CHAMP ELECTRONICS -" THE VALVE AMP
HOSPITAL"
NOTTINGHAM, ENGLAND
SERVICING OF A BIG, DIRTY, OLD
BUT POWERFUL HOME-MADE REGGAE BASS AMPLIFIER
This
one came from some black guys based in Birmingham UK. It’s very
hard to appreciate, comprehend, and scale the size of this humongous
monster from the photos. It doesn’t have a “brand
name” as it is “home made” from somewhere back in the
seventies I believe? My young apprentice (John-Boy) and I called it
“MF”! I’ll give you a clue, the “M”
stands for “Mother” and the “F” stands for
………?? It takes two people to carry this thing, as
it weighs in at about one and a half hundred-weight! Now, before all
you “KT88, Gold Lion” fanatics out there start
dribbling/drooling over the sight of 12 of them in an amp…..let
me re-assure you that six of them were caput and well below par. Also,
one of them was completely shot with no connection to the cathode
inside the tube!....Why, I don’t really know.
Though
this amp is very old and rusty, after replacing all the duff
KT88’s with modern, readily available ones and a good few
components too……she actually “did the
business” really well. The end result was a perfect 650 watts
true RMS!!
In reality, this amp wasn’t actually brought to me for any kind
of service or repair. but to see if I was able to make anything like
it. As I have made many “reggae bass” amps like this since
my early 20’s, back in the early seventies (please see this
article http://www.chambonino.com/construct/const5.html
), I of course didn’t have a problem in doing so. Nevertheless,
as my young apprentice (John-Boy) and myself both wanted to see it run
and see how good it really was, I decided to replace all the faulty
tubes and components at my own cost, just to see if it performed as
good, “and sounded as big”, as it looked!
And,
although it did perform really well, it certainly was an
“over-kill” from a size and weight point of view. It is
built on a cast-iron style bed frame…..also on a very strong and
thick chassis. The top-cover (not shown in the photos) is also very
heavy and OTT (over-the-top [pardon the pun here!]) too! A pretty big
and heavy beast this one! Oh yes, and just in-case you
are curious........the driver tubes are a pair of
EL84’s…..triode connected, as two cathode-followers, after
the splitter.
