We Return to the 5F11 Vibrolux Clone

During the Marcy amp build I believe I referred to the Vibrolux 5F11 build I did a few years back.  That amp was my first truly successful build.  In fact, it's the amp I loaned Marcy for a couple weeks.  She really dug it, and it lead to my building the MM-1.

There were a few details I never got around to finishing on that amp, so with the MM-1 done, I decided to go back and do a few things to the Vibrolux (which needs a new Crawfish name).

One big item was to finish the toning on the cabinet.  It's a Mojo cabinet that was lacquered, but it still looked a bit too 'new' for my taste.  Now that I refined my tweed finishing skills, I want to make the Vibrolux look old too!

I had to take the chassis out, so I snagged a few pictures.  Here's the whole chassis on the workbench.  After working on the other amp, this one seems much easier to handle since it's quite a bit smaller.

 I have Mercury transformers on this one as well.

The business end of the chassis.  I used similar parts - carbon composition resistors, big Sprague filter caps, and Mallory 150 caps in the preamp, and as coupling caps.  I may experiment with Vitamin Qs at some point, but this amp sounds great as is.

The tremolo is amazing.  With the depth full up and the speed set slow, it's just dizzying.  I really can't play it set like that for too long....seriously!

One very interesting thing has happened to the chassis.  The steel is beginning to get a nice flat brownish-tinged patina to it.  It surprised me when I opened it up.  With the cloth wiring, it looks very similar to an old one.  This is an unexpected surprise.

This is the cabinet after the finishing.  I used the same process as the MM-1:  some Honey Pine color poly, then some Crawfish Special Mixture shellac. 

After I put it back together, I put one of the new logo plates on it.  Now it's official!

This weekend I'll get some pictures of both amps together along with my old Princeton.