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A Rare One....

Wally

Well-known member
Joined
Feb 27, 2003
Messages
3,535
For your viewing pleasure....a Premier Md. Super 88 circa 1960. Yes, it does ‘Rumble’ exactly when on depresses only the high frequency tone selector...the white tab on the far right... and use the tremolo! There are many other sounds available there, as well. 2 x 6560s cathode biased. It came to me dead after being found in a farm shed. Magnificent amp, 8mho....

6721082E-8C32-4CDA-9C74-F8AFF6E5BF8D.jpeg
 

renderit

Well-known member
Joined
Jan 19, 2009
Messages
10,951
THAT IS NEAT!

Glad you could bring it back to life.

Nothing screams "electrocute me" like some of that 60's plastics mixed with high voltage.

How's it sound?
 

akstrat61

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Joined
Feb 16, 2004
Messages
1,845
I've never seen one! Very cool! Even the footswitch has character! :cool:
 

Iguana

Active member
Joined
Aug 22, 2018
Messages
108
Very cool! I’ve never seen one of those before! Thanks for posting.
 

Wally

Well-known member
Joined
Feb 27, 2003
Messages
3,535
Love it, VERY cool. Here is one with soundclips: http://www.preservationsound.com/2010/11/premier-88-wrap-up-or-i-will-not-let-you-beat-me/

Funny thing is, that there apparently was three versions, First 4*6V6, Second 2*6L6 and finally 2*6550.

I’m glad ya’ll are enjoying this one. It is a great sounding amp with many possibilities.
Lars, thanks for that link. I am going to bookmark that one. I have a large bag of components that I replaced. All of the tone and coupling caps were replaced since paper in oil caps do not stand up to the passage of time. I never leave PIO caps in old amps. the last part I replaced was the capacitor in the passive crossover unit inside the speaker cab. Before I fired the amp up,mit occurred to me to check the resistance in that circuit. It was way odd, so I took a look and decided that that cap,should be replaced. The resistance came back in line, and I fired the amp up. Note that the amp I have has concentric pots on the volume controls. The other sections on those pots are very subtle level controls for the tone sections. This was not available on the earlier Md. 88 amps. As I understand it, this version is the Super 88.
re: the footswitch. This amp came without a switch. I was using an old Gibson mahogany ‘doorstop’ switch that I Had. A younger friend had a Gibson GA1RE unit without a switch and had a search tool working for him that alerted him whenever a footswitch of any kind popped up. A shop in Austin put up an ad for this Premier switch, and since he had seen and heard my Premier he knew I would ant it he picked it up. I traded a plastic ‘doorstop’ that was a match for his reverb unit for the Premier switch. Good fortune, eh?
Nte that I do not have the speaker cab hooked up in this picture. The speaker connection is made at the bottom of the power amp through an octal connector, which you can see in the picture sticking out of the speaker cab...if you look hard enough. I have worked up another connector somI can run the amp through another can so I can push the amp hard without worrying about blowing those precious old Jensen Alnicos...especially the small speakers.
handles...I need to get my handles to Brookwood Leather for duplications.
I might try to get a sound file, but I am not the most tech savvy person around.
 

Wally

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Joined
Feb 27, 2003
Messages
3,535
Regarding that site at that link, Lars...again thanks. I was going through some of the posts there, and what did I find????
I posted there back in 2017 looking for a preamp schematic. lol...it happens to me a lot when I am researching things. I get to check out my thinking from years back!!! Fwiw, my amp sounds much better than his samples do there.
 

Wally

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Joined
Feb 27, 2003
Messages
3,535
Lars, I am breaking it apart right now to pull the handles off so that I can have reports made. The small handle is in two pieces.
As for the sound on that demo, I found it thin considering the tone tabs he had chosen. When I get it back together, I’ll see if I can do some sort of demo, which is not something I am used to doing....but my Air might give a usable sample. Maybe a young friend who is more tech savvy has a good rig. I’ll check it out.
 

MapleFlame

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Joined
Jul 3, 2005
Messages
14,044
Lars, I am breaking it apart right now to pull the handles off so that I can have reports made. The small handle is in two pieces.
As for the sound on that demo, I found it thin considering the tone tabs he had chosen. When I get it back together, I’ll see if I can do some sort of demo, which is not something I am used to doing....but my Air might give a usable sample. Maybe a young friend who is more tech savvy has a good rig. I’ll check it out.
Wally, if you have a newer smart phone, just do a video. They do a pretty darn good job all things considered. I've never seen one of these, has me very intrigued to hear it as it's a very different kind of amp. Such great external condition. Great score.
 

LeonC

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Joined
Aug 30, 2002
Messages
799
I've got a friend with one of these. He restored it from a state of disrepair as well. He told me it was one of the most difficult amps to deal with that he's ever encountered...very difficult to work on, apparently. He also remarked that it sounded absolutely fantastic after he got everything working again. I'd love to hear one some day. Such a cool look! Everything was going "push button" back in the 50s and early 60s... Reminds me of my mom's old DeSoto, LOL!
 
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