Bassman Question

[Jag]

It's like the old joke

"Play a solo. SO LOW we can't hear it."

[autopilot]

Update on Bassman...

Hey everyone,
Thanks for all the responses.

Today I got my big order of sprague and mallory caps...
I also found that Ruby Tubes has 70uf 350v caps, if you want an alternative to the 100uf spragues.

I replaced all the brown electrolytics, and popped in some yellow mallory's to replace the brown & orange drops, and also replaced all the 25uf/25v caps. I left all the blue ones alone and the ceramics per all of your helpful recommendations on this site, and other posts. I couldn't order the metal resistors as there was minimum order quantity.

SO! Right now, I'm letting the amp run for an hour or so just to make sure no problems develop. I've plugged in my Peavey Rudy Sarzo bass a couple of times since the repair, and so far it appears that the loud "Cra-pop" is gone. Even on the lowest bass notes, with volumes on bass & amp cranked, the problem I was having seems to be gone!

The head seems to be driving the cab ok as far as I can tell. And while I haven't tried the amp with the band yet, it seems pretty darn loud in our house. I imagine I could record with it if nothing else. I would still continue to use it with guitar either way. I can't really comment on whether the tone of this amp is better or worse than another bass rig, but it seems like everyone I've talked to that's a tech, or on here, doesn't think too highly of it for bass. Maybe I have bad ears, but it sounds fine to me...but then...I even think bass through a Marshall guitar amp sounds good...!

This has been a pretty interesting experience for me. I had never really replaced anything in an amplifier before, and while I'm a little concerned with whether my work is satisfactory, I am overall pretty happy with the experience, but it has brought a question or two up now for me...

When soldering on these amps, I noticed the point to point holes seemed to be full of a ton of solder, and pulling the part out was sometimes difficult as it seemed to get caught on the other parts. I ended up trying to pull out as much old solder as I could with a bulb because I was worried it was melting through to the other side. So much so, on the power supply filters, I didn't even bother removing the leads. I cut the old cap out, and wrapped the new leads around the old leads before soldering to avoid messing with the original joint. I got this idea from another tech I saw once. However, inside the amp, I got a little more brave, and completely removed the parts, but still felt like solder could be flowing through or something. It didn't appear that the person who had put in the orange spragues had done that much better at it...I was as careful as I could be, but just wondered what your experience is with it and if you have any recommendations?

Also, now that I have fixed that problem, I am paying more attention to the amp. I notice that the Deep & Bright switches seem to click or pop when they are switched, and I can't always tell if the switch is actually working or not. The Deep switch is worse than the Bright switch, but also I had point where the Bright switch caused a ground hum when I switched it. I gave the amp a slight bang on the top and it went away...I'm sure these have always been part of the amp's problems, but I never paid much attention to it before now. Is this just a dirty switch? The pots are also scratchy. Is there a cleaner or something to help with both switches and pots?

Sorry for the relatively basic questions, but I'm sure you all can help!