Ep. 98: "Reserve Champion"

The Truth About Vintage Amps with Skip Simmons

With Skip's internet down, we recorded our 98th episode the old-fashioned way. Once you get past the distorted land line telephone, you'll hear about how you can win some truly amazing gear on our 100th episode (including a new Grez Mendocino Junior guitar!), plus what inspires Skip, screen resistors on power tubes, center taps on resistors, and one heck of a goat story.

This week's episode is sponsored by Calton Cases, Jupiter Condenser Co., Amplified Parts and Grez Guitars. You can also use the discount code FRET10 to save 10% off your Izotope purchase.

Support us on Patreon.com for added content and the occasional surprise. One of our patrons will win a Hello Sailor Fuzz Face this month!

Some of the topics discussed this week:

:54 The Fretboard Journal 50 (link) ...and issue 1; NAMM Shows

6:15 Our 100th episode giveaways: Win a Grez Guitars Mendocino Junior; a Madsen Electronics GE Fuzz; or a First Coast Amplification Masco - 5F2A Princeton conversion... plus, Josephine Baker was a spy

11:57 What exactly does a Variac do on a dormant amp?

15:43 A super microphonic Deluxe Reverb

17:33 Screen resistors on power tubes: 1-watt resistors vs 3-watt resistors

22:10 Center taps on power transformers: Grounded, tapped-off, or artificial?

26:29 Replacing the rotary off-on switches on Gibsons; Carling rotary switches (link)

29:45 What inspires Skip

35:23 Skip and the Reserve Champion goat

47:09 How important is the orientation of film capacitors?

53:20 A 1974 Fender Pro Reverb with a hissing problem that goes away with the vibrato; rosemary seasoned foil-wrapped corn on the cob

59:08 Voltage on the chassis of a two-pronged Harmony H-195

1:03:50 Replica cabinets from Lightning Music in Marengo, Ohio; Electro-Harmonix Hum-Debugger pedals, Bruce Forman, James "Blood" Ulmer, the Westerlies

1:07:48 The Fretboard Summit at Chicago's Old Town School of Folk Music, August 25-27, 2022 (www.fretboardsummit.org)

1:09:18 Ananyo Bhattacharya's 'The Man From the Future: The Visionary Life of John Von Neuman' (Amazon link), vacuum tubes for computer memory, Nixie tubes, Fender Dimension IV Sound Exploder / Tel-Ray goo

1:12:26 The tone of Orange Drop capacitors: polyester versus polypropylene; spaghetti bolognese with a slug of El Pato

1:19:25 A Carl's Custom Amps Octal Princeton that can use either a 6L6, EL34, KT77, or 6CA7... and the difference in wattage

1:23:24 Musical instrument insurance; Heritage Insurance (link)

1:26:25 Do you need an insulator board on a turret board amp build? How to find time to work on amps when you have a busy life and family and other parenting tips. 1:36:22 Homework: How to add a tone control to a Gibson GA17-RVT?

Submit your amp questions, recipes and life hacks to the podcast via [e-mail] and don't forget to share the show with friends on social media.