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Hartley PEAVEY about chinese quality

#42
My Peavey Cirrus basses are awesome with a build quality comparable to $2000 to $4000 basses. At first, in the late 90's, the thought of buying a Peavey bass or guitar seemed like a bad idea. But seeing and hearing is believing and these are fantastic products. I will buy more of them.

All of my Peavey amps were a great value, and I have owned everything from Sunn, Ampeg, Acoustic in the late 60's and early 70's, to Carvins EV, GK Rack rigs BBE, IVP... I can't remember them all.

Most people do not understand manufacturing. I have worked in an electronics manufacturing plant, and I worked in marketing for the same manufacturer. It is a tough gig: design, engineer and produce a product with lots of little parts you buy and mate up some you make, market and promote it, sell it, and warrant it. Peavey did vertical integration in their manufacturing, notably the Black Widow speakers among many other components

I have done contract PA work with one of Peavey's large trapezoid cabinets and they always performed well. Peavey is pro gear, sorry to counter the naysayers. Well done Hartley, you are an icon of the music industry.
 
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#43
I still have the TKO 75 combo I got in 1988, and it still works as good as new. That thing has been completely bulletproof, been hauled and set up a thousand times, totally trustworthy. Oddly enough, I've had more compliments on my sound through that amp than any other. It's only 75 watts but it pushes and breaks up really well.
 
#44
cjj said:
As for Chinese quality, well, it's like everywhere else, you get what you pay for. The Chinese are quite capable of making very high quality items, but they will cost more than the cheap schlock most companies turn out just to make a quick buck.

After all, China is one of only 3 nations on the planet that have successfully launched humans into space, and it takes extremely high quality technology to accomplish that...
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This is absolutely correct. Junk comes from China because that is what the customer ordered. Meanwhile, iPhones and iPads, Sony, Nikon and most other high-tech gear also come from the country with more ultra high-tech automated factories than anywhere else in the world. Don't blame China - blame the greedy customers that didn't want to pay for quality.
 
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#46
I have used Peavey amps for over 20 years and have only had 1 failure. Mark III all the way to Mark VIII through out the years and several cabs (a powered 2x10 w/a 2x15, and a 1x18/2x10) and they have also been fantastic for me (and STILL have the 2x15). Right now I'm using a Mark VIII that I have had forever and a Fender Bassman 4x10 as a main rig with a small Ashdown head/Ampeg 1x15 Classic as the living room rig. I can honestly say I will probably always have a piece of Peavey gear.

I remember the first Peavey amp I had and on the inside of the chassis it had a little metal plate inscribed that it was "Made by beautiful women under atmospherically controlled conditions in Meridian Mississippi" How could you not want one?
 
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#47
In the 80s, I ran a tri-amp system.

TKO-65 with a Black Widow speaker for the bottom. A Minx for the mids and a Rage guitar amp for the highs. Honestly, it sounded great, and the Rage had just a touch of distortion, that made pinch harmonics just SCREAM.

Damn - those were the days...
 
#48
I think if you are passing on gear simply because its asian, you're missiing out on some great stuff. I have basses and amps from the "prefered" countries of orginain North America, Germany, Canada etc. Great stuff. But ive also got a Great V4B reissue and a few asian basses i picked up on the MF stupid deal of the day. Most notably a schecter stiletto and a G&L M2000 and a Comanche. All of them arrived with flawless finished and perfect necks

The G&L M2000 i paid 3-400(i cant remember now) for a brnad new in box honey burst model. and G&Ls have the benefit of there US made electronics. For that money you cant go wrong

Asian products are a reality now and it wont go away. At some point people started valuing style over substance and quality. My sister and her husband throw out alot of there furniture and clothing ever year or two. Simply becuase its not trendy anymore, they buy new trendy junk and repeat it again in a year or so.

I liked a lot of the comments about chinese quality though and its absolutely true. First there are improving and learning and second the quality is mostly governed by the companiy requesting the builds specs and requirements, then quality control down the line
 
#49
Marikk said:
I think if you are passing on gear simply because its asian, you're missiing out on some great stuff. I have basses and amps from the "prefered" countries of orginain North America, Germany, Canada etc. Great stuff. But ive also got a Great V4B reissue and a few asian basses i picked up on the MF stupid deal of the day. Most notably a schecter stiletto and a G&L M2000 and a Comanche. All of them arrived with flawless finished and perfect necks

The G&L M2000 i paid 3-400(i cant remember now) for a brnad new in box honey burst model. and G&Ls have the benefit of there US made electronics. For that money you cant go wrong

Asian products are a reality now and it wont go away. At some point people started valuing style over substance and quality. My sister and her husband throw out alot of there furniture and clothing ever year or two. Simply becuase its not trendy anymore, they buy new trendy junk and repeat it again in a year or so.

I liked a lot of the comments about chinese quality though and its absolutely true. First there are improving and learning and second the quality is mostly governed by the companiy requesting the builds specs and requirements, then quality control down the line
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Cool, my son-in-law is from Thunder Bay. Tiny world.
 
#51
This is somewhat analogous to the Carvin image. I have had my run ins with their gear, the first three BX 500s I got all failed. After I did the research on the problems here on TB the problem was sorted. And although I thought the tone was awesome when I bought it 5-6 yrs ago I had already moved on to Genz Benz. Recently a female bassist played the BX with a Aguilar GS 112 and asked me Kirk come turn some knobs cause it sounds fuzzy, resisting the temptation to tell her to "turn her own knobs" and dialed back the gain a bit and bliss was at hand. One mans trash truly is another mans treasure. I toured with a Peavy bass amp in the 70s, no shame, the Carvin BX is my jam gig amp. The SM 12 gets the real gigs. I would have no problem gigging my Carvin or a PV and I have had my eyes on the Peavey bass amps soon to come out with great interest. And I use Genz Bergantino and Glockenklang with some high end basses. Just for perspective as I am a bit of a tone geek.
 
#53
Peavey stuff has been bulletproof for me, and the vast majority of theater shows I've done have been through my nearly 30 year old KB300. Being a keyboard amp, it won't give you the kind of tone you'd want for a rock gig, but it's extremely clean, controllable, repeatable, and reliable, which is critical for pit orchestra work. I probably wouldn't want to record an album with it, but for day-to-day "throw it in the car and gig with it" reliability, I haven't found anything else that I trust as much.
 
#54
So going forward, what's going to happen to Peavey's American manufacturing? If its going to be more expensive, it better be world class or it'll get beaten up by the stuff in that price range that is world class. The Chinese made stuff undoubtedly makes up the largest part of their sales, so I wonder if that's going to force them to be completely manufactured in China in the near future.
 
#55
I've owned my fair share of Peavy gear over the years with no complaints in the reliability department for the most part. No qualms in general, but at the end of the day, when you spend your hard-earned money on an amp or piece of gear, sometimes you just don't want to spend money on an amp that you'll be plugging into every night and wincing at because it's not aesthetically pleasing to you. It may sound shallow, but I'd rather play an amp or instrument that not only sounds good, but also brings joy to my eyes when I see/play it, thus making me want to play more. Everybody has different tastes in style, so fortunately there are a lot of choices out there these days for us musicians.
 
#57
buldog5151bass said:
The Peavey look may be dated, but that is not what is keeping down sales.

1 middle of the road sound
2 weight
3 perception of quality

In that order. That's why the majority of what it sells is beginner.
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I suspect that the majority of what the music business in general sells is beginner. We focus on the pro stuff, but I'll bet pro is not more than 20% of the market.
 
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#59
Peavey is unusual in the regard that they make everything from instruments all the way to sound gear. Instruments are probably the smallest section of their business, and in their sound area, it's everything from backline gear to PA, theater systems, auditorium/school PA, etc, etc. No other company does that, so that makes it hard to compare them to other companies.

But due to the bell curve or other distribution model you subscribe to, someone's got to be at the bottom. If Peavey never existed, Electrovoice would probably be the whipping boy at the bottom.
 

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