Fender Blues Jr + Bill M Mods for Good Lap Steel Amp?

Nate Hofer · From: Overland Park, Kansas

I love the look and compact size of the Fender Tweed Blues Jrs. I see that Bill M specializes in modding these to be louder and have improved low end:
http://billmaudio.com/wp/

Would this pair well with my Stringmaster? (Love my Twin but the two 12" JBLs are annoyingly heavy.)

Has anyone experience with similar steel pairing?

Thanks!
nate

Gary Meixner · From: New York, USA

I think I posted something about this amp a while back. I play non-pedal steel, Western swing and old country music and use a Fender Blues Junior for most of my gigs and love it. If your band is not too loud, the stock amp with the basic tone mods, new power supply caps and bias adjust make a huge diffrence. At 15 watts it is a loud little amp and sure beats carrying around a Twin.

I got hooked on working on the thing and eventually converted it to run 6L6's. This required a bit of work but nothing too hard. You do need to change the power transformer and output transformer. The amp now is as loud as I think I will ever need with a strong bass and a beautiful singing tone.

Bill M. is a great guy and the products and services he provides are top notch.

I got my amp very cheap to start with so putting the money into it made sense. The bias adjust and basic tone mods and new power supply caps make the most noticable inprovment for the least amount of money. If you you need more power the 6L6 conversion sounds fantastic but you start to get into investing a lot more cash. Feel free to contact me or post specific questions and I will try to answer.

Best,

Gary

Russ Blake · From: Oregon, USA

Nate, I've been using a Blues Jr. on most of my non pedal gigs for the past couple of years. It works out great for me since the bands I play with tend to keep things at a reasonable volume, thank God! Mine is electronically stock, but I changed the Jensen to a Cannabis Rex which really mellowed out the high end. That 6L6 conversion sounds pretty interesting!

Dave Grafe · From: Hudson River Valley NY

Forum members Ian Miller and Russ Blake have both been using them for at least a year, the sounded great when I worked with them, I played a set through Russ's and had to bring it up in the monitors a bit but it was a fine sounding amp.

Nate Hofer · From: Overland Park, Kansas

Thanks, guys. Good information. I wanted to be sure I wasn't barking up the wrong tree. I'm definitely growing into the smaller, quieter amps but still wanna get as full a range of sound as possible.

I recently bought a Fender Excelsior, but I guess I'm sorta bent on something yellow and tweed too. Should be an interesting side-by-side test.

Anyway, thanks.

(Hey, Russ! Still lovin' the Stringmaster.)

Rich Hlaves · From: Wildomar, California, USA

If you like a little grit the BJr does a fine job for non-pedal steel. I've had an NOS tweed model for a few years now and really like it. The reverb is a bit weak however. It lacks a bit of bass. All this can be modded away.

Mine is bone stock.

The BJr should blow the Excelsior away once you get them both cranked.
_________________
On man....let the smoke out of another one.

Erv Niehaus · From: Litchfield, MN, USA

I use a tweed Blues Jr. for non-pedal, good sounding amp. I had a matching tweed extension speaker made for it also.

Forum Index > Electronics		Next oldest topic :: Next newest topic

All times are GMT - 8 Hours	Jump to: