RickTurner & Mik Bondy with Scarlet Fire Tiger and Super Bear Princeton Reverb

[jazzyvee]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wO1alj3Z46c

[edwardofhuncote]

Neat. That Princeton sounds great, and I agree 100%, installing a 12" speaker in one is the first mod. Mine had a Celestion Cream 12 in it. Whatever witchery Bear did with the tone stack definitely fine-tuned it further. I think it's just from an understanding of where the finish line is... this mod will have this result.


That's the original Peanut guitar leaning next to Rick there. Not sure about the other one slightly off cam.

[cozmik_cowboy]

That Princeton sounds great, and I agree 100%, installing a 12" speaker in one is the first mod.

Heresy!  If you want a 12, trade your Princeton for a Deluxe and leave the 10 in situ for those of us appreciate them!

Peter (who would, however, not hesitate to convert a Twin to 1X15.......)

[Songdog]

That Princeton sounds great.... Whatever witchery Bear did with the tone stack definitely fine-tuned it further..

I should do a web search for "Super Bear Princeton Reverb". Does anyone know what that "witchery" was, or what else Bear did to it?

[Songdog]

All I was able to turn up in a web search was from https://analogr.com/l/61edd602-bc7b-4f84-bf45-f16af866e40a:

He improved the power supply adding a choke to eliminate any residual hum.  He added a midrange control and bright switch to the preamp stage, so it's basically the front end of the reverb channel of a Twin Reverb.  The JBL was reconed, probably by Wiz in 1973.... Old pal Nic Grabien (Janet Furman’s first employee!) has “blueprinted” the amp for posterity.

Still looking for the "blueprint", but I doubt it's on the interwebz.

[peoplechipper]

I LOVE the idea of a twin with one 15" that would be killer; might knock you over too...

[edwardofhuncote]

Granted, it was a reissue, but (one of) the Princeton Reverb amps I had came with a 12... and yeah, everyone seemed surprised by that. I really don't know whose idea it was, but it came from Fender that way. Offhand I would guess a larger dealer ordered a special run of them. It was also tweed covered, so there's another clue.


At 1:35 in the video, RT says "...Fender is making awfully good amps these days. It might be possible to take a new Princeton Reverb, and do this [meaning the Bear mods I guess] to it... and have a great amp." He goes on the explain that much of its sound is owed to the 12" in JBL over the 10".


So that was just one takeaway. The other, more interesting thing was the addition of a Mids pot to the tone stack of the Princeton. That could make all the difference.

[rv_bass]

Sounds kind of like one channel of an F-2B