Tube Amp Servicing

[ripingitar]

AFTER PLAYING through a line 6 the past few years im ready to go back to tube !! I cant afford a new Tube amp But I have a peavy 3 channel Triumph 60 Im considering reviving ... it has original tubes in it but works fine .. it doesnt seem to have the distortion it had 13 yrs ago when i bought it new ..Im sure because of the tubes but still has good tone ... I was thinking of sticking all new tubes in it although i dont know how to bias the amp... What if I just jam new tubes in it ???

 

[tsl92802]

for an amp that old i'd just take it to someone to have it professionally serviced. some amps aren't picky about biasing...but really...just to have everything cleaned out (pots, biasing, tubes, etc) it'll be worth it.

 

[Light]

for an amp that old i'd just take it to someone to have it professionally serviced. some amps aren't picky about biasing...but really...just to have everything cleaned out (pots, biasing, tubes, etc) it'll be worth it.

All that, plus it might be time for a cap job. Probably not, but there is no reason not to have it checked out.


Light

"Cowards can never be moral."
M.K. Gandhi

 

[cephus]

One vote for jamming new tubes in it.

It seems really weird that so many people on this forum act like every amp is a delicate instrument. It's a plywood box. It has bumpers on the corners and is covered in thick vinyl. They are designed and built to be moved around. If it isn't making a weird noise or smoking, and it amplifies, it seems to me that it is working.

Amp guys aren't the same as instrument guys. They can very quickly go from "giving it the once over" to billing you more than you have into it.

 

[gbdweller]

If you haven't played through the amp in a long time, it may very well need a cap job. Filter capcitors actually degrade faster when they sit uncharged for extended periods of time. All of you tube amp owners out there should make it a habit to turn those vintage tube amps on and play through them every six months or so. This will help prolong the life of the caps.

I agree with Cephus about the durability of amps. They can take quite a bit of abuse. It's the tubes that are most fragile. Letting them warm up before taxing them and letting them cool down before banging the amp around will go a long way in prolonging their life.

 

[hungovermorning]

Another vote for a cap job. Tubes are funny, their distortion sounds most righteous right before they're about to blow up. I'm not sure which filter caps Peavey uses, but most amps (read: MOST, vintage Marshalls and other amps sometimes go 35 years without needing one) after 20 years need that because they dry up, especially after periods of dormancy. The bad news is that the cap job is about $200-250. The good nexs is it wouldn't need it for another 20 years. I would just play it as is if you can't afford anything else, I couldn't justify dumping $250 into a Peavey to be kind of happy when $450 would get me a perfect restored Traynor.

 

[cephus]

Gulp!

Six of those 6l6s is gonna cost a bunch.

Might be worth letting an amp guy look at it. Make sure to get an estimate if he's gonna do work on it. Pray it ain't the transformer. There ain't much else in there. You may want to take the screws in the top out, so you can pull down the chasis and see if there's anything obvious wrong. Mine has a few ICs in it, and I think at one point I pulled one out and reseated it because it had this whole stalagmite of crud that had accumulated around/under it.

I don't know about the cap thing. I never messed with that, but I guess my amp has been in pretty much constant service since it was new.

 

[ripingitar]

I CAN get preamp tubes from tube depot .com for pretty cheap .... its got 4 12ax7 and 1 12at7 driver i think .... I cant justify spending 300.00 at the amp shop ..so pre tubes may be the way to go .... I play pretty much the same type guitar.. humbuckers ..rock music .... how much gain comes from pre tubes and how much is affected by power tubes?? its a 50 watt has 2 power tubes..

 

[GreenDank]

...

best to have it looked at.

FYI, I've got some amps from the 1960s that have the original caps in 'em, so don't let all that talk of caps scare ya.

 

[cephus]

I thought the Duece had no preampt tubes. Only power tubes. I was thinking the Classic, Duece and Mace were all half solid state, half tube.

If they are the same as my classic they are 6L6GC. I bet I paid $30 for a pair of matched groove tubes in like 1991. The quickest google search I did showed the cheapest was $25/ea for used. Maybe there are cheaper places.

Here they are chepaer:
https://ssl.eurotubes.com/cart/index.php?page=view_products&category_id=3&sub_category_id=22

$15 ea.