1960's Gibson Falcon amps: anyone here with any experience with them??

[Soiouz]

The title of the thread says it all... I was offered a 1964 Gibson Falcon amp for a pretty good price and was wondering what the good people here on Offsetguitars were thinking of these amps...


I looked around the web a little and the reviews all seem to be very positive, but would like to hear from you guys.  Reliability? Sound? Effects (reverb, tremolo)? Use with a JM or a Jaguar? ....

[serial]

64s are decent amps, but the REALLY good ones are the tweed or blonde ones (up to '63).  The Falcons IIRC, are the 12" singles with 2 6V6s.  I like these, but I LOVE the older ones.  A year or two later, the amps got to be pointless IMHO.  If you're buying an old Gibby amp, go with a 12" speaker for sure.  Wattage is almost irrelevant-the old ones are cool and in my experience, reliable amps and still relatively good deals.

[Soiouz]

Yes, it's got a single 12 inch in it... I think it's a jensen speaker.

Thanks for the advice!

[Soiouz]

I just went to see the amp and try it with my old Jaguar.

It's in very good cosmetic shape: cloth, tolex, footswitch, etc. Fantastic reverb and tremolo effects and beautiful tone......

.......but, there's an extremely annoying electrical hum! 



So, I didn't buy it.... yet. The guy's going to get it checked by a tech......... Hope it's not a big problem.

[serial]

Is the plug ungrounded?  I would suspect yes, since that's the way they were.  That might contribute to some of the hum.

[Soiouz]

Yes, the plug is not grounded...... the amp is all original, so the plug is too. Is there a simple way to correct such a hum?

I never had an amp like that before!

[serial]

IF it's the hum, you can replace the plug with a grounded one.  That's IF thats the cause-there are other possible causes of hum in old amps.  I love the old Gibsons though...

[Vinkie]

Yes, the plug is not grounded...... the amp is all original, so the plug is too. Is there a simple way to correct such a hum?

I never had an amp like that before!

The hum could be a combination of no grounding, non-matched output valves, rf interference and probably dead filter caps. I have a '58 Gibson GA-20T Ranger and now it's a lovely and quiet amp but when I got it it was in a similar state as your Falcon. I found a nice tech and we worked on it together. Some resistors that had drifted too much were replaced and all of the leaky filter caps. It turned out that due to a dead resistor the amp was running haf power with only one side of the wave ampified so replacing that one made quite a difference. A 3-prong power lead for proper grounding and shielding for the back panel were added. After that it sounded excellent even with the (mostly original RCA) valves.

Gibson amps are generally quite nice although they went a bit eccentric after '63. This one sounds like it's still somewhat sensible and it seems to be in good nick so it could be rather good if you ask me. If you'd like to gig it a lot I'd replace the speaker with maybe a Weber or Celestion, the original Jensens sound nice especially clean but might not take the full blast so well anymore.

[Soiouz]

I bought it and brought it home tonight. In the end, the hum was simply the result of a bad circuitry at the guy's home...


The amp is really quiet now, and it sounds sssoooooo good! I'm really happy with it.   I can't wait to bring it to my band's rehearsal place so I can crank it up and see what it's really about!

But it sounds real good, and the reverb is one of the deepest I've heard!


[Edited to correct spelling]

[Vinkie]

I bought it and brought it home tonight. In the end, the hum was simply the result of a bad circuitry at the guy's home...


The amp is really quiet now, and it sounds sssoooooo good! I'm really happy with it.   I can't wait to bring it to my band's rehearsal place so I can crank it up and what it's really about!

But it sounds real good, and the reverb is one of the deepest I've heard!

Nice one! Congratulations! 

[pullover]

Great score, I have a 59 Gibsonette and it's one of my favorite amps in the world. Be careful with that 2 prong cord, and change it out for a 3 prong as soon as possible. If it starts to hum again, try flipping the plug over and plugging it back in, that should get rid of it in the mean time. I finally put the 3 pronger on mine after getting shocked every time I touched a mic or showed another guitarist a chord something while hold my guitar. It's kind of annoying shocking your face on a mic while playing.

[Soiouz]

Oh, thanks for that advice!! I admit that with the hum problem gone, I thought I wouldn't have to change the cable for one with ground, but now I just might go ahead and do that anyway.

Here's the amp with it's new best friend:

[serial]

So Happy to-getherrrrr!

Nice score.  I might go and pick up the 63 I've been looking at for the past month.  It went backstage at the Who show when they were in town.  My buddy brought it along for Pete's guitar tech to look at and I suppose after getting the positive vibes back there on the bus, I should've just gone for it.  I think I need to tomorrow!

[Soiouz]

So Happy to-getherrrrr!

Nice score.  I might go and pick up the 63 I've been looking at for the past month.  It went backstage at the Who show when they were in town.  My buddy brought it along for Pete's guitar tech to look at and I suppose after getting the positive vibes back there on the bus, I should've just gone for it.  I think I need to tomorrow!

Keep us updated!

I think you won't regret it.. I know I don't regret mine at all!!  Even better, I just discovered last night that the amp was designed to be used as a reverb-tremolo unit for another amp too (the reverb is a weird design in this thing)!  I can't wait to plug it in my bigger amp and hear how that sounds all together!

[pullover]

How much did you pay for it soiouz, if you don't mind me askin?