ebay Madness

[bob p]

There's a lot more to this than just one guy's youtube. Rebuilding old PA heads has been an underground thing for a while-
... What you're seeing now is the result of enough momentum, VG articles, and word of mouth that this is flowing over into areas that hadn't previously been aware of it.
...
Most of us wouldn't fault a musician who paid $1,000. for a custom hand-built amplifier that looks cool, why get your panties in a bunch just because the raw materials for that custom build come from old PA heads?

Well, that's exactly what I meant -- buying these things and building something fun out of them was an underground thing, and *WE* were that underground.! Not too many people knew what we were doing. Now everybody and his brother is bidding up the price on lunchbox PA amps and old Hammond guts.

Most of us remember when you could go out and buy a decent RCA 30W 2x6L6 PA amp at the flea market for $5. It either worked well enough to be fixed up for a harp amp, or it was so nasty inside that you had to gut it. If we gutted it, then we'd use it to build the ultimate ugly sealth/sleeper amp. Then we'd take that ugly POS to a shootout and blow people's minds. I can't you how many times I've blown people away by taking the ugliest, nastiest, crappiest looking carcass and then 'Wrecking it.

The last time I looked, you could still buy these amps for $25 on eBay. The fact that some guys are willing to pay $200 for some of these things really makes me miss the old days.

When did this happen? Its only been a few years since I've shopped for one of these things. But back then you could score an old Traynor for next to nothing. Not anymore.

[bob p]

Well, here's an explanation that comes from my daily search for new posts: It looks like the ebay auction winners are joining the forum.

http://music-electronics-forum.com/t20459

[bluzmn]

Well, here's an explanation that comes from my daily search for new posts: It looks like the ebay auction winners are joining the forum.

Masco MA-17P resurrection.

I think I'm the guy who started bob p on this train of thought; I started the thread he's referring to here. The plain fact is, when they are set up right, Mascos (and some other old PAs), sound incredible for harp. Even your fellow forum poster Bruce admits that. It has been conjectured that Little Walter (sometimes) played through a Masco; be that as it may, I have seen some Youtube videos of harp players playing Mascos that sound fantastic. It's the same old story; first the word got out about old Fenders, then people found out about how good old Gibsons sound. Now Silvertones and other amps we thought were garbage when I was growing up are going for exorbitant prices! I guess it's like that old blues song "Women Keep Your Mouth Shut" where the singer cautions women not to brag about how great their man is, because other women would try to steal them; maybe we should keep our mouths shut!

[J M Fahey]

Hi bluzmn.
I agree that those Mascos must sound good as-is for harp.
Probably because they are intended either as a flat response general purpose amp or, even more probably, as a voice-band amplifier, at least on the microphone channel.
Very different to a guitar amp and its classic treble-heavy EQ.
The problem with them is that today they are 30 to 60 years old (I've seen some '47 vintage RCA PA's offered), and the typical wire used way back then was cloth (fine) and rubber (ugh) wire.
I've read that even the Moon expedition suits are rotting at the seams, because of that.
And mind you, those *really* are NASA quality stuff !!!!
That's why I suggested stripping and re-building those Mascos *with the exact same original circuit* but on eyelet (or turret) board and, obviously, with modern yet same-value components.
In fact I'll build one just for kicks.

[bob p]

The guy who started me on this train of thought was the guy who paid $200 for a dead basket case PA amp. He paid a premium for a dead amp because he perceived that it had mojo, not because it had intrinsic value as a functional piece of equipment. I can't find extra value in a dead amp based on the conjecture that a hero might have used a functional one.