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Post subject: 1968 Fender Bassman Cab
Posted: Fri May 30, 2014 1:15 pm
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A friend of mine pointed me in the direction of an older guy selling his 1968 Fender Bassman Cab. It's a 2x15. It's not the original speakers. He's been the one and only owner, and he put the speakers in back in the 80's. overall, the condition is about an 8/10 the grill cloth is a little dirty but considering the cabs age it's understandable. He's asking 375 OBO. He said he's played it as a bass amp, but I always see guitarists using bassman amps. Would I be able to use it as a bass cabinet? Is the price reasonable? Thanks!


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Post subject: Re: 1968 Fender Bassman Cab
Posted: Fri May 30, 2014 1:31 pm
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Pictures would help.

If the speakers in that cabinet are JBL D140F, IMO, it would be worth the asking price and yes, you could use it as a bass amp. JBL D140F speakers are bass speakers.

Jerry

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Post subject: Re: 1968 Fender Bassman Cab
Posted: Fri May 30, 2014 1:53 pm
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Jakeyjakes83 wrote:
Would I be able to use it as a bass cabinet? Is the price reasonable?


Suitability for use with a bass instrument is wholly contingent upon what type of speakers are installed. Bear in mind, that cabinet is not the most efficient design for either guitar *or* bass. LF reproduction is hindered by the enclosure's relatively short depth and the ports are not correctly placed for proper tuning. Basically they're 'okay' but nowhere near as efficient as modern designs and quite unwieldy when loading or transporting due to the physical size. If the speakers are appropriate for bass, offer $325 tops.

Arjay

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Post subject: Re: 1968 Fender Bassman Cab
Posted: Sat May 31, 2014 3:39 am
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I agree 100% with Arjay. I’d want to run some simulations with cab volume and porting before I bought some old thing like that. And what about internal lining? Is there any at all, what type, and where?

There’s an unfortunate trend among many players to see the D140 as some holy grail of bass drivers. They were—thirty years ago. Today a $100 Eminence would crush it. Not only that, if those D140s are still using their original suspensions, then they might be decomposing and no longer doing their job, which would cause cab/driver tuning to be even worse than the original design. (Or, ironically, better, but with far less power handling ability.) Want to recone them? Try finding an original D140 recone kit (whose materials haven’t dried out / decomposed). And if you choose a generic kit—if you can even find one that isn't already drying out—who’s to say it’ll perform identically to an original; it might be stiffer and perform more like a guitar driver.

If the purchase is going to be made for collectibility/investment and possible subsequent resale, then okay. Or for low-volume use—sure, why not, as long as you go into it with the proper expectations around tone quality.

BTW, the Bassmans many guitarists used were mostly the old open-back combos which weren’t suited for BG in the first place, or they paired a Bassman head with a Bandmaster cab. I grew up in that era. Pedal steel players liked the Showman amps with single D130 cabs because they used to cut so well on axis (off axis, forget about it, because of the cone diameter, but that was n/a if mic’d). A guitarist using a Bassman amp today with an old closed-back Bassman cab—there’s no telling what kind of drivers are in there. I think Fender recently did a run of newer open-back 4x10 Bassmans for guitar, but I believe they shut that line down. I could be wrong on that.

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Post subject: Re: 1968 Fender Bassman Cab
Posted: Sat May 31, 2014 8:55 am
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So here's an update on the cab. The interior is in great shape. The guy had it professionally ported and padded. (Say that 10x's fast) the speakers aren't as old as what my buddy told me they are 200 watt Eminence speakers. I'm worried the mods would effect the value though.


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Post subject: Re: 1968 Fender Bassman Cab
Posted: Sat May 31, 2014 9:55 am
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Jakeyjakes83 wrote:
So here's an update on the cab. The interior is in great shape. The guy had it professionally ported and padded. (Say that 10x's fast) the speakers aren't as old as what my buddy told me they are 200 watt Eminence speakers. I'm worried the mods would effect the value though.


Got any pics?

Arjay

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Post subject: Re: 1968 Fender Bassman Cab
Posted: Sat May 31, 2014 3:49 pm
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Here's a link to my photobucket. It has the pics of the cab. http://s105.photobucket.com/user/JakeMB ... 8.jpg.html


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Post subject: Re: 1968 Fender Bassman Cab
Posted: Sat May 31, 2014 4:01 pm
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I play bass for a few local worship leaders. So the gigs I play include youth rallies, conferences and medium sized church services. I don't plan on playing it at the royal Albert hall. Lol I just thought I'd be cool to play on. I like the new fender amps but I wasn't sure how these oldies stacked up against the new stuff. Is the tone on these older cans any better/different than the new stuff?


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Post subject: Re: 1968 Fender Bassman Cab
Posted: Sat May 31, 2014 5:27 pm
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I took a peek at your pix. The guy did what he thought was for the best, but I'd walk away. New Fender Rumble 115 cabs are better, and very reasonably priced at $300 new/shipped. What are you playing through now, and what is it that you actually desire?
What can you actually afford to spend in $$$$?


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Post subject: Re: 1968 Fender Bassman Cab
Posted: Sat May 31, 2014 5:35 pm
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I don't need it I already have a nice peavey full stack. I just thought it was cool I. All honesty. :D lol


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Post subject: Re: 1968 Fender Bassman Cab
Posted: Sat May 31, 2014 6:01 pm
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linnin wrote:
I took a peek at your pix. The guy did what he thought was for the best, but I'd walk away. New Fender Rumble 115 cabs are better, and very reasonably priced at $300 new/shipped.


+1

The cab appears to be a '69 or '70 edition, not a drip-edge '68 model as previously reported. Someone did a pretty good job of re-tuning it for better resonance but it's still a 29.5" x 39" x 11.5" behemoth that's a PITFA to move around. A modern enclosure will eat that dinosaur's lunch.

Arjay

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Post subject: Re: 1968 Fender Bassman Cab
Posted: Sun Jun 01, 2014 7:40 am
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It is cool-looking and I can understand the pull. But the problem is, we can’t model it w/o knowing the exact internal cab dimensions and port lengths+IDs and the Thiele-Small parameters of the drivers. Just off the top of my head, the ports look too long and too narrow, but I’ll be the first to admit I’ve never tuned boxes that shallow. Nevertheless, the cab might sound perfectly ok. On the other hand, it might be a one-note boom box. Or, it might be something in between (not great-sounding, but still usable). The fact that the cab’s performance is not knowable, coupled with the fact that the cab’s original/collectible value is no longer there, makes me lean strongly toward No Sale. But that’s just me thinking logically. If you want the cab and you get (or have already gotten) a chance to play through it and you like what you hear, then by all means grab it. Nice thing about buying used is you can always sell it for what you paid for it. Also, the fact that the box has already been hacked means you can always have another go at tuning it for better performance, or even restoring it back to sealed-box if you want to find drivers suited to that.

Good to see another P&W player on here.

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Post subject: Re: 1968 Fender Bassman Cab
Posted: Sun Jun 01, 2014 9:36 am
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craig.p wrote:
or even restoring it back to sealed-box if you want to find drivers suited to that.


This enclosure was never a "sealed-box". It was designed with two small rectangular ports positioned offset so that each of them vented just above and below the internal center partition. This type of cabinet was originally fitted with a pair of 12's and those ports may have been sufficient for them. When Fender upgraded the Bassman's speakers to 15-inch in mid 1968 they neglected to re-calculate the porting parameters required for the larger drivers.

Arjay

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Post subject: Re: 1968 Fender Bassman Cab
Posted: Sun Jun 01, 2014 12:39 pm
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Arjay, thank you for the correction.

C.

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Post subject: Re: 1968 Fender Bassman Cab
Posted: Mon Jun 02, 2014 11:51 am
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craig.p wrote:
Arjay, thank you for the correction.


No sweat.

Someone went to quite a bit of trouble and expense to re-engineer that cab's baffle board. It might actually sound pretty good (though still a muthafuggah to load and transport).

Arjay

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