"Kalamazoo Bass 30" Whaddya Think?

He took all the cool stuff and replaced it with lame stuff, with the possible exception of the recapping, the speakers and grounding system. Probably sounds good but I'm having my doubts at that price.

 

Nope...maybe ok for guitar, but not at $400.

 

Can't hurt to look, if you're OK with the price. It would be a totally vintage sound, but would it be audible enough?

 

I played through one for a bit. Someone was actually going to give it to me and I passed. Sounded like crap then, probably sounds like crap now. In its day it was low budget stuff.

 

I think the price reflects the mods done, not it's resale value. If it sucked originally and they decided to mod it, I get it. I did that to an Ampeg B-12XTC myself. That said, this thing could be a cool quirky amp but probably wouldn't suffice for most band situations and I doubt you could get your money back out of it. That's coming from a big fan of low wattage tube amps.

 

Well old tube rigs can be awesome, but at that price I'd like original knobs and grillcloth and no logo.

 

At that price I'd hope the seller had all the original parts to come with the amp as it was.

 

Should be a decent practice /recording amp, priced reasonably. Guitar might sound even better through it.

 

A blast from the past.
My first amp. The amp I learned on, practice only.
Drove my parents crazy, sitting in my bedroom, cranking this up. With a Gibson EBO.

 

I got 1 for $100 years ago, recapped it, and tried it out. Sounds pretty good, but not loud at all. I sold mine to a guitarist, and he just uses the original Jensen 10s in the cabinet with another head. I'd pass.

Chris

 

Way back in the day, after I had cajoled my parents into helping me buy my first real amp(a used Sunn Sorado), I came across one of these at a school find raiser rummage sale. Can't remember what I paid for it, but it was a deal. Used it as my first practice/'coffee house' amp(actually did use it in a church youth group coffee house situation). It weighed a ton for it's small size. With two EL84 type tubes into two 10" in a fairly shallow cab, it sounded great in the bedroom, but went into Jack Bruce fart tone pretty quick live. I did an early bi-amp experiment with it, putting it on top of the Sunn cab, and then the Sorado head on it, fit perfectly and looked similar. Bottom line, it does better as a guitar amp. Yes, the original speakers were junk for bass(sounded pretty crunchy with guitar), but with this particular amp, I don't think he upgraded with bass in mind. That, with all the unnecessary cosmetic changes(sure, there's a lot of quirky things about this amp, but that's part of it's goofy charm), I wouldn't pay more than $200. AND it's just going to sit in your den or practice space, unless you do use it as a guitar amp.

 

That's a real neat-looking amp but I'd be wary of earthquake damage, as one was apparently happening while the photos were being taken.