Fender Blues Junior Amp

[JimPage]

Hey--

A couple of days ago, I traded some road-weary gear and added a few bucks at Atomic Music and walked out with a very clean Fender Blues Junior amp.

Atomic Music, for those unfamiliar with this DC-area store, carries used gear and you never know what you'll find there on any given day. They've been around over 15 years; started in College Park, Maryland, and now have stores in Beltsville, Maryland, and Rockville, Maryland. Beltsville is right up the street from College Park, and is the store I go to.

So this amp sounds pretty nice and looks great. I wanted a Fender tube amp that was around 15 watts and was light enough to lug around easily. This should fit the bill. There are tons of articles about these amps on the web; some folks love 'em, some folks hate 'em, and a good many mod the living heck out of them for one reason or another.

I guess they're like the old VW Bug of amps.

The places where I'll be using this are mainly back-deck jam sessions and the occasional small gig. My '75 Vibro Champ was my go-to amp in those situations until about a month ago, when a couple of the regulars at a jam each pulled out banjos. At that point, even at full blast, I could no longer hear myself! I was playing my parts-caster version of an early '50s Tele through the VC.

Hence the Blues Junior.

I'll report back soon on how this amp does in real use and how it sounds with different guitars! If any of you have experience with it, please share!!!

--Jim

[Mr. Bill]

They're great little amps. I've fixed a million of them and once they've been settled in, they work well for most players.

During the course of production Fender has had a few systematic problems with them, but nothing that can't be easliy fixed. Some of the typical things were bad soldering on the tube sockets, bad runs of filter caps, bad runs of tube sockets. That is not to say that your amp has any of these problems. The only real advice here is to check your output tubes, as these amp run them fairly hard.

Congrats on the new purchase. Keep us informed as you learn more.

[JimPage]

Good info, Mr. Bill. Thanks!

--Jim

[MOSDAN]

You got some good info from Mr. Bill. These are great little amps with a lot of volume for only 15 watts. Be careful of the knobs and pots as the pots are soldered directly to the board and are a bugger to replace. There is a mod that can be gotten off the internet that protects the pots and is easy to do. I don't have the URL for the mod but you can google for it. Congrats on your purchase!

[JimPage]

Hi, Mosdan--

Thanks for the info!

As far as the "protect the pots" mod, all I've seen so far-- and I've looked A LOT-- is the warning from BillM about the white replacement chicken-head knobs not having the proper base to keep the knobs and shaft from wobbling back and forth. He gives info on how to correct for that. The black stock chicken-head knobs, as on my amp, have the correct base.

Is that what you're referring to?

--Jim

[MOSDAN]

JimPage,
I looked for and found the sight for the mod that corrects the problem that some of these great amps have. It is one of BillM's mods. As he mentions, some of the stock knobs don't fit correctly and it is crucial to modify the pot shaft so the knob goes down far enough to engage the "step" properly. One has to be careful when refitting the knob to the pot shaft that too much force is not used to place the knob on the shaft as damage to the pot can result. The red amps have a totally different knob problem as the knobs were of a different design than the black knobs. Anyway, here is the link:
http://billmaudio.com/wp/?page_id=217

[JimPage]

Hey, Mosdan!

Thanks for the link! That's the one I read. My Blues Junior has the stock black knobs with the proper stepped bottom, so I should be good to go.

I also bought a Fender cover for the amp, for whatever protection that might provide.

Take care--

--Jim