouldn't have that problem.'” He elaborates on the potential causes, emphasizing the importance of proper shielding and isolation of the tremolo and reverb circuits to eliminate interference.

2. Nick from Detroit: Power Discrepancies in Fender Champs

Timestamp: [23:49]
Nick’s Concern:
Nick observes a significant difference in current draw between his 1975 and 1978 Silver Face Fender Champs when powered by a Variac. He’s unsure whether this variance is normal or indicative of an underlying issue.

Skip’s Guidance:
Skip advises, “[24:44] 'I’d be looking at the cathode resistor for the power tubes. Make sure it’s, you know, 500. Supposed to be 470.'” He recommends measuring the plate current of each amp’s power tubes to determine if the difference is within acceptable limits or if further investigation is needed.

3. Martin’s Soldering Techniques

Timestamp: [26:22]
Martin’s Query:
Martin asks about Skip’s preferred diameter of Kester 44 flux solder, contrasting his own preference for smaller diameters.

Skip’s Insight:
Skip responds humorously and informatively, “[27:18] 'I use 0.050, which is probably what you’d call your medium size.'” He explains his usage of different solder diameters based on application, favoring vintage solder when possible but not shying away from modern equivalents for practicality.

4. James from the Midwest: Enhancing a 5E3 Kit with Tremolo

Timestamp: [28:39]
James’s Challenge:
James seeks advice on integrating a tremolo system into his 5E3 amp build, debating between complex circuit additions and simpler pedal solutions.

Skip’s Recommendation:
Skip suggests, “[31:53] 'I would try building a tremolo pedal yourself,'” highlighting the benefits and limitations of external pedals versus internal tremolo circuits. He encourages experimentation while cautioning about maintaining the amp’s tonal integrity.

5. Bruce from Nashville: The Angela Super 6V6 Build

Timestamp: [33:28]
Bruce’s Bold Project:
Bruce shares an enthusiastic, manifesto-like email detailing his ambitious modifications to the Angela Super 6V6 amp, incorporating multiple switches and controls to achieve a personalized tonal palette.

Skip’s Encouragement:
Skip praises Bruce’s ingenuity, “[36:10] 'If he did it all and it does work, that’s pretty groovy.'” He underscores the value of community-driven innovation and the rewarding nature of customizing vintage amps to suit individual preferences.

6. Bob from Boulder County: Observations and Food Tips

Timestamp: [37:02]
Bob’s Contributions:
Bob doesn’t pose a question but offers observations on amp terminology and shares a clever recipe for homemade rice using tomato paste and spices.

Skip’s Thoughts:
Skip engages with Bob’s insights, “[38:33] 'That’s some cool stuff right there, Klaus,'” appreciating the blend of technical knowledge and practical tips that enrich the podcast community.

7. Dave: Exploring Multi-Output Guitar Setups

Timestamp: [55:19]
Dave’s Exploration:
Dave inquires about the feasibility of running a single guitar signal through multiple amps optimized for different frequency ranges, inspired by Charlie Hunter’s hybrid guitar setups.

Skip’s Expertise:
Skip analyzes the concept, “[62:33] 'In the hi-fi world for a while, in the 50s when it was still mono, you’d see amps that were bi-amp setups.'” He connects Dave’s idea to historical practices and suggests practical implementations using modern equipment to achieve a balanced, wide-ranging sound.

8. Klaus from Denmark: Creative Amp Configurations

Timestamp: [66:14]
Klaus’s Innovations:
Klaus shares his experiment of using a reverb driver transformer as an output transformer on his Princeton Reverb Reissue, noting improvements in sound quality and amp behavior.

Skip’s Recommendations:
Skip delves into the technical aspects, “[66:17] 'Another weird thing you can do is you can take the output of the reverb tank and put it into the normal channel of a two-channel amp.'” He elaborates on the potential sonic benefits and encourages experimentation while maintaining caution to preserve equipment integrity.

---

Community Highlights and Creative Sharing

Throughout the episode, the hosts foster a sense of community by sharing listener-submitted recipes, holiday tips, and personal anecdotes. From homemade Vesper martinis to inventive chip dips and lasagna recipes, the interjections provide a warm, personable layer to the technical discussions.

Notable Food Tip:
Joe from Culver City shares his Vesper martini recipe: “[14:17] 'It's three ounces of gin, one ounce of vodka, and half an ounce of Cocchi Americano… garnish with a lemon twist.'” This addition exemplifies the podcast’s unique blend of niche interests.

---

Recommendations and Personal Touches

Skip and Jason conclude with recommendations for books and movies, encouraging listeners to engage in offline activities and broaden their cultural horizons. Highlights include:

• Books:
  Skip recommends "Off the Record" by Joe Smith and "Same Place, Same Things" by Tim Gautroux, emphasizing their storytelling and technical insights.

• Movies:
  Suggestions like "Little Miss Sunshine," "Master and Commander," and "Napoleon Dynamite" cater to diverse tastes, reflecting the hosts' eclectic interests.

Skip’s Final Thoughts:
In a heartfelt closing, Skip shares, “[69:55] 'Read a book if, you know, you should read something good and hard that's, like, difficult.'” His encouragement fosters a culture of continuous learning and exploration within the community.

---

Conclusion: A Blend of Expertise and Camaraderie

Episode 142, titled "Paul Jerky," encapsulates the essence of "The Truth About Vintage Amps" by delivering in-depth technical advice while nurturing a vibrant, supportive listener community. Through addressing a spectrum of questions—from grounding issues and power discrepancies to innovative amp configurations—the podcast reinforces its role as an indispensable resource for vintage amp enthusiasts. Simultaneously, the infusion of personal stories, holiday cheer, and culinary creativity ensures that each episode remains engaging, relatable, and uniquely enjoyable.

Whether you’re troubleshooting a vintage amp or seeking inspiration for your next musical project, Episode 142 offers a comprehensive blend of knowledge, humor, and community spirit that epitomizes The Fretboard Journal’s commitment to all things guitar amp-related.

Transcript

[Skip Simmons]

Jingle bell, jingle bell, jingle bell rock.

[Jason]

How are you?

[Skip Simmons]

Yeah. What do you think?

[Jason]

That was great, dude.

[Skip Simmons]

That's some pretty cool jazzy rockabilly Arch top guitar on that. I wonder who that was. Probably Barney Kessel or somebody.

[Jason]

Someone good? Yeah.

[Skip Simmons]

Yeah, someone good. It's pretty ripping. Of course, I'm pretty tired of hearing it.

[Jason]

Yeah.

[Skip Simmons]

It'S the Christmas spectacular.

[Jason]

It is the Christmas Spectacular Truth About Vintage Amps episode. There is some great Christmas music out there, but yeah, some of the old classics. I'm just like, I don't ever need to hear this ever again.

[Skip Simmons]

It's okay even if they were good. But I have listened to that. Cool. All right, that's our baffler for today. Who plays that? It opens with a little arch top rockabilly intro and then there's these little jazzy pew little licks. It sounds like the guy on Bill Haley in the Comets. Just some jazz guy playing rock and roll like Barney Kessel would do, right?

[Jason]

Yeah. Yeah.

[Skip Simmons]

So we want to know to all.

[Jason]

Our listeners, this is the 142nd episode of the Truth About Vintage Amps podcast, where everyone out there, you all should send in your questions to podcastritboardjournal.com I will read them or play them for Skip. You can just record a voice. MEM podcast has a couple of sponsors that I want to give a shout out to our our friends at Grez Guitars, our original OG sponsor. They've got the Mendocino. You'll probably see Barry at the Bay Area Guitar Show, I'm guessing if.

[Skip Simmons]

If we sh on the downsy. But remember that one time he brought a shop guitar that I think was 20 something hundred and he said 16 and we sold it like instantly. Right?

[Jason]

Yeah.

[Skip Simmons]

So that could be happening very early Saturday morning potentially. I'll certainly call out and hammer him about it.

[Jason]

Barry should be there and then if you didn't miss him there and you're somehow going to the NAMM show a week or two later. He's going to be a big part of the Wire Wood Wire and Volt show, which is sort of the Anti NAMM show also taking place in Anaheim January 23rd. 24th. But you should follow Barry at his Instagram just to see what he's up to. He's got a beautiful Mendocino headed to the Music Music Emporium back east right now and so many. I mean his. His guitars are just like beautifully simple designs that just look like they could have come from any era from the 50s on till today. And they're just so cool. We are also brought to you by our friends at Amplified Parts. Your loved ones are probably staring at your workbench and your guitar hobby and going, I don't know what to get you for the holiday. They have gift cards so you could right now tell your loved ones to go get you an Amplified Parts gift card and then you can buy whatever the heck you want. I know we have some questions about some parts that Skip uses that we'll field on this podcast, all of which I think are available at Amplified Parts. So we'll be talking about that.

[Skip Simmons]

I have given people. I've had people buy gift certificates from me to give to someone to come here and blow on whatever they want because they know they didn't really know. Yeah. So do that. So feel free. If you got a. If you've got a housemate, spouse, buddy, want to do something nice for them, give you give them a hundred dollars here and I'll send them home with. With some stuff.

[Jason]

Yeah. I often mention Emerald City Guitars. Our last sponsor, Trevor Boone and company over there not only have one of the coolest guitar stores around, if you ever come through Seattle, you should visit it. They've also got one of the coolest YouTube channels around. They just had Dave Davies flying v. Dave Davies from the Kinks. They had it. They did a whole video on it on their YouTube. They also did one of their guitar RV things with former guest Colleen Fazio and so much more. They've got pretty much everything from 500 Harmony amps to wide panel Fender twins and everything in between. One of my favorite stores in the whole wide world. Tell them the truth about Mini Jam. Sent you. And then our final sponsor, I'm just throwing this in there, is Will Simmons, former Truth About Vintage Jams podcast guest. Let's all remember he's got a new book out. Love and Degradation, Excessive Desires and Queer Feminist Art. I tried to look on Amazon to see if any of them sold from our last week's plug. I'm not sure if any did, but it is.

[Skip Simmons]

Well, I'll tell you, I've never read anything written by someone I know really well. That's something very personal. And I will also say that dude can write. Oh my God. It's like you could just chew on a paragraph for a long time.

[Jason]

Had he been working on this for years?

[Skip Simmons]

He's been writing for a long time. But yeah, you know, it's not something I pretty much tend to go with schematics, you know, and just super dry stuff or more escapist. You Know kind of stuff right. Where I'm just kind of going to zone out while my wife found a regular over the air TV channel and all they play is the Office. That's it. And commercials in between. So she has the Office all the time. So I don't usually read stuff that really requires a lot of concentration. But it's very. He's very good and very intense.

[Jason]

Yeah. All I can say, there's one of those channels that only shows Supermarket Sweep, the game show. And I. I'm gonna throw her under the bus right now. My sister was on that show in probably 1990, I'd say maybe 92. And every time I see that show, I, I think, I mean they've probably recorded 4,000 episodes. So it's like a 1 in 4,000 chance that I'll see my sister on there. But. But I've never seen it.

[Skip Simmons]

Just gotta keep it going.

[Jason]

I know it's every time I see that free Supermarket Sweep channel, I'm like, I gotta try. It's like rolling the dice. Is this gonna be my sister's episode? But no, it's never been Anyway.

[Skip Simmons]

The Office is great. I have to say. It is great.

[Jason]

Oh yeah.

[Skip Simmons]

Even after Michael Scott they managed to keep it pretty interesting for a good long time. And you know, I can't remember Ryan in that. BJ Novak I believe is the actor's name. Yeah, we saw a movie that he starred in a few years ago that was really good. And he had gone on a date once with someone and never seen her again. And then two years later her family gets in touch with them because she told him that they were this big thing and she's died, she's been killed and he gets like dragged back. They all think that they're like boyfriend and girlfriend and have been forever, but to him she's like someone he went out with once two years ago. It's really good. I wish I could think of the name, but I'm sure if you googled that actor, you could see that he starred in that movie. And I'm going to have a bunch of movie and book recommendations because I want people to get off the Internet during Christmas. And that was one of them. We just sort of segued into it. So. Yes, perfect.

[Jason]

Over on our Patreon page, which everyone should go follow, you can not only get to the front of the line with your amp questions, but listener John from Chicago just made a spreadsheet of everything that he needed to build the Angela single ended amp build from amplified parts. So it's just a parts list that folks can use to.

[Skip Simmons]

People love doing that.

[Jason]

People love building stuff and working on amps.

[Skip Simmons]

Yeah, well, I don't prep that much. The appliance guru who showed me how you fix a washer in 10 seconds. I was the guru before that because I was showing him how to work on tube amps. And he's that kind of guy where he'll call me up and say, okay, I have my parts list already. I'm going live. Parts list, just get cracking. But it's good people that are organized like that, and that'd probably be helpful for some other people who are getting ready to start building some stuff. I'm thinking about building another tweed Harvard in this little acoustic brand amp that was given to me recently. Like a little 110 solid state. Good quality, but has just the right chassis and just the right size. And building something like that is fun. And thanks for that. Paul Virkey, who I call Paul Jerky because he makes unbelievable jerky. And again, just like we're always talking people that just go so far out. He could have spent 20 minutes telling me how he picked the bourbon that he wanted to use for the jerky and how he has to go to the special meat shop and get just this blah, blah, blah. Hey, if we have a Hallmark, one of them is people who are. Take it out there. Just like, no, I think I'll do this even better no matter how much time it takes. So that's a good thing.

[Jason]

Does he sell this stuff?

[Skip Simmons]

I don't think so. I think it's all personal. Even though it has a little label and it has the seal immediately. You know, the. The vacuum packer thing. He's a very serious amateur, I think. I wish. I wish he would. It was really good here.

[Jason]

Here's my goal for 2025. Well, I have a few. But a few years ago on this, we made a cookbook of everybody's recipes. I compiled a cookbook, and I think it's still free online. People can still find it. If you can't, let me know and I'll send it to you. But next year, this time of year, let's make a gift guide of stuff made by Tava listeners that has nothing to do with amps that you can buy for your loved ones.

[Skip Simmons]

Like it?

[Jason]

Because we've had mango farmers on this show. Now we've got Jerky. I'm forgetting of a million other things, but I know a lot of who.

[Skip Simmons]

Write about stuff that's not amps.

[Jason]

Yeah, we'll just make this cool, weird list. And the only thing tying everything together will be that you all listen to the truth about vintage amps and make stuff.

[Skip Simmons]

Wow.

[Jason]

That's my goal. You can start sending it to me now and I'll have it ready for fall of 2025.

[Skip Simmons]

Well, I'm. Of course, we didn't know what was going to happen when we started doing this at all. Right. We just started yakking. But I am glad that it's not. What's the right word would start with mono, Like M O, N o something. You know, it's. It's very. It's certainly not all about amps.

[Jason]

No, it's evolved. It's, you know, could have gone various ways. It could have just gotten very geeky and boring. It could have gone very lightweight and jokey. But I feel like we've straddled a nice line.

[Skip Simmons]

Yes. Like the Davis, the Davis PA head I'm fixing up. Made in Texas.

[Jason]

Okay.

[Skip Simmons]

This is from 1970 and they have this like solid wood cabinet like furniture. If you went out and started looking on the reverb or ebay for Davis Brand PA heads, you'd probably see some. They tend to be EL84s and they're kind of late 60s, but they have this really cool furniture looking wood cabinet. Well, this thing has a switch on the back that says tube saver. Tube saver. I could make it a baffler, see if we could get people to try to guess what it does. But what it really does is so smart. Power transformers usually just have two wires on the primary side, the part that plugs into the wall. Right. Well, this thing has three wires on the primary side because when you flip the switch, it changes it to a different winding which lowers the voltages going to the amp, the B and the filaments. And there's a little description in the little owner's manual thingy I have that says you put it in this position and the tubes will last 20% longer. And that is how really groovy boutique amps. Hi. Bill Kernard T Rock they have, they can afford to have transformers that actually change the windings. Every other way that you try to lower the power of an amp is sort of a compromise. I've always said, you know, it's hard to make a high powered amp sound like a low powered amp. But this was done way, way back. Not so much to change the sound of the amp, but just to have this position where it would run. Super cool. It said recommended for continuous duty, which of course Means just turning it on and leaving it on forever. So I'll be bringing that one down two EL84s, but it doesn't sound like a box. It's just big and clean and loud sounding and you can flip the tube saver switch if you want. Nothing new under the sun, right?

[Jason]

Yeah. Well this reminds me, since you bringing up Davis, which is a town in California, the town right next to Davis where he used to live. Dixon, one of our listeners just launched the Dixon amplifier company dixonamplifier.com he's not in Dixon. I think he's in the Bay Area.

[Skip Simmons]

Is his name Dixon?

[Jason]

I don't know what his name is. That's a good point. But he's making a cool, really retro looking 15 watt 260v6amp. I'll include a link in the show notes. Everybody go follow that guy.

[Skip Simmons]

We'll see.

[Jason]

Yeah, we'll see.

[Skip Simmons]

Everybody's doing that. But he does have a good name.

[Jason]

Yeah, he does. We have lots of questions that have been submitted. Please keep Those coming to podcastritboardjournal.com please send us your voice memo. You can just record it on your smartphone and hit send or an email with photos we'll take either. You ready to just field some questions and comments?

[Skip Simmons]

We better or it could just dissolve into rambling.

[Jason]

This first one is from listener Joe.

[C]

Hey Skip and Jason. This is Joe from Culver City. I'm a relatively new listener. Got hip to your show by my friend Tim in Ojai. I've been commuting to a gig in Studio City for the last three months and you know Los Angeles, it's 10 miles and hour and a half of spare time on your hands. Anyway, thank you so much for all you guys are doing with the show. You inspired me to do my first build which will be the 5F 2A. Also picked up Marlon Blenco's book Designing Two Preamps for Guitar and bass. Trying to teach myself from the ground up here. Not only learn how to read schematics but how to understand them. Anyway, onto the question. I've got a Princeton reverb inspired amp of sorts. It's got a an extra knob that dials out the negative feedback as you crank it. Anyway, it's got a quarter inch TRS jack for the virb and trem foot switch as opposed to the normal RCAs. And both the verb and trim independently work great but with the foot switch connected with the virb and trim engaged, I get that sort of optical trem tick sound which I know it's not that because it's a bias driven tram and it works fine without the foot switch connected. I've tried different TRS cables to the foot switch, I've replaced the braided wires to the tank and I'm coming up short. So the only theory my half baked consciousness can conjure up at this point is that there's some kind of grounding issue with the foot switch itself. But then again, I wouldn't be calling you if I had good ideas. So onto the recipe portion. Today I bring you the Vesper martini, named after the character Vesper linda from the 1953 Bond novel Casino Royale. Now, this is a very simple drink, but it'll kick you on your ass if you're not careful. So try to limit yourself to one. It's three ounces of gin, one ounce of vodka, and this is the make or break part of the recipe. You have to use a half ounce of Cocchi Americano, which is an aromatic wine, sort of a fancy way of saying vermouth with extra herbal ingredients. Now, when Bond ordered the drink, he asked for a half measure of quino, which we know today as the Les Blanc, which you guys have mentioned on the show previously. But in 1986, Lillet Blanc removed the quinine from their recipe and totally changed the profile of the fortified wine. But luckily these days you can easily get Cocchi Americano here stateside, which is very close to the original recipe and it's fantastic. I highly recommend it. After chasing down a parasitic oscillation in a fender twin last thing, rub the rind of a lemon twist on the rim, garnish and you're good to go. Before I do that, I'd like to give a quick shout out to my boy Jan at Body and Soul Instruments in San Francisco. I own, I think, at least six of his fuzzes now, and he's just got some of the best ears in the business. Give him a follow on Instagram. And thank you, Skip and Jason, for everything you do with the podcast. I wish you both a splendid holiday. I look forward to Skip's thoughts on what makes my foot tick.

[Jason]

Wow.

[Skip Simmons]

Wow. Wow is right. Yan reference. A guy that didn't know Jack, right? Like, didn't he? I don't even think he had a soldering iron. And then he just. I hate people like that. Supposed to. Supposed to take forever to learn how to do something good and people come along and just do something good right off the bat. We're gonna hold. Guy called me up a few months ago down By Fresno way south California. He says, there's a guy down here on Facebook Marketplace, some old ham radio guy or something. He has a bunch of tubes that he wants a thousand dollars, and he doesn't even want to see you if you're not ready to pay a thousand dollars. And I said, well, a thousand dollars worth of tubes that I'm putting in the garbage can wouldn't be good. But I gave him a straight up like 10 minute thing about what to look for. Because, you know, if it's tubes for audio as opposed to tubes for color television sets, I throw away hundreds of tubes every year. They're absolutely worthless. So I didn't want the guy going nuts. I didn't hear from him for a long, long time. Month, two months maybe. And he calls me up out of the blue and says, I got all those tubes. There's 66.0Amperex Bugle Boy, 12ax7s in this one tube caddy as part of the pile. Those are worth a hundred dollars a piece. And next thing I know, he's coming up here with eight repairs because over the last few months he started listening to the podcast, got all into it, bought a bunch of old stuff, brought it all up here, brought all the tubes and just left them with me. And it's nice to have people trust you. But this one tube caddy with those are some of the finest 12x7s made like Telefunkens. And to find something like that, it's some ham dog. And we're talking nos in the box because you know, the first thing I told him was a tube in a box. Nine times out of 10, you open up the box and the tube, that is not the tube that came in the box. It's just some old worn out tube that the cheapskate guy stuck back in the box but in. And there were quite a few like that as well. But the, but the stack of 12 AX7s, that's the most profitable tube pile I've ever seen. Dang. Yeah. Why did I veer onto that?

[Jason]

I don't know. You didn't want to talk about Joe's foot?

[Skip Simmons]

No. Joe's foot. Well, that was a. That was a good. That was a good voicemail.

[Jason]

Yeah, he's got a good audio quality, good quality.

[Skip Simmons]

And he obviously hasn't had one of those four ounce martinis yet when he did that. You might want to shake that up. Stir it. I split it.

[Jason]

Maybe someone else spirits history lesson in terms of ingredients and all that other stuff. Yeah.

[Skip Simmons]

Well, there again you know, somebody who just takes it a little bit more seriously because they want to. My only theory on his foot. So he's got tremolo and reverb foot switch, but they combine on one jack, which is a tip ring sleeve, instead of having two separate ones. My only tip is that fender foot switches that turn tremolo and reverb on and off. They have. The reverb wire is shielded, but the tremolo wire is outside the shield. It's not shielded. It's next to the shielded wire. And that's the one that turns the tremolo on and off. So I. I think that if you separated those, that tip ring sleeve jack into two separate jacks, and then you ran two separate foot switches, you wouldn't have that problem. But I believe he might have a chance of fixing it by having the shielded. The shielded wire only be the reverb one and have the tremolo wire be outside the shield. That's what I'm hoping, because they're talking to each other somehow, right? I've even seen cases where the tremolo would start ticking only when the reverb was on. And that's because some of the wires inside this particular amp had gotten too close together. And, you know, two wires in two bamps. There's a reason why all those parts are exactly where they are. They can start yakking to each other through. Through space time. Space continuum. Don't ask me how, but I know it happens. So for the ticking foot, see if you can drum up even one of those crappy Fender reissue foot switches has wire like that. One reverb shielded tremolo wire plane and report back because we want to know if that fixes it.

[Jason]

Yeah. Thanks for submitting your first question. Yeah, listener Nick in Detroit included a picture, but I didn't send it to you. For a handful of years now, I've been enjoying my economically priced red Variac modded with a digital display. It's been very dependable, and I recommend it to everyone. But it has also distracted me while bench checking my two silver face Fender champs side by side. One champ is in 1975, and the other is 1978. They both function normally. However, one appears to be drawing more amps and significantly more wattage than the other. The difference appears to be big enough to warrant a Tava question. And then he included the photo. I posted this phenomenon a while back to the keggers on Facebook, and we went around for a little while. One kegr said to verify they have the Same power transformer and they do indeed match to even the playing field. Further, I swapped the tubes and speaker, which didn't change any readings. I checked all the basics on the hotter one and they are measuring within spec. So Skip, is this one of those shut up and play it scenarios or do these differences warrant further investigation? So his 1978 Champion on his Variac is drawing 0.33amps on current and 36.7 watts of power is 75.46amps of current and 50.8 watts of power.

[Skip Simmons]

Watts are confusing. We talk about watts as far as how many watts an amp puts out. That's like the power that it puts out a Marshall 50 watt or a Marshall 100 watt. But if you look at some old ancient silver tone tweed champ looking thing, sometimes you'll see a sticker on the back that says like 80 watts. Well, we know that can't be right. That's how much it uses and wattage can be used to determine either of those things. I never use watts to determine how much juice that the amp is drawing because my, my Variac uses amperes instead. But they're both, you know, and there's a math between them. I'm sure they're, but they're both just, they're just different ways of, of reading it. So one amp is one amp, one amplifier is drawn 0.33.

[Jason]

Yep.

[Skip Simmons]

And the other one is 0.4 something 0.46. I say close enough, but I'd be looking, I'd be looking at the cathode resistor for the power tubes. Make sure it's, you know, 500. Supposed to be 470. And sometimes they'll go up, up, up, up, up, you know, and sometimes they'll overheat. Also that bypass capacitor that's in parallel with the cathode resistor on Silver Face Champs is notorious. I, I generally change that all the time. And if either of those two things go weird, then one amp might draw a little bit more current. So we could determine that by actually measuring the plate current of each amp. That's how much juice just the 6v6 is drawing, not the whole thing. So if this question was perfect, he might say, well, one amp, one of the champs, the plate current is 35 milliamps and the other one is 38 milliamps. And I would say, well, there's a little difference there, but close enough. If one was 10 and one was 50, then something's wrong. So check out that output stage, measure the actual plate Current of the power tubes. Another thing you can do is you can take the power tube out and turn both of them on and see what they read. Now if one's a little bit higher than the other one, it might be just a little difference in the power transformer. But if you take the power tubes out and they both run exactly the same, which isn't going to be very much without a power tube like 0.2 or something. Right. That'll tell you that there's really nothing wrong with the amp. It's something up with the, with the 6V6. How's that?

[Jason]

That was great.

[Skip Simmons]

Okay. Measure, play current of each one.

[Jason]

Martin says Skip mentioned in episode 138 that he uses Kester 44 flux solder. I'm curious as to which diameter of this product Skip prefers and why. I have a preference for the smaller diameter solder because it seems to melt more evenly. To Skip, use multiple diameters of solder depending on the application. For example, larger diameter for caps and smaller for resistors. That's from Martin.

[Skip Simmons]

I couldn't formulate the joke quick enough. Nah. Or just. Well, it depends on if I'm working on pre war stuff or not. Right. It's like one time I told people I was going to sell gloves that you put on to handle tubes because everybody knows if you touch a tube, it leaves oil on the tube and then when you turn the amp on, the tube breaks.

[Jason]

I think I asked that question on an early episode.

[Skip Simmons]

Yeah. And I said, well, you have to have gloves. Special ones for 12x7s, different ones for 6v6s. I sell the whole line, of course. Skip simmons amp tube gloves.com 0.0 5.050 Smaller is way more common for small stuff. Little pencil soldering irons and printed circuit boards and stuff. Bigger is a pain. Only once in a while would you need that much solder. So I use 0.050, which is probably what you'd call your medium size. And they have it at, at our sponsor. Yeah, it's still, still fine. I, I use vintage when I can get it, but I also use plenty of the regular stuff. And that's, that's just a solder that's been around for a million years that they never really changed. And I don't like the lead free part of it is because it doesn't look right. And I know people say, what the hell are you talking about a solder joint looking right? Well, some of the stuff I do, people are looking at it at the solder joints. And I want it to look right, like Lillian Lupe did it, you know. And the lead free just doesn't really quite do it for me.

[Jason]

Sure makes sense. You ready for another one?

[Skip Simmons]

Ready.

[Jason]

Okay, this one is from James.

[D]

Hello, Jason and Skip. This is James. I'm a little southwest of St. Louis and in the garage you can hear the water running. So here's a genuine hillbilly tip. If you got a little space, put in one of those inflatable Coleman hot tubs and make the wife really, really happy. Speaking of happy, I recently picked up a 5e3 kit to build and really want to add a tremolo to it. And it seems like the options are from adding a full vibr Lux circuit to it, which seems pretty complicated, to just adding an effects loop and putting a pedal to it. Of course, I can't help but wonder, what would Skip do? And finally, a quick food tip that all the kids here like. Take two room temperature packages of cream cheese, a can of rotel, which is diced tomatoes and chilies, and a half a package of taco seasoning. You blend it together real well and let it sit for a minute. And we like dipping it with just potato chips, but anything will do. And that's it. Thank you so much for everything, guys. You're the best. Keep it up.

[Skip Simmons]

That is mellow. I think he's in the, the actual spa thingy and has been for a couple hours. Maybe after one of those martinis. Right. He is relaxed. That rotel and cream cheese thing, that's trouble. That's like the sour cream and French dry soup mix. Crap dip, just like, like so good. But then about 10 minutes later you're going, oh, I think I'm on a barf. But no, that is a. That's a great dip. Yes. And definitely cool for kids, right? And. And the chip department. A pretty big store in Marysville that I never go to, but now I've started going to it because my little local store was closed for a while. It's like a Mexican grocery store kinda. Well, I mean, it is, but they don't wanna just have Mexican stuff. They got everything. More beer than I had at the regular store. Huge meat shop, butcher department. You know, you could say, yeah, give me that chuck roast and grind it for me. And they just say, absolutely no problem. And the chip collection, Whoa. All sorts of ones that they make there at the store. And every different kind, right? We like Juan Tonio' Those are really good restaurant style chips. But if you got a Mexican or Hispanic grocery Store in your neighborhood. Check it out. The spices and all the little plastic envelopes are like a fraction of what they cost when they say shilling or whatever in the little jar. And a lot of stuff, just especially the meat. Nothing. All wrapped up on Styrofoam. No. You point to it and go, yeah, give me one of those. Give me some of that. And check it out. So let's see.

[Jason]

5V3 kit.

[Skip Simmons]

5V3. I would if I really wanted, if I really had to have it. You, what you really want is a tweed Vibrocks. Just build that instead of the Tweed Deluxe because it has tremolo effects loop, I guess. But most people will tell you that a tremolo pedal between the guitar and the amp will work fine too. So the cheap date would be to just buy some new tremolo pedal from someplace that you can send it back if you don't like it and just put it between the guitar and the amp. I'm thinking about building a tremolo pedal myself. I got. I got some ideas. My problem is all the tremolos that sound really cool, they're. They happen in the amp. They don't happen between the guitar and the amp. So all you really are doing is kind of simulating a tone, which of course we can do really well, you know, but it's not quite the same, you know, Bias modulating tremolo makes the power tubes go loud, soft, loud, soft, loud, soft. Well, nothing between the guitar and the amp is ever going to do that, right? So tweed vibr lux is not much more, not really any more complicated than a Tweed Deluxe. So you might try building that instead. And you better have not only the schematic, but the layout. And you better build it exactly like that or it might not work great.

[Jason]

I love it. This next one has a lot of words in all caps and bold, so it sort of reads like a manifesto.

[Skip Simmons]

I'm not sure I've got that typewriter. I got a typewriter that only types caps. I gotta give it to somebody who just talks really loud. It's for the telegraph office. Office. It's called a type. A telegraph mill or something.

[Jason]

You may want to give it to Bruce in Nashville based off of this email I'm going to.

[Skip Simmons]

All caps, baby.

[Jason]

Angela Instrument Super 6v6 build is the subject line in tribute to Steve M. Steve Melkasethian Skip gets it. I'm sure he says. Here's a wigged out tip for my fellow Angela Super 6v6 wannabe builder wanks. That should inspire you all to get those hot irons a heating do like me and build yourself a real cool Angela Super 6v6 vibro champ. And start with a Vibro Champ replica kit for a massive jump start. Sure, I could send a schematic and a long narrative telling exactly how I did it. And oh, how I laugh hearing Jason try to read through all the technical mumbo jumbo. But that's just not my way. Nope. I want you schnooks to try and learn something on you your own here. Jack. First bone up. Yeah, there's a lot of bold here too. That I'm not doing justice. First bone up and build yourself a solid state rectifier. To properly watch this thing at the right voltage, you ought to know what voltage that is if you've been listening to Skip. And watch it, Sparky. It gets crowded real fast down there under the hood. Then hijack the unused rectifier tube socket hole for the second 6V6 socket. Genius, right? I hate punching out tube socket holes. Then install the Angela Tweed style tone pot where the treble knob goes on the panel. You did get a black panel, right? Then put the Angela bright deep switch where the bass knob goes on your panel. That switch looks righteous right smack in between the other four knobs. I won't tell you where to stick the Angela twang switch. Go think for yourself because I've already told you too much. Or just go full Simmons and skip it altogether. And now the peace de resistance. Damn it, Jason, speak English. Retain the tremolo circuit. Even you mudden heads can figure out how to do that on your own. My slack jawed champ playing jam mates. Gawk and amazement when I sneak this beast in and unleash the happy springtime sound through the lens of the swamp. It's the loudest Vibro champ they've ever heard. And I never tell my secret. And please don't hack up a real Fender Vibro champ to do this. Get a replica skit kit or Skip will be frenzied. Class dismissed. That's Bruce in Nashville.

[Skip Simmons]

Wow.

[Jason]

Yeah, wow.

[Skip Simmons]

Well, that's some free thinking. And the bottom line is, if they. If he was asking me if all that stuff would work, I would have said, well, I don't know. But the fact that he did it all and it does work, that's pretty groovy. Don't write in all caps but that you did it and you're using it and you're flipping people out. That's beautiful. Maybe somebody that guy plays with is going to say, I got to get a soldering iron.

[Jason]

Yeah.

[Skip Simmons]

Beautiful.

[Jason]

That was beautiful. Thank you for sending that in, Bruce. We have a few more. Believe it or not, this one comes from listener Bob, who sent us more than a few questions over the last several years. You too can be like Bob. Send us a voice memo or email to podcastritboardjournal.com I skipping Jason.

[E]

Bob in Boulder County, Colorado. No question. Today, just an observation and a food tip. Observation is the use of the word tolex. It's kind of like Kleenex. It's very generic term. Fender started using it in 1960 according to the Tom Wheeler book, and Fender doesn't even use it anymore. But we still call anything that's on an amp that's not tweed Tolex, so it's not really correct. Food tip. If you want to make little Charlie's Rice and you don't have El Pado on hand, do a Google search for El Pado recipe and you can make the rice using tomato paste and a combination of the spices and seasonings that you probably have on hand, including garlic powder, cumin, onion powder, paprika, etc. Jason, I saw your YouTube from a while back in the interview with Guitar Magic, and you don't look anything like I thought you were going to look. It was kind of a revelation. And I hope you are going to come out skiing with Pete Henriksen this winter because I'd like to make a few turns with you. Happy holidays, keggers. As always, appreciate being part of this great community.

[Skip Simmons]

Wow, I didn't know you had that eye in the middle of your forehead or something. I don't know.

[Jason]

I only have one eye.

[Skip Simmons]

Yeah, well, Tol X is a brand name. Yes, like Kleenex or Variac. But don't spend too much time worrying about that. And what was the other thing after the Tolex comment that he watched the.

[Jason]

Video of me talking.

[Skip Simmons]

Oh, yes.

[Jason]

Yeah. And then he wants to go skiing with me, which is nice.

[Skip Simmons]

Yeah, that is cool. How far do you have to go to ski an hour?

[Jason]

I go to. I go to the closest to Seattle ski resort, which is if nearest you, it'd probably be the equivalent of like Boreal. I can go up there in less, you know, in about an hour. Ski for a few hours and come back and no one's the wiser. The other resorts are all two to two plus hours away from Seattle.

[Skip Simmons]

Okay, Just had to ask. Keep going.

[Jason]

Yeah. Well, no, Bob, Bob, if I do make it to Colorado, I will definitely reach out to you and Peter Henriksen of Henriksen Amplifiers and whoever else wants to go skiing and is in amps in Colorado.

[Skip Simmons]

Colorado. What's the number for 911? Remember you're not 25 when you go to Colorado.

[Jason]

It's true. Okay, our next letter is from Brian. I'm going to be reading all sorts of weird emails here. Hey Jason. Hey Skip. Brian from Bakersfield here. Before I read on, do you know who Brian from Bakersfield is? Is one of these people who's in.

[Skip Simmons]

Your probably, but I don't. I don't know for sure.

[Jason]

On your pre Thanksgiving episode, episode 141, Jason mentioned a wicked snowstorm in the Pacific Northwest known as a bomb cyclone. Coincidentally, my family was caught in one just after leaving Skips ranch, headed to my daughters in Eugene for Thanksgiving in 2019. Wow. It's way back. That's five years ago. About two hours north of Skips, this crazy snowstorm hit us out of nowhere. Pretty soon semi trucks were stalling out in all lanes of I5. We turned back headed to Redding for the night when all the freeway lanes dead stopped. And there we sat from 4pm to 1am when they reopened the road. If we hadn't packed hard boiled eggs, leftover Halloween candy and bottled water, we might have perished. The pass remained closed the next day so we had to cancel our holiday and head home. My detour to Loma Rica was to drop off my 1954 tweed Harvard to have Skip service it. I inherited this amp from my dad and it's very special to me. It's all original and in excellent condition, but has never been worked on or serviced. I do most of my own electronic work, but I had wanted the Harvard gone through by the right person. Then I started listening to the TAV podcast and decided that Skip was uniquely qualified to restore a Tweed era amp to its day one sound. When I picked up the amp, Skip told me that everything was in good shape. But he did replace one capacitor. It was a little leaky, pretty good for a 65 year old amplifier. And of course he big time undercharged me for the work. I don't have. I don't cook or have recipes, so here's the food part of my letter. Just before we left Skips, we left him a jar of my wife's homemade secret family recipe cranberry sauce.

[Skip Simmons]

Oh yeah, I remember.

[Jason]

Written on top of the canning jar and Sharpie Happy Thanksgiving from Mrs. Pack In. On the next podcast, episode 25, Skip remarked that he had some on toasted Cornbread, and it was pretty happening. I haven't used the amp that much lately. I plugged it in the other day, ran it down to 110 volts with the Variac. It sounded good. Very clean. And that darn thing is dead quiet. Jason and Skip, thanks for all you do. Don't ever stop. That's from Brian. P.S. on Skip's recommendation, I sent the Harvard's frozen Jensen P10R to Weber for reconing on the questionnaire. I chose the return it original option, and it came out great. Really good service. Would highly recommend them for speaker work.

[Skip Simmons]

It's one person, and he's not a lunatic. That's all I got to say. And he. And he. He's not some kind of been repairing speakers for 75 years. He just worked at Weber and they needed somebody, and he said, I'll do it. And now that's all he does. And it just does a beautiful job and no drama. And they should be sponsors. I tell lots of people to go there, you know, there's lots of people that do it, but not too many of them do. I have 100% approval from customers. Just about everybody that does it. You find. Eventually you find somebody. Yeah, but it took me a year and a half to get that thing back or. Or whatever. Right, sure. So the. The Weber guy is definitely great. And Northern California is not California like you're thinking. We get some pretty serious weather. Not like back east, you know, kind of thing, but we get some high winds and rain and close to the ocean. We've. You. You know, you've experienced it. And I could definitely see going north of Redding, as you're starting to get up towards the Oregon border. There's a pass up there, and we're talking the woods, baby. Like. Yeah, not anything like you're thinking, just like pine trees and really steep hills. So. So there's some. There's definitely some wilderness up there. And whether, you know, we have livestock and stuff, so we're outside all the time, and it makes an impact. But when. But I always think when I was a kid, I never even paid any attention. You know, some town somewhere could have flooded, and I would have never known. I mean, unless your own bedroom was full of water, you would. You don't have the stress of it. But once you get a little bit older, if you live out in the country and you have your own place, weather can be a little tense at times, even in California.

[Jason]

Yeah.

[Skip Simmons]

Yes. And I know some listeners are saying, shut up. You know, you call that weather? It's true. We don't have tornadoes, stuff like that. But there's been a few. There were a few earthquakes out here recently. I didn't feel any of them.

[Jason]

You didn't feel any?

[Skip Simmons]

I didn't feel them.

[Jason]

Maybe when you go to the Bay Area guitar show, you'll get to feel an earthquake.

[Skip Simmons]

Hopefully not.

[Jason]

No, I know.

[Skip Simmons]

Hopefully not. That's challenging enough as it is.

[Jason]

Totally.

[Skip Simmons]

Food. All right, here's food.

[Jason]

Oh, okay.

[Skip Simmons]

Sol s o l food sauce.com solfoodsauce.com no spaces. It's a bay Area company and this stuff is called Peak P I Q U E Hot pepper sauce.

[Jason]

Okay.

[Skip Simmons]

P I Q U E. And it's really like hot vinegar. And you get the soy sauce mixed with that stuff just right. Like a pot sticker sauce. Solfoodsauce.com the Peak Hot pepper sauce, it's not red, it's clear. It's like yellowish. And there's a pepper floating around in it. And it's just this really bright, tangy, vinegary thing with heat. Not, not out of control heat, but some heat. And as a substitute for any type of vinegar or wine in something. And in Asian style stuff, you mix it with just the right little bit of this, of the soy and it's a good one.

[Jason]

Yeah.

[Skip Simmons]

Next.

[Jason]

Yeah. Apropos of nothing, I just thought of when Ian Moore was on this podcast and. And had that salsa that had like the peanuts in it.

[Skip Simmons]

Yes, that was good. Absolutely.

[Jason]

I made that.

[Skip Simmons]

I gotta free my mind.

[Jason]

Yeah. So gonna get Ian back on the show one of these days. Okay. We have a couple that say that they are Christmas themed, so I better read or play those. This one is from longtime member of our community, Jeff Schick. Here we go.

[F]

Skip Jason. Holiday edition Tava. Jeff Schick here. Kennett Square, Pennsylvania. Thanks for everything. You guys do like to talk about a hi fi amp. I stumbled upon also a little bit of another recipe. It's really easy stuff, you know, I'm not inventing anything. Little chicaroni, pepperoni roll. And then, you know, some traditional Christmas music that everybody's gonna laugh at. But any event, a Bell 2325 hi Fi amp new in the box from 1957 local find.

[Skip Simmons]

Wow.

[F]

Dry rotted cord, the whole bit. Really cool. Control panel, slim line tag on it. You know, interesting enough. It's a push pull loudness knob that you turn it on and off with and some filters and level level dial. So I think maybe master volume, volume type of thing, bass treble. But any event it's really cool. I'd like to learn more about it. I'm afraid to turn it on even with the variac, so skip any advice on, you know, warming this baby up even with the Chinese variac, let me know. But cathode feedback was the topic, really, within this amp, and I don't really know anything about it. I just know that when I posted it, some really smart keggers, including Kevin H. Can't pronounce your last name. Kevin Hill something, you know, hey, I got shikatana. It's not so easy, so I feel for you. But any event you talked about or he talked about this cathode feedback through a dedicated tap out of the transformer. And it was typically only used in hi Fi or nice hi Fi amps, like maybe Macintosh. So what the hell is that? And then. All right, pepperoni roll. It's the same dough that you would get from your local shop or grocery store, not frozen. And you square that baby up on your peel. Make sure your oven's up to temp with your stone in there, right? And this one's easy, actually. Some deli pepperoni, thinly sliced, right? Then some thinly sliced provolone from the deli, thinly sliced mozzarella, and that's pretty much it. And maybe you could sprinkle it with a little garlic salt. Not salt, but garlic powder. You know, if you want to flavor it up a little bit, maybe dust the top of it with some oil. But you got a burrito, roll it up, you know, fold those ends in and get it tight. And then seal it up with some, you know, dip your fingers in a little bit of ramekin and water and seal those ends. And make sure it doesn't come apart, because leakers suck on the stone. And then, yeah, gotta watch it. Get it in there, get it cooking. It's, you know, same 455hundo. And you just watch it. You gotta work it a little bit because she needs some attention so she doesn't leak. And, boy, I'll tell you what, you got one hell of a appetizer or even a meal. And it's kind of easy during the week, too, for the kids if they love that kind of stuff or the family does.

[Jason]

So check that out.

[F]

And then, you know what? This one's kind of cheesy, but my mom loved it. God rest your soul. You think about this stuff once in a while. When it comes on, it kind of drills you in the head, but can't say there aren't some keggers and people out there that don't love a little bit of Andy Williams once in a while.

[Skip Simmons]

Right, folks?

[F]

Happy holidays. May the sleigh bells keep ringing. All right, have a great holiday. Keggers, T A V A Skip and Jason. Take care. Happy New Year, boys.

[Skip Simmons]

The. Yeah, he's a. He's a. He's a force to be reckoned with. And he. And you know, he's the guy that got me the pizza stone and definitely kicked up the, you know, the pizza level around here. Right. And he also knows about the Don Pepinos, which should be on our list of essential things to get. That's just so much better than most of the stuff you get in a can. And about 150 years ago, when I was in high school, I worked at a straw hat pizza place. And they did this big. It's a corporate chain. And all of a sudden they decided they wanted us to do a sandwich. And the sandwiches were basically pizz pizza dough just like this wrapped around, like, and sealed up. Not rolled up like a Swiss roll, but like he said, like a burrito with a sort of a fold. And. And you put the egg wash on it so it would seal it up and you'd bake it in the oven and they would have, you know, meatball ones and ham and cheese ones. And so of course, using some pizza dough to make like a real hot pocket. Right. Like kids used to want 10 years ago. That's a good one. I'm down with that now. Hi fi. Yeah, number one, I would have thought it would have gotten a lot bigger by now, but mono hi Fi amps, not stereo, just mono integrated hi Fi amps that are 2.6 V6s or whatever, they sound better than your stereo unless you have a great stereo. And also unless you're willing to absolutely gut the thing and basically just use the transformers, they don't usually do the guitar amp conversion thing very well. The guitar amps that we really like in general are very crude and simple, and they're not high fidelity. That's why when you whack the guitar, they get a little distorted, you know. But hi Fi amps like this bell he's talking about are way, way more sophisticated than that. And he's mentioning inverse feedback, which is a something a lot of high fidelity. Almost all high fidelity amps use where they take a certain amount of the signal from the speaker and they feed it back into the amp, which reduces the gain and it reduces the distortion. And you look inside a 2.6 V6 hi Fi amp and there's about a trillion more parts than there is in the Tweet Deluxe. But fix it. The electrolytics, believe it or not, if they'll pass an ESR test, can often come back to life. But old wax coupling capacitors, that's what you gotta get rid of usually because they'll leak DC and then it makes the amp run crappy. So I wish more people were into that. I, I've been hoarding. Not hoarding. I have a lot of good mono hi fi amps that are just waiting for somebody to say, hey, I want to get into that. You're not going to sit on the couch and put on Dark side of the Moon. You know, get your four ounce martini, go in there. There. It's just like a little amp hooked up even to your computer, especially with Bluetooth and a decent little speaker. And it's like you got a big old radio that just sounds way better than the little computer speakers ever would. Like Fun for cruising YouTube and sitting around and just playing stuff sounds so much better. We have one of the little Bluetooth like little rechargeable speakers and that adds a lot of sound. It's a lot better. But a real tube amp sounds a lot better. I'm surprised I don't have more people coming wanting those. They're also, in my world, they're a lot cheaper. I could see doing one of those amps for somebody for four or five hundred dollars where there's not a whole lot of great PA heads available at that price anymore. Because way more people want a smoking guitar amp than one a little mono hi Fi amp. How's that?

[Jason]

That's great. Did you want to talk about the cathode feedback?

[Skip Simmons]

He didn't give us enough of a description to really say something smart about that. But generally speaking, they take speaker signal and they run it to the cathode of a preamp tube. And if you were to connect and disconnect that thing, when you connect it, the amp would get quieter. When you disconnect it, it'd get way louder. But the whole thing is all about high fidelity. You know, you're looking at stuff on an oscilloscope and you want all the frequency ranges to be duplicated just right. It's kind of the opposite of old guitar amps especially. They're just a simple, crude thing that you change the sound by how you hit the guitar. But hi fi is not supposed to be that way. It's supposed to reproduce the signal that you're Putting into it as accurately as possible. Okay, Plug your guitar into your stereo and you'll go, this is painful, right?

[Jason]

All right, we have one or two more I'll play for you. This one is from listener Dave.

[G]

Hi, Skipping Jason, this is Dave. I have a question and simultaneous music suggestion. So there's a guitarist of great influence, not necessarily great fame, named Charlie Hunter, who plays a hybrid guitar, sometimes baritone, sometimes bass and guitar combined into one instrument. So his thumb and a couple of fingers on his left hand are playing the bass lines. And with whatever other fingers are remaining, he's playing counterpoint melody lines, guitar solo guitar accompaniment. It looks like he's got too many fingers. It's just, it's. It's incredible to watch. And his guitars are custom made where there's a pickup, or at least previously it was. So with the. No, Novak's guitars that he had the Charlie Hunter Novak's guitars, where there was three strings that were designated bass strings with the designated bass pickup with a designated bass output jack, and then there was a regular guitar pickup on the remaining three or four or five strings, depending on what the. If it was a, you know, six, seven or eight string guitar going to a rig, another output jack going to a guitar amp. So my question is in a setup like, like his, where you have a wide range of tones, basically you've got bass and treble and everything in between happening at the same time in the same instrument. And what prompted me was listening to another episode. We were talking about steel string guitar. So you have these super deep strings with super, super high treble. You get this gigantic range. So would it be possible, would it make sense if you had one pickup or one output or even multiple pickups and in multiple outputs to run into some sort of box that then splits that signal into say two or three different amps, a base amp, an amp that says Maybe has a 12 inch speaker in it, something broader range, and then something like an 8 inch speaker that picks up trouble. Tweeter kind of situation. Is that possible? Would that make sense? I don't know if you're going to understand my question, but could you run one really broad spectrum sound, almost like a piano or something, into three different speakers, same signal going into each speaker and just sort of allowing the speaker to project what it's best at projecting and sort of letting that particular device filter out the other frequencies based on what it's capable of handling? I hope that question makes sense. Jason, you should get this guy in the front, but fretboard journal on your Fretboard Journal podcast, something like that. Because he's super talented, really interesting points of view. And he's, he's going to be, I think, more of a legend after his time. Love the podcast. As everybody says. I'm one of the few guys that says that, you know, when, when Skip says, well, people are putting their heads down on their desk. I'm one of those people who is fast asleep, has no idea what the heck you're talking about and probably never will. Thanks.

[Jason]

Wow.

[Skip Simmons]

All right, everyone can take a nap now. Charlie Hunter, Ralph Novak, came to my amp class I had 35 years ago. Wow. Yeah, I made special pot of beans for him because he was a vegetarian. Jason. Yeah, and we had an all day amp class once when I was practically a kid. And he came and of course the fan frets is his thing. And he lives in Oregon, still builds guitars. Charlie Hunter is one of his bigger, you know, customers and he worked with that guy to make something that would do what Charlie Hunter wanted. Which, if you just heard it, I couldn't even describe it, but, but our caller there was right on. It's a super wide ranging sound and when he wants to play those low notes, he doesn't want them to go like on a tweed champ. And yes, there's been all sorts of attempts at doing what he's talking about. One thing that came to mind right off the bat are these obscure amps called Audio Guild. The Audio Guild, Versatone. And it was a combo amp with a 12 and a 10, 8. I think it's probably some different models, but 2amps. So you plug into this thing and internally it would split your sound. So it could go to a bass amp or a treble amp and each one has its own volume control. Also you could take any 2amps. You could take a nice big clean solid state bass amp with a 15, 200 watts and at the same time play a Fender amp, Princeton Reverb. And as long as your guitar can drive both of those amps at the same time, which they can through ab boxes or whatever, then you've got this big wide fidelity thing that you can, can almost get kind of an active tube EQ because you've got a bass volume and a treble volume at that's at that point. And you can actually boost bass and treble and cut. Whereas most of the tone controls and the old junk we mess with are all passive. All they really do is cut stuff. You know, a treble control usually just rolls off highs, but if you have what's called like a bi amp setup. Then you have volume on each frequency. I made some preamps in the past that go between the guitar and the amp. And they basically have a bass volume, a middle volume, and a treble volume. And they all play at once. So you could play just one for super treble E or super bassy, but you can also roll them all up. And as you turn each volume, you're kind of like a real graphic eq. You can actually boost and cut bass, middle treble. Sound city amps from England don't make me work on one. They're a nightmare. But they do that too. They have a totally commercial amp I know of. They have a preamp setup that basically has a treble amp, middle amp, bass amp, not power amps, but in the preamp. And it enables you to have instead of a. An actual treble knob, middle knob, bass knob. You actually have treble volume, middle volume, bass volume. And that's the way they do it. And this guy's not crazy. Start hooking some stuff up. And it'd be curious to know what Charlie Hunter's into. I bet he uses some solid state stuff. You know, he's got a real clean sound. It could just be a twin, you know, along with a solid state amp for the low notes. And you could take your own homebrew guitar. Don't do it with a valuable guitar, please. And put two jacks in it, you know, how about a jack for the neck pickup and a jack for the lead pickup? And run it into 2amps. Little champ, big amp. Mix and match blend. Let the good times roll.

[Jason]

Yeah, thanks for the question, Dave.

[Skip Simmons]

In the hi fi world for a while, in the 50s when it was still mono, you'd see amps that were. That were bi amp setups. So they would have an amp for the lows and an amp for the highs. And each one would have a volume control. And that was part of the eqing of the amp. So nothing new under the sun as usual.

[Jason]

Yeah. Didn't Jack Cassidy play one of those Versa Tones?

[Skip Simmons]

Yes, he did. And they have a very crazy cult following. And there's this guy I know, pro bass player from the Bay Area. He played on Wicked Games. That's a good one, right? Remember that? That guy was from Stockton and. And he's been trying to get to make those again, but they're pretty complicated. And he brought me a whole bunch one time and I fixed a whole bunch of them. And I don't think they ever actually got around to actually making Any new production, but there was some jazz players Cassidy that just really loved it. And when you, when you play one that's working, you can see it's kind of like you got a, a 40 watt amp and a, a 5 watt amp. You know, an amp with a 12 and an amp with an 8 and you can just blend them together in a really cool way.

[Jason]

Yeah.

[Skip Simmons]

Love it. Absolutely.

[Jason]

We have time for one more question or one more comment and this will be from listener Klaus. If anybody out there has submitted a question or voice memo recently, I will. We will get around to it in our next episode. Keep the Questions coming podcast fretboardjournal.com join the Patreon check out our sponsors. And this is from listener Klaus. He says no real questions, just want to share some love. Klaus is in Denmark by the way. First, the only amp related thing, I tried the cool trick of 2024 of using the reverb driver transformer as an output transformer on my Princeton reverb reissue. And it's really cool. Lovely sounds at super low volume. You obviously lose the reverb and tremolo for this particular amp, but you can make up for that with pedals if you need to. Another interesting observ. Normally this amp starts to break up around 4 or so for me, but in this new setup I have to go eight or nine before it starts and even at 10 it's not really fully breaking up. So you can infer from that that there is a decent amount of the distortion this amp normally produces that is coming from the output stage. Skip has talked about this before, I think, and it's not exactly something new that I've discovered. Just a cool way to kind of prove that. Second, the last episode, the topic of Martinelli sparkling apple cider came up. Favorite festive non alcoholic beverage ever. I don't know if this is true anymore, but at least around five years ago they used to come with these soft white plastic pop off caps. A cool trick is to hang onto those and use them as a makeshift bottle cap for your half drunken beer, soda, whatever. They keep a nice tight seal and you can split your lovey and you can split your lovely fizzy drink into multiple sipping sessions this way. I've come back to a beer that was open days ago and it was still fresh and bubbly. Great little hack. Lastly, gotta have a little redneck recipe. I love the crema you get on lots of Mexican food and where I live you can't buy that off the shelves. The real way to make it is to mix some lime juice into heavy cream and let it sit out overnight and become nice and sour and thick. But if you're anything like me, you don't plan that well in advance. So I experimented a bit and found that if you just buy some sour cream and mix in heavy cream and lime juice until the consistency is right, you have instant homemade crema and it's dang near close to the real deal. All the best. Happy holidays to everyone. Keep the show going forever and ever.

[Skip Simmons]

That's some good stuff right there, Klaus.

[Jason]

Making Mexican crema over in Denmark.

[Skip Simmons]

Yes, just that sweet light white stuff that's not quite cheese, but you get it on a lot of enchiladas and stuff like that. That, that's a good call. And I'm sure there's maybe even one of our listeners makes even better by hand, hand pressed, apple sparkling something or other. But Martinelli's has been around for a million years. Aren't they from. I think it's from California probably. And it's just, it's slightly tart and it's very fizzy and any adult could drink a glass or two of it. And kids love it. And I do remember that those, those pop off caps. Of course. That's why I prefer the quart of Miller High Life. So you can screw the top back on, put it back in the fridge for half an hour, come back later. Right. And yes, the reverb transformer will drive a little speaker. And I thought of this last week. I wrote it down. Another weird thing you can do is you can take the output of the reverb tank, which is a little shielded cable with an RCA on it. You can come around to the front of the amp. You'll need a little converter or a little adapter, but you can take the output of the reverb tank and put it into the normal channel of a two channel amp. Like a deluxe reverb or not a Princeton reverb, but a deluxe reverb or twin or something. So if you do that, the reverb works. But now you have volume, treble and bass controls that only work on the reverb. And you can get some sounds out of it that you couldn't normally. So there's another weird, weird thing you can do Easy with a 2 channel amp with. With reverb.

[Jason]

Amazing.

[Skip Simmons]

Yes. And that was a good call. Last week I had two amps exactly the same. One sounded great, one sounded didn't, didn't. They were real old 40s PA heads. Factory one had a 82k resistor. And one had an 820ohm resistor. And you can imagine that a hundred times, thousand times different is gonna. And that's why one of the amps sounded crappy. And it took me a long time because you're looking in there at this old ancient thing. It all looks really original. Finally, I said, wait a minute. That third color of the resistor, right. 820. I need a hobby. Gray, red, brown, and 820. 82K is like gray, red, yellow, but the yellow kind of fades a little bit. And Kernard, Bill Kernard, always telling me that there are. That big companies make mistakes. And since I spend so much time doing Fenders, I hardly ever see mistakes. But really, when you get down to being super stumped, realize that sometimes the thing was made wrong, which he assumes a lot of the time where. And I generally don't. I always go, oh, this must be the way it's supposed to be, because that's the way Fender did it, or RCA did it or whatever. In fact, these two amps were RCAs. They're the. They were ones with the master volume that I was telling you about. One just worked way better than the other one. And that's why, so. And it took me a while. Yeah. To figure that out. And a lot of times you can't just put an ohmmeter on it. You got to disconnect a resistor or you're not going to get a true reading. So there.

[Jason]

All right, well, Skip. We did it. We did another episode of the Truth About Vintage Amps podcast.

[Skip Simmons]

There's more, though.

[Jason]

There is, yes. Do you want to talk about it?

[Skip Simmons]

Got to get you to put down the computer for a few minutes.

[Jason]

Okay.

[Skip Simmons]

Over the next couple weeks. I live. My wife, you know, that's her source, too. But how about a book called off the Record? It was probably from the 90s. It was written by a guy whose name is Joe Smith, who actually was like, this huge Warner Brothers record executive guy, and he was retired. And this book is basically. He calls all the millions of people he's known from. From, you know, Artie shaw in the 40s, all the way up to, like, the Eagles and Prince and whatever, up into the 90s. He calls these people up and says, hey, tell me a story. So they're one or two pages long. And there's obscure people like record producers you never heard of or engineers or famous people like James Brown. You can hear Don Henley talking about the Eagles breaking up and how they got into this fight and Stuff like that. And it's. It's something that you can just kind of pick up and flip open. And it's really. It's really pretty interesting. And I'm sure it would be $5, you know, if you can. If you can find a copy off the record. Joe Smith. If you got a. Someone in your life who works on guitars, I've said it before. Guitar, Electronics for musicians. Big paperback. Donald Brosnac. B R O S N A C. It's a great picture. It's a little dated, but sometimes in a good way. And it's a great. A great book on how a pot works, how a pickup works, how to. How to put it out of phase. How to put it in phase. And I'm on my second copy. I kind of demolished the first one. Right. So that's a good one for people to. To get for someone. I've also mentioned the All Music Guides. They're big, thick paperbacks. Again, put down the computer for a second, flip the thing open to some band you never heard of and read a little bit about. See what the reviewers say about some of your favorite bands. And while you're looking. The Blue Nile. Do you remember that band? Or Scottish.

[Jason]

Yeah.

[Skip Simmons]

Oh, man. A Walk across the Rooftops is the name of the record. And very moody British. Kind of like the Cure. Right. And really good. Tinseltown in the Rain. You just put Tinseltown in the rain on and look out the window at the rain instead of looking at the computer and. And you'll feel better. Right. How about a movie tip from you for people who got me. Yeah. From you. Turn off the computer and watch Little Miss Sunshine. Speaking of the Office. Right. That has Steve Carell in it. That's a great one.

[Jason]

It's a great movie.

[Skip Simmons]

Napoleon Dynamite, if you haven't seen it in 10 years, you know. Really? Yeah. Unless you were never 15 years old, ever. Unless you were born 40. There's something in Napoleon Dynamite for. For everyone. Right. I'm always recommending those great books by Patrick O'Brien, which can be a little hard to get into, but there was a movie with a famous actor, can't remember his name, called Master and Commander. And it's all in the ships and the cannons and all of that stuff, but it only barely touches the surface of what the books are about. But if you have any interest in it, Master and Commander is a pretty. Pretty fun watch and really well done. And if you like it, then it might be an intro into reading some of the novels that inspired the movie. And that is beautiful writing. So beautiful.

[Jason]

Not a Hollywood production at all. But I think I've mentioned this probably on the podcast before. On YouTube. There was a guy in not far from here in Port Townsend rehabilitating this wooden boat called the Tally Ho. I think the YouTube channel is the Samson Boat Company. And that guy just got his boat out on the water and kind of shut down his workshop. And it is just an absolutely beautiful, you know, started during the pandemic. Kind of like this podcast. You can watch every little piece of this 100-year-old wooden boat get restored to, like, fresh out of the factory. And it's mesmerizing. Even if you're not a. A boat person. I'm not a boat person. The other little heartbreaking movie that I watched recently is on Netflix. The only girl in the orchestra which follows, she's a double bassist, Orin O'Brien, who was the first woman in the New York Philharmonic. And she's kind of at the end of her career and starting to. To teach others and starting to kind of like, sell off some of her double basses. And I think anyone who's into guitar gear, anyone who's acquired stuff over the years and become really into this one thing, can relate to, you know, you're kind of like, at the end of your career and should be settling down. And it's like, who's gonna take my hundred thousand dollars double bass? Like, it's. It's beautiful. It's a short film on Netflix.

[Skip Simmons]

That's what I'm talking about. Thanks very much.

[Jason]

Those are my two. Neither holiday related, but there's a lot of great Hallmark holiday shows, too, which I can't tell you about.

[Skip Simmons]

That's okay. Well, I just say read a book if, you know, you should read something good and hard that's, like, difficult. Here's one. I think it's probably from the 80s, very Southern, very Tennessee Williams. Same Place, Same Things is the title, and the author's name is Tim Gautrou. G A U T R E A U X. You know, he's like a literary literature professor in Louisiana or something. And Same Place, Same Things is about six or seven stories, so they're not very long. And the book is very slim. And some of them might only take you, like, 15, 20 minutes. Oh, my God. Beautiful, beautiful, beautiful writing. I remember one is about a guy who travels the country fixing people's irrigation pumps, and he meets. Well, there's some. There's. It's. It's. It's. It's sort of Dark, sort of. Not there. The first one is called Waiting for the Evening News. And this guy is a train engineer on a freight train train. And he's having a bad day and he knows he shouldn't, but he has like a little half pint, you know, of old. Old Jim Beam or something. And right after that, the train crashes and it has a bunch of chemical tanks in it like they do down there, right? And there's this huge fire and this huge disaster, and he freaks out and he just runs for his life. And the book is. Or the story is basically about him coming to. To realize because he thinks he's, you know, he knows he's going to get fired because they're going to test his blood alcohol. Sure, but. But it's very short, really gripping. The guy gets you into the character within, like one page, same place, same things. I don't know if he ever wrote anything else. I just happened to find it at, like, a library book sale, you know, where they were selling books that nobody checked out for a while, but just knocked me out. I read. I reread it maybe once a year.

[Jason]

I love that. All right, thanks, everybody, for tuning in to the Truth About Vintage Amps podcast once again. I'm not sure if we'll have another one before the end of 2024. Hopefully we will, but please keep the questions coming. And thanks as always, Skip, for helping us all out.

[Skip Simmons]

We will do it again. Read a book, listen to some music, turn off the computer, and January 11th and 12th, you want something from me, you can get to San Rafael. I'll bring it. You want to bring repairs, I'll bring them home. You want some projects to work on? You want 25 EL34s? You want a PA head? I'm making some nice ones. I'm bringing one of those Ducanes that I've talked about with the two 6v6s that everybody who plays one just goes, what the hell this is. Whoa. So, and thanks to all our sponsors and thanks to all the people who come by and bring me, I've gotten some good holiday stuff. Someone brought cheddar cheese that's on purpose now 11 years old. Wow. It's like the sharpest, sharpest. And man, you put that on a just piece of sourdough, a little red wine. It's really intense and good. Yeah, that was Joe D. That was the guy that found all those tubes or that paid the thousand dollars for what turned out to be a fantastic tube score. He also brought some really expensive scotch that I would never, ever afford. So. So thanks for all the people that keep coming up and bringing me stuff. Homemade. Homemade pomegranate jelly. Make some cornbread, put some pomegranate jelly on it, and we'll talk to all of y'all again soon, all right?

[Jason]

Thanks, Skip.

[Skip Simmons]

Thanks, Jason.