OMG why would someone do this?

[glebert]

Picked up a project 1965 Showman the other day. I knew it had been modified (jacks on the back labeled FX in and out were a clue) and I was kind of bracing myself for what I would find inside. I did not expect this.

So basically there is some kind of goopy silicon stuff all over the place, and presumably black spray paint. What in the ever living hell?




Amazingly, the amp actually seems to work. I got it fairly cheap because it didn't turn on, but had seen in the ad that there was no fuse holder. This supposedly had belonged to the guy's kid and he was just trying to get rid of it. If it wasn't for the interior condition this would have been a really good score. Now, I'm not so sure...

[nosaj]

OMG no pics what kind of a thread is this? Share your pain let it out.

sarcasm off

nosaj

[xtian]

What, you've never heard of "gooped" circuits? It's to hide the special recipe.

[drewl]

Could be "secret" Dumble.

[mozz]

Yeah, like the guy who was caught selling $170 pedals that were gooped Joyo $30 pedals repainted.

[nosaj]

Yeah, like the guy who was caught selling $170 pedals that were gooped Joyo $30 pedals repainted.

c'mon labor is worth something for the painting.
nosaj

[Leo_Gnardo]

Picked up a project 1965 Showman the other day. - - - - - So basically there is some kind of goopy silicon stuff all over the place, and presumably black spray paint. What in the ever living hell?

Showman had a run-in with the gloppita-gloppita machine, eh? @ 25 years ago, an otherwise nice looking mid 60's Deluxe Reverb showed up on my workbench, with a big rectangular block of black epoxy inside sprouting wires going to the tube sockets, controls & jacks. Something went awry under the glop, and the owner had no idea the innards of his amp were in such a condition. IIRC the owner mentioned it had been worked on by Harry Kolbe in Manhattan. He knew it was modded and all that but it was working for a while, anyway, then fzzzt.... silence. At some considerable expense I replaced the circuit with a stock ptp version built on tie strips, what a hassle. But it was fun to take a chisel & big hammer, give a whack & loosen the mystery slab 'o stuff to start the proceedings. That's how we fix amps around here, with a big hammer. Sometimes.

Looks like you bought a siimilar project. Good luck! I hope it was cheap, anyway.

[drewl]

Did you ever figure out what was under the goop?

It's like the Mesa Boogie amps that have that rectangular tone shaping block.
Ooohh, mystery circuit!

[Enzo]

In another industry, someone I knew was selling speed up kits for Pac Man arcade games. It was an epoxy box with a bunch of various colored wires streaming out. Kit included a ne panel button that said SPEED. Fortunately I was aware that to speed up a PAc Man all you needed to do was lift a chip leg and solder a wire from the pin to another spot on the board.

Sure enough, when I cut it open, I found the purple wire simply soldered to the green wire and another wire soldered to it's mate. There was no circuitry in the epoxy block at all.

[glebert]

Put this back together and gave it a bit more of a real use test today. The tremolo circuit is removed (which I expected) and the Intensity knob changed to MV. Normal channel breaks up at about 2 or 3 so that must be a mod, and the treble control is a switch pot labeled "DR ON" and it seems to make the treble pot non-fuctioning, which seems kinda weird. Wondering if it supposed to do something else as well. That boxy thing that is sitting where the trem roach would have been looks like a relay to me (has pins out horizontal to the tag board). Vibrato channel seems pretty normal. Pretty noisy when you turn up the MV, probably because of the extra gain in the Normal channel.

[glebert]

Don't know why the picture I embedded isn't appearing now, if it was ever visable to anyone but me.

The more I explore this amp the crazier it gets. Basically of the nine knobs on the amp six of them work as some sort of gain, level, or volume control. Two of them only work when using the effects loop so I'm guessing they are for adjusting the send and return levels, only one impacts volume when plugging a guitar in the FX return jack. It is actually a great sounding amp, reminds me of a plexi clone I have, but can also switch to a Fender clean sound, I just wish I had a user's guide for it or the name of the nutjob who did it so I could ask him about it (and punch him for gooping it).

edit: more of the mystery revealed, there is a relay for channel switching and can be controlled from Vibrato input 2. Looks like there used to be a label for it there but it came off.

[The Dude]

Dear God! It's beyond my comprehension why someone would do that.

[drewl]

Early Dumble!

[glebert]

Early Dumble!

Dang it, now you have me wondering if this was the work of someone notable. I guess Zinky and Lee Jackson also gooped some of their amps.

[Enzo]

I don't recall who signed the drawings, but I have several SLM files that include a "goop chart" along with the schematic and layout drawings.