Fender Hot Rod Deluxe III

[Brad1]

Just picked up a near-mint one of these pretty cheap ($210 with foot switch) at a local pawn shop. (Young sales guy said "you DO know that's a bass amp, don't you"? "Nuh-uh...it's a guitar amp", I said.) Wasn't really looking to buy much of anything...but figured I might as well snag that. He said "I just put that on the floor 2 hours ago". I plugged it in, and exercised all the knobs and switches, and cranked'er up in both channels. No problem noted. So...walked out with it.


ANYWAY...I've searched the 'net, and found a few things about "mods", etc. What I could not find is...did they fix the switching circuit resistor problem? Planning to disassemble to check things out, clean, check bias, etc., and was just wondering if I might as well just plan to do something about those, beforehand?

Thanks,

Brad1

[Tone Meister]

Other than maybe checking the power tube bias, most here would recommend against fixing something that isn't broken. In the different revisions Fender sorted out many of the issues plaguing the Hot Rod series. I think I'd check the bias, maybe take a few voltage readings, screw it back together, and see how it sounds.

Hard to make music with an amp on the bench, so I'd wait until it breaks before working on it too much.

[52 Bill]

Agree ^^^^^^

The power resistor problem has pretty much been solved for a while now. If I have to pull the board to fix something else, I will always check them and the Zener diodes, but unless the amp is showing signs of problems, I would not pull the board just to see.

[Brad1]

Sounds good, guys. Figured they MIGHT have solved that known issue, but wasn't sure. I'll just check bias, and see what happens.

Thanks.

Brad1

[Steve A.]

Good snag! I have a hunch that they would have raised the price on it a LOT once the boss checked Google...

Steve

[E biddy]

I did this master volume mod, for myself and a couple of friends. I like it a lot, and so do they.

Fender Hot Rod Deluxe Mods Part-2