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If not, I understand why. I have owned a few and own two M15 basket cases now.
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I've got a 410 that I picked up a couple of years ago, I'm not sure on the year, but they were only made '61-'63. As far as I know this is the smallest Magnatone that has the tremolo. It is supposed to be a 5 watt amp but I don't seem to get more than 2 or 3 watts out. It has an external speaker jack in parallel with the internal speaker, and I've never been able to figure out what the correct speaker load should be. The schematic calls for a 4 ohm internal, but I have no idea if the external speaker would also be 4 ohm, making a 2 ohm load. I worry more than I should about getting the speaker load right, so I've never tried it with a 2 ohm load.I've had problems finding a speaker that really seemed to make it sing, it is hard to find vintage 12" 4 ohm speakers. I finally got an old Utah from a organ repair guy. Haven't installed it yet as I loaned the amp out to a buddy and he doesn't seem to be in a rush to return it.
The tremolo on mine definitely has some pitch shift to it, but not as much as I would like. I haven't tried different tubes in it though, it uses an odd one for the trem (12DW7) so I haven't been able to try a bunch.
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You kidding?
They're awesome!
Just gotta' be careful working on them, no good way to support them while under the hood.Comment
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I have a Magnatone amplifier, but I don't seem to have figured out how to work with it correctly, because I don't like what I get.Comment
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you want to see a rats nest,Attached FilesComment
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I should have titled the thread who wants to curse magnatone amps!Comment
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YUP.....that's a Magnatone M15, all right. The first one I had worked on WAS that M15...did a full restoration job on it, including repairs to the plastic housing the chassis fit into. Only had one of the two cast frames, so had our complex maintenance tech fabricate one....a very accomplished welder, so that solved the essential mounting problem. Had to make use of Boat Resin in repairing the damaged plastic housing, so that was an interesting adventure. The Power Supply was rebuilt, ripped out their male 2-prong AC plug, replacing that with re-cutting the chassis to fit IEC-320 panel mount receptacle. Loads of work...project took a couple steady weeks of surgery before finally having a really nice sounding amp, clean pots, great Vibrato, reverb was still so-so (original tank), but bloody QUIET and electrically safe. The owner, who never did hear one, was blown away (studio owner). Did two more for the Mike Campbell Vintage Guitar Amp sale on Reverb this past summer, though nothing as deep as I did on the M15).Originally posted by dragonwerx View Post
Getting the fiberglass cover off is the key. Need it out of the way to deal with cleaning the chassis surfaces for the jacks, pots, other locations where connection to ground needs to be solid. Their chassis' over time gets very oxidized, so had to spend time getting fresh metal where needed. Getting the mounting bolts off of the cast support brackets was, of course, a real PITA! Granted, there were moments of cursing during the repairs....Magnatone will extract some colorful language from some of us.
Logic is an organized way of going wrong with confidenceComment
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I have both of them totally apart. I am planning on making just a head out of one of them. That would be the cats meow. I'm a lifelong machinist, the mechanical end
was no problem. Trying to fix them as a novice is daunting. I have put them aside while I learn on simpler problems.Comment
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The power tubes on the Magnatone M10, M15 are 7189 or 7189A. They have slightly higher plate voltage ratings then EL84/6BQ5's do. And there is a pinout issue that would need to be made if you install EL84's. I had an M10A with both a 7189 and EL84 tube installed. The chassis was wired for using Pin 6 for Screen. EL84 uses Pin 9 for the screen, so I had to jumper Pin 6 over to Pin 9, so it would accommodate both EL84's and 7189 tubes.Logic is an organized way of going wrong with confidenceComment
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I have a stock of about fourteen 7189As, the 7189 is a different tube and I think it has a different pin out. Maybe the same as the EL84, I would have to check. I have a few 7189s but I won't put them
in the amps.Comment
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Logic is an organized way of going wrong with confidenceComment
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