All Activity

The Faber TP-59 slips right on and is spaced at 82.55 mm. The zinc stop bar was 78 grams, the Faber 28 grams, a net reduction of 50 grams or 1-3/4 oz.

I have a tailpiece stud well question here too if the moderator here dont mind me interrupting... Will a stud well ever get slanted during an installation ? Be it hammering in or using a drill press... i have thought it over ie: even if you may hammer tap in and perhaps accidentially placing the stud well slanted but during the process of hammering it in, wont the 30mm deep stud well hole auto correct the seating of the stud well to be straight while you tap in the the stud well?

Yeah, I bought this from Buffalo Brothers, who were a big Heritage dealer back then. They told me they sold it new and it was a special run they ordered n that configuration, and took it back in trade from their original customer. You never know about the veracity of such statements, but it all looks legit. The stud spacing confirms to me that it never had the usual Schaller roller bridge/top-loader hardware on it. The studs are metric thread.

Right, with the gain at a moderate spot and the bass and mids set low, it is gorgeous. I wouldn’t say shimmering Blackface clean, but just different enough and truly beautiful. More organic sounding. Wonderful at lower volume. It will stay clean unless i dig in with a pick. I was listening to Kenny Burrell’s God Bless the Child version, and Midnight Blue, and it is a lot like that - also much of Grant Green’s portfolio from the 60’s. Maybe a little darker and less smooth polish than a Blackface clean, more like a mic’d Deluxe. Truly a gorgeous sound when you get it set right. I’ve never heard an amp sound so much like it is mic’d. That intimacy and immediacy…..wow. Very giggable at 26 lbs. My drummer is on the loud side, so now I am at risk to get the MB California Tweed 40 watt head to see if it will give me more headroom for louder gigs. I hear it stays clean longer at higher volume. I played the 2:20 combo version at Guitar Center the other day. Wonderful little amp. Also looking at Suhr Bella. 44 watts/6L6. Also the MB open back cabinet is terrific sounding. More room filling, lush, ….All my other cabs are closed or ported. I forgot how great open back cabs are….i ordered an Eminence 2512 Neo speaker to try in it. I’m on a little amp bender so I need to sell some more stuff….

It's not unusual that a series of customized guitars would be built back then. My H535 doesn't have the standard Schaller bridge and tailpiece or bridge. It's a Nashville style. I don't know who spec'd it, but it's factory stock. Folks like Jay Wolfe and Ed Roman bought enough guitars at a time to spec special builds. I know that the Ed Roman Class of 59 and Blues Deluxe guitars came with a stoptail and Tone Pros bridge. If they didn't want the Schaller hardware or pickups, it would be a simple thing to tell the factory to build a few dozen with XYZ hardware.

I've installed a new stopbar (TP-6 fine tuners) on several Heritage guitars from the period and ran into the tight spacing. The solution for me was buying studs out there that were used on/sold for the Les Paul Custom (LPC), which have a slight dimensional difference from those used for the standard. I would actually buy the stopbar, which came as an assembly, to get the LPC studs and toss the bar itself. As I recall, and this is 15 years out, they were Imperial so someone may have swapped bushings when the original bar was put on your guitar. Heritage would do a lot of special orders at that time. I don't know if this is what you are running into, but it's food for thought and worked to solve my problem.

One of my favorite H-170 was a gold top lightweight. PunkKitty had it for a whille, as I recall. It had only three knobs and a full neck.

Well, that's a possible hack. I could squeeze it on there, but that's not natural to be that tight. But it turns out after some research, that not all stopbars are the same size... Hmm. The most common size is 82mm between studs, which was also the same as the Schaller top-loader that Heritage used. Schaller today, offers a stopbar tailpiece with 81mm between studs, smaller than most and Imperial (5/16") studs. The historic Gibson size is 3.25", or 82.55mm, almost exactly. I haven't found any 83mm spaced stop bars, but wouldn't be surprised. Was told when I bought this 1998 H150, that it was factory equipped as I got it. And I think that's true. It appears Heritage were sourcing the same zinc stopbars that Gibson used on historic re-issues in the 1990's. I was told it was a dealer order run of H150's, which normally in that time frame, had the Schaller hardware and pickups. But these were built with SD-59 pickups and tune-o-matic bridges (Nashville type) and 3.25" spaced stobbars as mine has. I think maybe they rounded it up to 83mm for some reason. Turns out, Faber stop bars are 3.25" between studs (82.55mm) and I have one coming to try out. I think it will fit just fine. Also, it seems there are different thickness of the mounting ears in stopbars as well. The Gotoh aluminum bar seems really happy on the 2001 H535, it's shiny as is all the hardware on the H535 as i got it. I've played the living heck out of my H150 all these years, and it was well played when I bought it used. So all the relic'ing was done the natural way. I ordered an aged nickel Faber bar. Learn new stuff all the time. Gotoh GE101A with drawings: https://g-gotoh.com/product/ge101a/?lang=en Schaller stop bar: https://schaller.info/en/stop-tailpiece/1205 Faber TP-59: https://faberusa.com/product/3010-2-aged-nickel-tp-59-tailpiece/ TonePros T1ZA: https://tonepros.com/product/t1za/

That's exactly what I was thinking.

I've owned the Mesa Fillmore 50 combo for about a year and I can say the first position on the gain switch gives up the glassy tones with ease, the second position gives up the tweedy tones, and the third position is classic Boogie. Randall Smith has said he based the tone stack on the vintage tweeds, but with the mid control down low, and the gain switch at the 1st position you can easily get the classic Fender clean tones. Another thing these amps are louder the most people give them credit for.The problem is the most people are running the preamp gains too low. When they preamp gains are above the halfway mark which is still very clean on position one, and the master is cranked they are very loud. The volume on the master doesn't really come on 'till the last third, it's way different than most amps which develop most of their volume in the first two thirds of their travel. I have no problem getting clean above some hard hitting drummers.

You might just file a bit of the Al stop bar?

ok- so I had been in the market for an amp...after reading this thread, I just pulled the trigger on a Mesa Boogie Fillmore 50...I think that it will be awesome!

Yes!!!! Thank you

Well done! I love that top! Inlays…this one is really a beauty. And a great deal.

SCORE!

It is a very good sounding amp. Different from my usual flavor, but I like it a lot. Variety is the spice of life! I once played a ‘58 Deluxe and have never forgotten it. This one has a some of that vibe for sure. I love those old Rudy Van Gelder studio recordings of Kenny, Grant etc. It is a great sound. Cuts through really well live too.

It was not as described!!!

I've had a 1998 H150 for a bit over 20 years. It was factory equipped with Duncan 59's, and a standard tune-o-matic tailpiece and bridge (Nashville style bridge made in Germany). The tailpiece has no branding on it. The puzzle is the stud spacing on the stop bar is the puzzle. I've very, very carefully measured the spacing and it is 83mm not 82mm, not 82.5mm. The threads are the standard metric threads. I compared it to a recently acquired H535, made in 2001, which came with the Schaller roller bridge and top-loader tailpiece. It measures at 82mm stud spacing, same threads. I put a Gotoh aluminum stop bar on it, and fit perfect. The reason I had the Gotoh aluminum bar on hand was that I tried to put it on the H150 a few years ago, and it was a very, very tight fit. So I just set it aside and went back to the zinc (Zamak) stop bar it came with. Just for grins, I tried the Schaller top-loader from the 2001 H535 on the H150 and same deal, very tight fit. The studs threaded right in, but the top-loader didn't want to slide on all the way, just too tight. I just measured a Custom Shop Gibson R0 (1960 re-issue) with "vintage correct" everything on it, including a 1950's spec aluminum stop bar. It's imperial (inch) based, but measures 82.45mm stud spacing. So that's kind of puzzling. I'm not sure who made the stopbar on my H150, but I was told it was factory equipment at the time (Buffalo Brothers sold it new originally, and to me as used). I feel confident that is true. The stop bar it came with, fits perfectly. So the spacing seems quite intentional and what Heritage intended to do on that H150. I sort of wanted to try an aluminum stop bar, but not sure where to get one that might fit. I suspect a "vintage correct 3.25-inch" might fit it. Anyone know the history of this, or seen the same?

Very thorough amp review, especially since you've just begun your sonic journey with this new rig. Interesting that you feel the amp leans more into the vintage bassy 'tweed' tone rather than 'glassy Fender' (scooped?) tones. Maybe an EQ pedal will help dial in your desired sound if knob twisting doesn't get you where you want to be. But it does appear from your comments that you really dig the tones you're getting. Tweaking a new amp at home and again at a live venue is part of the fun and part of the adventure. Enjoy!!

After resolving some noise issues (one power tube not seated properly)…we got down to business. I’ve had it a couple of days now, and I am looking forward to exploring it more. Bought from SoundPure, and they were very good, except the footswitch cable was missing. They are sending one. SoundPure is one of my preferred dealers as they do free shipping (over a certain amount) and no sales tax for California buyers. Makes a meaningful net difference to save that 7.75% on a bigger purchase. Very old school amp. Even has the older “Boogie” badge. Touch sensitive, feels a little more like a tweed deluxe than a blackface amp. Somewhere in between. You can really hear your picking technique (or lack thereof in my case). The kind of pick, angle and attack come through quite audibly. Great low gain sounds. Build quality is solid. It is pretty light for a 50W tube head, so at first lift it feels a little funny, being used to much heavier heads at this wattage, but definitely solid. At 26 lbs this amp may be the best tone per pound tube amps head I’ve ever played. My back is not so good these days, so to know i can gig with something portable, reliable and that can give me a tone that I dig is a big deal. I’ve been looking for something light, with “that sound” but haven’t been able to find it. This one is very very close. The cabinet is nice too. Typical good Mesa Boogie quality. I got the 1x12 23” wide cabinet. Wider cab makes it sit perfectly under the head; i dont know if it makes any tonal difference. Maybe, but hard to know without A/B against the smaller cabinet. Open back. MB Black Shadow speaker is a good match for this amp. Sounds nice and full even before break in. I didn’t get the cab to match the head with tinsel grill cloth, which looks cool, kind of like a mini-stack, so I’ve got a little mismatch ‘cause i liked the all black cabinet better. I might change out the grill cloth on the head so that they match someday. Might also swap for a Neo speaker for weight. Eminence Deltalite 2512 might be a good match. I like that speaker a lot. Clean, clear. More like a monitor speaker. And very light. EQ is simple (Treble, Mid, Bass) and there is a pretty wide sweep for each. All seem sensitive to how much gain you are putting in. More gain requires backing off of bass or it gets indistinct, but at the right levels the bass is tight enough and lets a lot of “wood” through. At certain settings it almost sounds like you are playing an upright bass on the low strings. Lots of thump if you want it. Sound is excellent. Treble and presence used in the right combination produces really sweet top end. I love it. Mid control is effective to either scoop or bring up the mids. Very useable. Reverb sounds just like it should. I keep it around 9:00 and it gives plenty of depth to the sound. The on line chatter about it not being very loud for a 50 watt amp is correct, at least with the gain at 1:00 or lower. With the gain at noon or 1:00 It never gets super loud, even with the Master dimed. Loud enough for my small to medium gigs though. I suppose for a bigger/louder show you could just mic it. I have not pushed it to see how loud it can get and stay clean. Will try later when no one else is home. I play clean 95% of the time, so that’s what I’ve been dialing in. Clean tones are definitely familiar with this amp, but a little different. Not glassy like a blackface, more like a tweed. You can hear a little more guitar wood, a little more midrange, etc. Reminds me a lot of the early Kenny Burrell G175 into a Fender Deluxe recordings or some older Grant Green. Very organic sounding. Lots of good presence. Seems like it will cut through a gig mix very well. At the moment my only quibble is that so far it is a little hard to get the low end sounding exactly like I want it, but it is very good nonetheless. I’m sure I’ll figure that out. More to come…the real test will be when i gig with it in a couple of weeks.

This was the very first thing I noticed about mine. For starters, grab a single coil guitar, preferably a Tele, put the gain position switch into the middle position, gain about 6/7, and everything else at 5 (tailor the bass to the low e-string), and you will hear the sound of a Fender tweed amp with all of it's squishy-ness there that makes playing tweeds so much fun. But the Fillmore is even more fun than a tweed because it has a great sounding reverb!!! This isn't but it sounds very much like a hot Tele pickup...

That makes sense to me. They seem pretty proud of the "Pattern Vintage" neck carve on the McCarty 594's. I have a few and I like them too... which says a lot for someone like me who typically doesn't like necks as chunky as that.

Should be available to a costal dweller like you. Half serious, but what do you have to loose?

Seriously? Salt water Dan?

Thanks! I must have missed that pic. Guess I should look closer next time!