Are Amp Kits worth the cost, or just go it alone?

[Dolmetscher007]

I have been looking, for a while now, into building a tube amp. I've been scared off from doing so due to the deadly high voltage. I'm way too new to electronics to just start soldering huge iron transformers and capacitors based on some sheet of paper that I downloaded off the internet. I'd be dead by the end of day 1.

That being said... I am still a super curious bastard, so I was wondering about something. I was on StewMac's website the other day looking at their amp kits. They have a Fender Princeton and Deluxe Rev., and they have a couple of Gibsons, and some tweeds... all for sale, but unfortunately, they are for sale for almost what you'd pay to buy one fully assembled by the aforementioned companies. Now, I know that DIY very rarely works out so that you actually save money. Brewing your own beer, for example, you'd have to brew 300 gallons before your return on investment actually shows up. So, I am sure that building an amp for $990 that you could buy for $1,100 is actually pretty good, all things considered. Because you will get the satisfaction of having built it.

That being said... StewMac publishes the .pdf step-byt-step instructions, schematics, parts list, and wiring diagrams for all their amp kits. There is literally nothing stopping you from taking the parts list, ordering the parts from somewhere else, building your own plywood box, and going really DIY. Can any of you guys tell me if you'd save money by doing that, or is it just best to buy the $1,000 amp kit from StewMac, because you'd end up paying about that anywhere?

[Jazz P Bass]

If you have no experience with electronics I would suggest that you avoid a kit.

[alexradium]

for me,DIY has a sense when i want something specific to my taste and i can't find it or its unreasonably expensive.
But i have all the tools and the knowledge on the subject,experience in playing different things and judging if they work right or not.
So,if you aim to save money,i'd say no,a quality kit plus all the hours spent and tools needed to work on an amp with safety and knowledge it costs alot.
If its something you are planning to do for the future and intend to make more things and you have the will because its entertaining to you,then go for it,but you can find many products around that with a simple change of speaker and tubes will come out 95% equal to the major brand standard amp.

[J M Fahey]

Browse around, there are other amp kit options available way cheaper than stewmac ones.

And you don´t need (yet) a full kit, including a nice tolexed cabinet, facsimile front plate, etc.

For practicing/learning , I´d definitely get a basic Champ kit, just chassis, transformers, hardware , tubes and components, and build it.

No cabinet, nothing fancy, just a bare chassis on the table, which works when plugged to any speaker cabinet you have.

Heart warming accomplishment , very useful, killer sound, etc.

Then IF you want to, later you build/get/modify some cabinet to house it.

Personal suggestion: make it for a 12" speaker, anything from a fancy Jensen/Celestion/Eminence to a $20 Craigslist "pull" , you will have "big amp" sound, just at Home practice levels ... not bad at all.

Champs are assumed to be little more than toys, only because of the weakling 6" speaker inside a shoebox , but plugged into a serious cabinet, it becomes a serious amp.

Don´t *start* with a more complex amp, staircases are climbed step by step.

FWIW my first Guitar amplifier was a Gibson GA5 clone (their version of Champ, go figure), straight from Jack Darr´s book, using surplus Hi Fi amp iron , inside a cadmium plated generic chassis.

Boy, was I proud !!!!!!

All wiring using solid core wire, all perpendicular angles, it looked inside like a mini version of a Hiwatt.

Again, do not start with a complex amp.

[Leo_Gnardo]

Again, do not start with a complex amp.

That ^^^. AND kit sellers do not provide you with step by step instructions, the way some kit outfits did back in the 1940-70's. Like Dynaco, Heathkit, Eico, Knight and others. IOW there will be no "cut 4 1/2 inches of red wire, strip 1/2 inch insulation from each end, tin the ends, solder one end to pin 2 of V1 and the other end to the second terminal on tie strip #5." None of that.

Takes a good tool kit too. You'll want a decent soldering iron, a roll of quality 60/40 or 63/37 solder, wire snips, needle nose pliers (several different types) etc. If you only build one kit, acquiring the tools and solder will add to the expense.

Good luck.

[HaroldBrooks]

I would build the kit, even if the price was close, as in 90%.

Here's what you need to do to be reasonably safe from High voltage, Never work on an amp that's powered up ! Never work on an amp that is plugged in ! For an amp that's already off and unplugged, Discharge all the caps from positive to the chassis ground before you start, even if the amp has been off for some time. Never stick two hands into an amp that had already been running. If you want to be even safer (you should) where rubber gloves (form fitting) this way you are never a path to ground. [ Unplug and discharge the caps each and every time you work on your amp, and you have little chance of shock.

Watch a couple of these videos. Also, like J M Fahey said, start with something simple like a Fender champ type amp, or an early Princeton, that is just a Champ with a tone control. Practice soldering on some terminal strips.

https://www.youtube.com/results?sear...citors&sp=mAEB

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KMKoHI4yFN8

You benefit from building your own because you will know the circuit backwards and forwards by the time your are done, and now will be able to fundamentally trouble shoot the amp going forward.

You can modify the amp (cautiously at first), but hey, it's your amp ! so later on you don't have to stick to the original design. This is a big plus over buying a pricey or vintage amp pre built. I've modified a few of my amps and they are by far and wide the best sounding (to me) amps I own, FAR better than anything I could have bought in the same realm. You know how you are going to use your amp, so you can customize it to your liking.

You get the satisfaction of having built it yourself, and being able to service it yourself later on, another big plus.

Finally, it keeps your brain active solving problems. It's like a workout at the gym for your body, except your brain is flexing it's muscles to understand the dynamics of an amp and it's function, through and through.

[glebert]

I'm not saying you shouldn't build a kit or from scratch. There is another option that I have been looking at, just to get a bit more immediate gratification. There is a company called KLD that sells pre-loaded turret boards on Ebay really cheap. Basically add tubes, transformers, and pots, install in a chassis, and you should be good to go. For the record I have not built one of these, nor am I associated with the maker, just something I have been considering. They have several models based on Fender and Marshalls, they also have some PCB designs with mounted pots and that include transformers.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/Turret-boar...8AAOSwQVpaqMOA

And before I get flamed I agree it would probably be better to build your own, but maybe this is a way to kickstart the interest that might otherwise languish.

Anyone had any experience with these?

[pdf64]

I suggest to get some practical electronics experience by building a pedal or two first, before investing a lot of money in tube amp parts / kit.

[nosaj]

I suggest to get some practical electronics experience by building a pedal or two first, before investing a lot of money in tube amp parts / kit.

Here we go again, I think this user has already done this thread before.
nosaj

Take your pic several of his threads suggest many of the same options presented in this thread also.
https://music-electronics-forum.com/...earchid=720580

[Tony Bones]

In reply to the cost question, you really shouldn't be building your own just to save money.

Having said that, I know that I - and probably almost everyone on this forum - started out by rebuilding organ and PA amps into guitar amps. Unfortunately, the price of old unwanted tube PA amps has gone up over the years. 20 years ago you could easily find functioning PA amps for anywhere from free to $20. Today I see them on ebay for $150. That's about the cost of a set of new transformers and a blank chassis, which is all you'll really keep from the old amp. so there's really not much point in paying that much.

OTOH, if you keep an eye on Craigslist, garage sales, gramma's basement, friend's barns, etc, you can sometimes find something cheap or free. Hammond organ amps can sometimes be found for little money. You could buy this for $70 + $20 shipping and save few dollars over a bare kit, but you'll still need to buy a lot of loose parts before it becomes a functioning head. And you'd need a lot of help, but there's a lot of help available here and on other forums on the web.

[loudthud]

To build an amp from scratch you will need the following:

A chassis. A pre-fabricated 'guitar amp chassis' will cost you. Other than that you can purchase a pre-fabricated box and drill holes in it, or build your own box out of sheet metal.

Transformers. You could wind your own (ha ha) or you will have to buy them. There are places that sell transformers commonly used in guitar amps.

You will have to purchase electronic components. You will have many questions. You will buy the wrong components. You will spend a great deal of time trying to get all the components you need to build an amp.

There are very few places where you can purchase electronic components in a retail setting. There might be a Radio Shack, of Fry's in your area. Other than that, you might be able to find what used to be called a "Surplus" store. Most places now are internet based. The problem comes when you only need one or two 10 cent parts and the minimum shipping is $5. That's where a kit will save you time and money.

Consider this kit: https://www.tubesandmore.com/product...itar-amplifier

Here are links to a couple of threads about the Mod102

https://music-electronics-forum.com/...ghlight=mod102
https://music-electronics-forum.com/...ghlight=mod102

[E biddy]

I started out with this kit. https://www.modkitsdiy.com/kit/mod-102-guitar-amp-kit

I thought this kit was a perfect place to start.

Then I built a 5f2 princeton with a partial kit from Mojo. Then I did a scratch build of a Fender 5f10 straight from the original schematics and layouts. The last build was kind of a 5f10 mixed with a blackface princeton and switchable bias and feedback. I now designing something based around a deluxe reverb.

[Justin Thomas]

My Opinion:

Will you save money on a kit that you assemble yourself?
Maybe.

Going on you've never built anything before... Do NOT build your own speaker cabinet. Head boxes are fairly simple though.

Tools can be purchased, but if you don't have any to begin with, could cost anywhere from $100 & up.

Parts can be gotten from a variety of sources... Safety can be learned also. I recommend R.G. Keen's tube amp debug page, Step 0: being prepared. Actually, here's a link: www.geofex.com

But here is the one variable I haven't seen mentioned, yet this is the most VALUABLE part of all:
YOUR TIME.

Who here, whether kit, mod, DIY from scratch, ever had a build work perfectly the very first time? Not me. My very first build had 100 hours in it then I scrapped it. No experience & a more complex circuit I had no busibess building into a very unconventional chassis.
2nd build, maybe 40 hours of construction & tweaking.
3rd build? Maybe another 100 hours...
4th build? Can't even guess, but two years later I finally got it together and then maybe 50 hours chasing hum.
5th build? Again, got frustrated, gutted it twice, think I finally made progress last week...

Most I spent on ANY of tgese (by using scavenged parts), maybe $300 TOPS. But my "hourly wage"? The unpaid time? I probably made a dime an hour. Probably less.

You seriously pay for the learning curve with your TIME.

Other than that, dig in, go for it, etc. But count the hidden costs.

Justin

[DrGonz78]

My first amp build was based on 5F1 Champ. It was not a complete kit bought from a supplier. I found a cabinet, speaker and chassis on eBay (from a kit) for a real low price. Bought a Classic Tone power transformer and I had a nice Hammond Output Tranny on hand that was basically free. I then ordered all the small internal parts from Mojotone and built the amp. The build was fun and the only problem I encountered was the need to reverse the output tranny primary wires.

The next amp I built was a push pull with a pair of el84 tubes. The power transformer was from an old Zenith radio and with some great advice here on MEF I was able to build the amp with great success. I was very lucky with both builds and did not have to spend hours fixing any problems.

I think my luck was based on the knowledge I received from the cast & crew on MEF. Since I learned how to repair amps first it made building the amps much more successful. I really think it's backwards thinking to build an amp and then expect to be able to troubleshoot the build if there is a problem. When I first started to repair broken amps I knew that the circuit in question had worked at one time. Can't say that about an amp that you built from scratch. My advice to anyone thinking to build an amp would be to open a working amp and get comfortable checking voltages. Learn safety practices about working on live amplifiers and learn how to read a schematic. Of course soldering and the mechanics of the build are important too. But once you finish the build it pays off to know how to inspect the amp safely.

It seems the OP on this thread took off and has not responded to anyone's suggestions. But if he is questioning his ability to safely work on anything with high voltage then I would say don't start building an amp. Start by learning the basics like testing voltages and safety practices.

[J M Fahey]

My first amp build was based on 5F1 Champ. It was not a complete kit bought from a supplier. I found a cabinet, speaker and chassis on eBay (from a kit) for a real low price. Bought a Classic Tone power transformer and I had a nice Hammond Output Tranny on hand that was basically free. I then ordered all the small internal parts from Mojotone and built the amp. The build was fun and the only problem I encountered was the need to reverse the output tranny primary wires.

Hey, best trainer out there !!!
And to boot it sounds GOOD!!!!