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Welcome!

Ahh! Happy Days! I had a G18 C. 100w Green Back in a home built cabinet. I gave it away to a fellow Basschatter. It sat in my den for over 30 years and was rarely used. I bought it from Tottenham Court Road, probably from Lasky's. Around about 1966/67, I carried it home by hand (in it's big box) on the underground, bus and pavement to Hornchurch. Even after all this time my arms have never regained their original length! That circular wood plate or a piece of 4 x 4 was the stabdard way to brace the loudspeaker and the rear panel. Check out the "Recommended Amp Techs" part of the forum under the "Repairs and Technical" sub-forum. Best of Luck.

You could get a Zoom MB60+ and have a larger choice of everything.

From a former South Londoner.

I think I’m going to get a tc spark and a compressor suggested. If the spark doesn’t tickle my fancy I’ll look into others like the beta and genzler.

Ok so I demoed one of these at a friends business - he owns a backline company and was lent one to try out to see if he wanted to add it to his stock. He had a 700w version and the matching Ampeg 2x10 cab. Construction - all seemed pretty good, nice and solid. Wouldn't transport it around without a bag but as good as any others I've seen of the same type. The low and high switches weren't amazing but functional and easy to use, I would have used a metal switch but apparently they are copying the SVT Classic style which makes sense. Was pretty easy to figure out how to use it, and I ran it pretty much flat with the super low switch on the mid position and the super high on. Sounded really nice and powerful, no obvious issues, I was really taken with it to be honest, made my P sound great! The overdrive was really nice too, no loss of bass and sounded quite natural to me. I had the idea of trying it against some other Ampeg amps in his warehouse to compare it. Ampeg SVT 4 pro into a 8x10 - sounded brittle and sharp and just unpleasant compared to the Venture. Not used one them before so it might be user error but when you try it flat and it sounds awful that's not a great start is it? The a SVT Classic full 300w all valve goodness into the 8x10. Oh. My. God. I WANT ONE. As we all know they sound amazing BUT what I thought was the Venture did a good job tonally against the SVT - no it would never have the velvety smooth sledgehammer power of the SVT Classic but the character was very similar to my ears. Hope that helps - I was never a huge Ampeg amp fan but I've been looking at maybe getting a Venture in the future. Or an SVT if I can afford a roadie as well.

The Trickfish mini 500 does indeed have a fan, only the Bullhead series is fanless.

UPDATE: This has focused my mind a bit. I had to call into the nice people at Bass Direct today to sort out an issue with the Dingwall (it's a minor problem but it had Mark properly stumped). While I was there I showed them my Stingray and asked how much they'd put it on for and how much comission to sell it. They said £1500 and 20%. No criticism of the team in Bass Direc, but I don't think it'd be worth my selling if £1,200 is all I'd get for it.

I think you're probably right, but I think it would have been a more tricky excercise with the BB3. For all that that are nominally flat, they do in practice seem to have a lovely hump in the bottom octave.

I’m just being the voice of reason for you! 😂 Should you choose to proceed with it, I will applaud you! And make sure to let us know.

My point is, I am not a qualified electrician but am qualified in audio tech and have worked with it and single/3-phase electricity enough over the years to have the experience to know it is not direct mains electricity flowing through these people. If it was, they would definitely know about it and would have probably bitten their tongue off at the very least! However, I agree that precautions are obviously best and having socket testers/inline RCDs is good for peace of mind. What these people experience is a static and sometimes impressive looking small blue flash like you would get from Nylon trousers, or poor shoes, or a balloon.. It is caused by small static or potential build up on a ground plane, because for whatever reason any inducted voltage caused by nearby noise or whatever, thinks your mouth is a faster route to earth than its current connection. It is not caused by a fault causing the live mains to somehow connect to the casing of the microphone. It is also worth noting that with the example I quoted, the guitarist did the whole gig with no problems. He then turned up the next year with the same setup and never mentioned his amp killing him in that time. I have also seen this issue with RCDs in place and they don't blow as it is not seen as a leakage to earth from another conductor.

I read he also built the pyramids in Egypt 🤣 it was on a webpage so i can’t imagine it’s fake news.

Thanks. You may be on to something. It does sound very similar to what one might get from a single coil and if you move something it would change or go a way. This just doesn't go away. I may try it in another room or location before sending it back just to make sure as a last ditch effort to keep my good deal.

Every time I see Ian King play I go straight to the Overwater website and start planning a build.

i already felt a bit sorry for itu that he sacrificed his fr/fl idea to the bands traditional hearing. which sounds suits which music.. ?! would have anybody expected to hear fretless in Black Sabbath, or Whitesnake, hm? we should dare to have our personal sound, not only following long set paths. isn't it THEIR iconic sound we all love with our heroes?! let's say Stanley Clarke plays with the brown bass a roots reggae song! i guess we won't miss the wobble, would we? the same is with the transitional points, you mention. all that would make no difference anymore following my thoughts above. (if i got you right emg456) one neck, two worlds, one sound Chris

Welcome Victor.

Hi @TimR, most DI boxes I have opened up over the years just have a simple switch that causes a break in the connection to pin 1 of the XLR, there is no resistor. I think it would have to be of a pretty high resistance to give the same noise cancelling effect, which would be the same as a break in the connection. Mic cable shielding is not designed as a safety earth plane. It just happens to connect to earth in the mixer to aid with signal shielding if there isn't inherent noise being inducted it on the run. I have seen installations with all shields removed at 1 end on multi-channel snakes in noisy environments before. It wouldn't be my choice as it limits your options for noise issues, but I have seen it done.

This'll be my last post. But in the scenario above where someone is already getting electric shocks possibly due to a faulty amp, removing the earth from the mic wire is NOT an acceptable solution. If the fault is in the guitar amp (or the supply feeding it), removing the path to earth means they are still building potential which can easily be earthed through another path, like a different mic or some random bit of stage kit or touching someone else who is earthed. Especially dangerous if it's one where the potential slowly floats up over time. The ONLY safe solution is to stop using that guitar amp/supply. Hum is not necessarily a sign of serious danger. However, an electric shock is a damn good indicator (nylon trousers notwithstanding). The point is not that the fault is definitely lethal, but that you don't know it isn't

Thank you! I'll have a go

Having received the new electronics for my Thumb bass I began removing the knobs. The push/pull knob had a spring underneath which I was expecting, but I didn't notice that one of the other pots also had a spring until turning the bass over and it dropped off. Any idea which pot shaft it came from, or why the balance or the stacked T&B knob would have had a spring?

Nice cardigan.

Assuming there's no fault in the mic wiring.