Cheap Vintage Solid State Bass Amps

If you are looking for vintage SS amps that can still get the job done today,
check out the old Acoustic amps.
They were expensive at the time, so not everyone had one.
They were built to last and many have.
Don't expect them to be small, light and easy to move.
Nothing from that time, that put out much sound, was even remotely small.
Most were happy running at 4 ohms.
The best known are the 360 and 370.

 

The Univox UB250 piggyback bass amplifier sounds great. They were made by Unicord between 1970 and 1978. The 18 watt RMS head powered a single 4 Ohm 15" speaker. They can be found on Ebay and Reverb most days. They are inexpensive, light and reliable. If you run across one with the original Eminence pro Mag speaker, you are in for a real treat.

 

The original silver-knob with leatherette applique Peavey Bass heads. Built-in FUZZ ! ! ! You could go to a junkyard and find one holding up a car where somebody took the wheel off, take it home, and it would light and be ready to gig as soon as you run the critters out of it. Be sure and get it with the chrome castered 215 BW bin.

The Ford pickup of bass amps in its' day.

 

Early ss kit is both less easy to repair than tube and more problematic for spares, so there is going to have been a lot of attrition.

 

Standel made some great SS stuff back in the day. I had a 100 watt 215 that could blow down walls. +1 for Acoustic as well. Some of their gear is still in service and there’s an active club here on TB.

 

The older Acoustic stuff is great. I think of the older 70's/80's and 90's Peavey stuff too.

 

Check the Thrift shops and garage sales to find old SS stuff.

Rock was built on the SS sound - the fuzz boxes of old were all SS.
It may be hard to find an exact match for an old transistor, but you can usually find a close match. Though it may come in a different package, you could adopt it to fit.

 

This old Acoustic gets used live on a regular basis and is my go to at home, my tech went through it says it's easy to work on, and is still hitting on all cylinders ... love the sound too

Oh yeah got about $200 in the whole rig

 

I used an Acoustic 140 head in bars for about 15 years - probably still going somewhere!