New Fender Champion 600

[Brad1]

Anybody have a chance to try these things out, or peek under the hood?

Wonder what kind of things one could do to these? I'm sure they have a circuit board in there, but there can't be too many components, and there may be room to fiddle. I dunno. The small hole in the back was barely big enough to get a hand into.

5W, SS rect, 12AX7, 6V6, 6" speaker. One knob...volume. Power switch and speaker jack. Tiny little transformers. Hi and Lo inputs. Cool two-tone cab. Cute little thing.

About $180 at one of the local stores. That ain't TOO bad for a brand new Fender tube amp. Haven't looked them up on websites, yet.

Zuzu and I ran it through the paces with a Strat at the store. Seems pretty responsive. We had it in the Hi input, volume at 10 (out of 12)...dig in harder and it gets more gnarly...not real smooth, but kinda cool. May be a good amp to record alongside another to add some hair around the edges.

Just wondered if anyone futzed around with one of these, yet.

Brad1

[steve]

Someone posted this link on the Gear Page:

http://www.crazyquiltarts.com/images/remote/champ600/

Most definitely PCB construction. Probably designed to compete with the Valve Junior. The OT and PT look adequate.

I haven't personally tried one, but a friend of mine did. He said it was very noisey and had lots of hum. Was there any hum or noise in the particular amp you tried?

I emailed Fender's tech support and they emailed me the shematic and parts layout. The circuit is based in the 5F1 Champ, with a few tweaks.

Sure does look cool though. Although it has a 6" speaker, it also has a speaker jack to plug into a bigger cabinet.

steve

Anybody have a chance to try these things out, or peek under the hood?

Wonder what kind of things one could do to these? I'm sure they have a circuit board in there, but there can't be too many components, and there may be room to fiddle. I dunno. The small hole in the back was barely big enough to get a hand into.

5W, SS rect, 12AX7, 6V6, 6" speaker. One knob...volume. Power switch and speaker jack. Tiny little transformers. Hi and Lo inputs. Cool two-tone cab. Cute little thing.

About $180 at one of the local stores. That ain't TOO bad for a brand new Fender tube amp. Haven't looked them up on websites, yet.

Zuzu and I ran it through the paces with a Strat at the store. Seems pretty responsive. We had it in the Hi input, volume at 10 (out of 12)...dig in harder and it gets more gnarly...not real smooth, but kinda cool. May be a good amp to record alongside another to add some hair around the edges.

Just wondered if anyone futzed around with one of these, yet.

Brad1

[PlayItAll]

They do look super cool!

Is the cabinet big enough to cram an 8" speaker into it?

[Keystring]

They do look super cool!

Is the cabinet big enough to cram an 8" speaker into it?

If it's anything like the original inside, it looks like it could take an 8" speaker.

1949 Fender Champion 600

[steve]

If it's anything like the original inside, it looks like it could take an 8" speaker.

1949 Fender Champion 600

Might be possible. The Fender site lists the dimensions of the cabinet as:

Height: 11" (28 cm)
Width: 12" (31 cm)
Depth: 7.5" (19 cm)

It doesn't list the internal dimensions, though.

steve

[Keystring]

I found one comment on another forum that said the inside top to bottom dimensions are 7 5/8 inches, so I suppose an 8 inch speaker could be used with
a little 'notching'.

[Brad1]

Stopped by the store to pick up some cables and took a closer look at it.
Looks like it would be almost impossible to get an 8" speaker in there.

What's worse is what I saw on the label. I can't buy it....I just can't.
It says "Made in China".

NNOOOOOOooooooooooOOO!

Brad1

[Enzo]

Where did you THINK a $180 amp was going to be made?

[Brad1]

Yeah, I know....

I was hoping Mexico....or ANYwhere but China. I try not to add to our massive trade deficit with them, (and also helps raise our energy costs the more we buy that they use energy to manufacture), if at all possible.

Oh well. I was wanting to save up for a kit of some type anyway. Hopefully, with as few parts MIC as I can get.

Brad1

[yoder]

Looking at the schematic for the new Champ 600 it is very close to a blackface champ (AA764) Interesting is uses the same tone stack as the AA764 but with fixed resistors for bass and treble levels. Looks like they are set equally at about 2/3 of max bass and treble. Hmmm, with two pots you could add a bass and treble control or add a tone bypass switch. With that tone stack out of the circuit that amp should really overdrive quick and easy. I have one on the way. I'm going to use it for harp so I will be tweaking it for that. Looks like a fun little amp to play around with. Anyone else out there using one for harp?

[ZBod]

I bought a Champion 600 yesterday and played through
it til the wee hours of the morning using a Nashville Tele
and a Gibson Nighthawk. I'd recommend it for the price.
I a/b'd it with a '72 Champ and they sound VERY similar -
the Champ having a bit more low end and gain due to a few tweaks, larger speaker, RCA tubes, etc.

The hum level is about the same on both amps. Any ideas on how to reduce hum in a Champion 600? I'm not too familiar with circuit board Fenders. It would seem that an equivalent of the "twisted pair" filament mod would be part of the design, or am I being too optimistic here? Either way, I'll keep it. Certainly beats a silverface champ in the looks dept.

[jrfrond]

I am new here, but not new to the repair industry. Having said that, I wrote an article at the 300guitars.com website describing a complete mod for the Champion 600 (and complete explanation of steps), that turns it into a little fire-breathing dragon. Hope you find it informative.

Hot-Rodding the new Champion 600