6v6 and 5y3 in bassman head

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dragonbat13
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6v6 and 5y3 in bassman head

Post by dragonbat13 »

i am thinking about getting a non master bassman head, probably silverface with drip rail grille.

how much would be involved in installing a tube 5y3 rectifier and 6v6 power tubes?

output tranny swap will not be a problem because i want multiple output taps for inmedeance.

i have done some amp work on my twin and want a bassman because of no master and two simple channels with volume base and treble with no mid controls or master volume.
Mark Clay

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NickC
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Re: 6v6 and 5y3 in bassman head

Post by NickC »

You'll need a 5V secondary off the power transformer for the tube rectifier. Stock silver-or-black-face Bassman PT doesn't have it, so you'd need to swap the PT out or use a dedicated, small 5V transformer.
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Structo
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Re: 6v6 and 5y3 in bassman head

Post by Structo »

6V6 require a different primary impedance on the output transformer, you probably know that since you said you want multi secondaries.

But, if you just want a 2 x 6V6 amp perhaps a silverface Princeton would be better?
Already has a tube rectifier and the 6V6.
Except I think the later ones had reverb and tremolo.
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Alexo
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Re: 6v6 and 5y3 in bassman head

Post by Alexo »

Might want to just uses a sag resistor in this case instead of an actual tube. Much more reversible mod.
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selloutrr
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Re: 6v6 and 5y3 in bassman head

Post by selloutrr »

for the amount of modification needed to achive your goal. It might be better to start from scratch and build an amp to your liking. If you wanted the bassman circuit you could easily build it in that size/style chassis to keep the look.
IMHO it's not worth buying an old amp that you will have to invest the following into.
1.) tubes
2.) at least a dedicated 5V transformer if not a new Power Transformer
3.) new Output transformer
4.) probably filter caps due to age
5.) you will probably rebuild the circuit to blackface spec (at least the bias)
6.) a good solid cleaning and hopefully nothing else is wrong.

If you build the amp it'll come out to about the same cost but all the parts are new and GOOD (assuming you test them before soldering them in). The Iron is the only plus side of a vintage amp as a mod project, but not in this case.
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