Blues Jr. Pro's and Con's!

[charlie brown]

I had an Odd, experience, this morning. I plugged into my old '82 (Japanese) Fender "Sidekick 35R"

which I use daily, as a practice amp. Then, for grins, I plugged into my Blues Jr. III. Tried to

set them at the same volume, and tone...and, the Sidekick actually sounded better! At least, this

morning, it did. LOL I was surprised, to be quite honest. That little Sidekick has always been

a great little "solid state" amp, and totally reliable. But, it's actually not as "boxy" sounding,

and a bit cleaner, too...all things being equal, setting wise. Headroom is about the same, as well.

And, the Sidekick has a slightly smaller cabinet...so, I'm not sure WHY it sounds less "boxy," than

the Blues Jr. The Sidekick seems to have more of a "blackface" tone, to it...even with the smaller

cabinet.

 

Interesting!!

 

Any similar experiences, from any of you? What did you do, to "cure" the "boxy" sound, from the BJ,

(aside from getting rid of it, that is)?

 

 

CB

[Big Bill]

I have a Blues Jr NOS. I don't hear that boxy tone you describe. The only problem I have with it is the reverb. I can't get a solid connection to the tank, I have to jiggle the wires. I had this problem with another.

[charlie brown]

Well, with it's small cabinet, the BJ has always sounded a bit "boxy" to me.

But, what surprised me, was how much less "boxy" the Sidekick sounded, in

comparison, since it has even a slightly smaller cabinet. The BJ also seemed

"harsh" in tone, compared to the warmer tone, of the SS Sidekick. How ODD

is That?!! To be honest, I'd never bothered to compare the two, before.

 

I know the circuits are completely different, etc. But, I just never expected

this kind of difference...seems like it "should" be the other way 'round!

 

CB

[Big Bill]

I would have thought the same as you. Perhaps replacing the tubes in the BJ may make the difference?

[dc3c46]

I had an Odd, experience, this morning. I plugged into my old '82 (Japanese) Fender "Sidekick 35R"

which I use daily, as a practice amp. Then, for grins, I plugged into my Blues Jr. III. Tried to

set them at the same volume, and tone...and, the Sidekick actually sounded better! At least, this

morning, it did. LOL I was surprised, to be quite honest. That little Sidekick has always been

a great little "solid state" amp, and totally reliable. But, it's actually not as "boxy" sounding,

and a bit cleaner, too...all things being equal, setting wise. Headroom is about the same, as well.

And, the Sidekick has a slightly smaller cabinet...so, I'm not sure WHY it sounds less "boxy," than

the Blues Jr. The Sidekick seems to have more of a "blackface" tone, to it...even with the smaller

cabinet.

 

Interesting!!

 

Any similar experiences, from any of you? What did you do, to "cure" the "boxy" sound, from the BJ,

(aside from getting rid of it, that is)?

 

 

CB

Blues Jr. is boxy and there is really no cure unless you run it

into a 2x12 or what I do A/B/Y with another amp (I use my Lonestar Special with

a 2x12 cab and run both together.

I found that my AC 15 does not sound boxy at all and better too.

[moparguy]

Could be the difference between solid state and tube amps your experiencing, there is a pretty noticable difference, just my 2 cents

[bonzoboy]

The first time that I used a Blues Jr. was when on a guitar hunting trip.I was so impressed with the tone of the Blues Jr. that I bought that too along with the guitar.The Blues Jr. is a great little amp with a great frequency response,great reverb and tremolo effects and it's plenty loud.The only thing that I found compromised the sound of the Blues Jr. was the Fender/Eminence speaker,a lot of people have found that replacing it with a Celestion Vintage 30 improves the sound tremendously.

[charlie brown]

Yeah, it's a great little amp, for sure. I wouldn't argue that.

I was just surprised, at the difference in tone, between it,

and my 30 year old SS Sidekick 35 Reverb. Just didn't expect

that, in all honesty. But, I've never been one to "trash" SS

amps, anyway. Played too many, that were just outstanding.

 

And, you're right, about the Celestion Vintage 30 speaker.

But, in this comparison, BOTH amps have stock Fender Speakers.

Maybe someday, I'll put a Vintage 30, in both of those amps,

too.

 

CB

[Bender 4 Life]

Any similar experiences, from any of you? What did you do, to "cure" the "boxy" sound, from the BJ,

(aside from getting rid of it, that is)?

 

 

CB

 

you're familiar w/the saga of my BJ III.......the "boxy" sound was why I put the chassis into a wide open backed white pine 2x12" cab, and added a Jensen ceramic(vintage series) speaker in tandem w/the Fender Lightning alnico spkr.

 

it has such a different, "wide open" sound now, that you'd never guess what amp it really is (except for the knob layout).

[bluesguitar65]

I think the el84 is what makes it boxy sounding and the boxy sound is the tone characteristic of the Blues jr.

[badbluesplayer]

Here's a fully tricked out Blues Junior. It has all the bells and whistles and it's a good example of what you can do to a blues junior.

 

 

An upgraded speaker will cost a hundred bucks or so. A full sized tweed & oxblood pine cabinet is about $250.00. This amplifier also has about 200 bucks worth of work done on the chassis, including converting it so it has a 6V6 output section, bigger trannies and a choke. The full sized cabinet will allow you too use a long reverb tank, which is much more lush. The amp weighs less with the additional iron and the big cab that when it was stock.

 

The blues junior is a $500.00 amp. If you put another few hundred bucks into it, it will sound like a boutique amp. You won't find a better sounding amp than this one right here, period.

 

Believe me - You can't "Rest in Peace" until you're in a pine box!!

[charlie brown]

I understand, Ron...but, for the price of 2 Blues Jr.'s, you can then have One, that sounds

the way it should, to begin with?! If you, Bill M, and all these other folks know how

to improve them, WHY doesn't Fender just build them, that way, to begin with. The "better

components," and configuration, can't be THAT much more expensive to build, in the first

place, so one doesn't have to "mod" it, to get great tone...does it?!

 

Don't misunderstand...I really like what you've done, and your desciption of the final results,

but...at or above, the cost of 2, to get there, seems across purposes, of Fender's original concept.

 

Maybe, you should build 'em from scratch, that way, in the first place, charge more

(but, less than the cost of 2 BJ's) and start your own Amp line? Worth a thought,

anyway. Call it "The Bad Boy Blues" amp, or some such.

 

Cheers,

 

CB

[badbluesplayer]

I understand, Ron...but, for the price of 2 Blues Jr.'s, you can then have One, that sounds

the way it should, to begin with?! If you, Bill M, and all these other folks know how

to improve them, WHY doesn't Fender just build them, that way, to begin with. The "better

components," and configuration, can't be THAT much more expensive to build, in the first

place, so one doesn't have to "mod" it, to get great tone...does it?!

 

Don't misunderstand...I really like what you've done, and your desciption of the final results,

but...at or above, the cost of 2, to get there, seems across purposes, of Fender's original concept.

 

Maybe, you should build 'em from scratch, that way, in the first place, charge more

(but, less than the cost of 2 BJ's) and start your own Amp line? Worth a thought,

anyway. Call it "The Bad Boy Blues" amp, or some such.

 

Cheers,

 

CB

 

I hear ya! It's very difficult to justify the expense. But you know it could be dangerous if you played through it. :unsure: :unsure:

You might go home with $1,100 less.

 

Seriously, though. I think the reason the stock amps have el84s is because they're preferred by most people. They also go better with the amp they way it's packaged. They probably did prototypes with both 6V6's & el84 and the el84's won out.

 

But the el84's and the fender circuit are an oddball match. And not what you'd think when you think "Fender blues amp."

 

So if you really want a blues amp, you have to have 6V6's. They compromised the "bluesy" 6V6 idea and made the amp a more "rocky" with el84's.

 

Then there's the cab. A big pine cab is part of "the" sound. The pine helps to kind of scoop the mud out of the tone at high volume. It turns mud into fart, which is kind of good. It also compliments an Alnico speaker much better.

 

The guts upgrades are like the rest. A hundred bucks worth of parts makes roughly a couple hundred bucks worth of "upgrade" in the sound.

 

Lets face it. You can only do what your amp can do. At a certain point, your amp just can only do so much.

 

Whether it's worth the trouble, I don't know. But if I don't work on something I'll have to finish the bathroom.

[badbluesplayer]

Charlie - you could do this. The easiest place to start is to get a better speaker. You can get great speakers for say $80.00 to $110.00 or so. You can sell the old speaker in the same box for $35.00 to $40.00. That's a net expenditure of maybe $50 to $70 plus shipping.

 

Then go from there.

[charlie brown]

Ron, I appreciate the input, truly! And ALL your suggestions. My "tone"

worries evaporated, this morning, when I re-did the side by side, of yesterday

(Blues Jr. to Sidekick 35 Reverb)...then plugged into my VOX AC-30! LOL

Wow!! What a toneful amp, that AC-30 is "Stock!" Now, I'm sure there are things

that Could be done to it, as well...to "improve" the tone. But "Why?" LOL

 

And, Yeah...I know, it's an unfair comparison, "Apples to Oranges," and all that.

 

I DO think I will put a different speaker, in the Blues Jr. I really like Celestion

Vintage 30's. So, I may start there? We'll see...

 

Cheers,

 

CB

[charlie brown]

you're familiar w/the saga of my BJ III.......the "boxy" sound was why I put the chassis into a wide open backed white pine 2x12" cab, and added a Jensen ceramic(vintage series) speaker in tandem w/the Fender Lightning alnico spkr.

 

it has such a different, "wide open" sound now, that you'd never guess what amp it really is (except for the knob layout).

 

 

I hear you, Bender. I've often thought of doing something similar. Even (maybe) with 2X10's instead?

But, I appreciate ALL the suggetions, and thoughts you all have shared. Thanks...

 

CB

[T Bone]

I have the NOS version too. To me it sounds way better than the standard Blues Jr. (though I am certain it would pale to the modded version BBP shows above). It does have a different speaker among other changes from the standard model.

 

Question, when you did the A/B, were you playing at a moderate volume, or was the Blues Junior pushed to near break up? To me, that may have been the difference (plus with the volume and master volume the way they are on the Jr. there are a whole lot of potential settings to try out).

 

I really like my NOS Blues Jr. But I've only had it about 9 months, and have been away from home and working 70-80 hour weeks for about 8 months (been home 2 weeks and only fired it up for an hour a few days ago). So I need to get to know the amp better myself. But I do also remember back in the 80's or 90's, and I had a Fender Sidekick (I think it was a 25?). And for an inexpensive little solid state amp, I found the sound simply amazing. Had it when I began collecting vintage amps (had lots of tweed, some blonde and brown tolex, and others). It really never sounded bad in comparison.

 

Maybe all this is simply a testament to how good those solid state Fenders had become?

[charlie brown]

I have the NOS version too. To me it sounds way better than the standard Blues Jr. (though I am certain it would pale to the modded version BBP shows above). It does have a different speaker among other changes from the standard model.

 

Question, when you did the A/B, were you playing at a moderate volume, or was the Blues Junior pushed to near break up? To me, that may have been the difference (plus with the volume and master volume the way they are on the Jr. there are a whole lot of potential settings to try out).

 

I really like my NOS Blues Jr. But I've only had it about 9 months, and have been away from home and working 70-80 hour weeks for about 8 months (been home 2 weeks and only fired it up for an hour a few days ago). So I need to get to know the amp better myself. But I do also remember back in the 80's or 90's, and I had a Fender Sidekick (I think it was a 25?). And for an inexpensive little solid state amp, I found the sound simply amazing. Had it when I began collecting vintage amps (had lots of tweed, some blonde and brown tolex, and others). It really never sounded bad in comparison.

 

Maybe all this is simply a testament to how good those solid state Fenders had become?

 

T-bone, the comparison, was done at several different volume levels, just for "fun," to see

how they stacked up against one another. The Sidekick, compared very well, with the BJ...in

some ways, at some settings, even "better." But, in all fairness, I think the Sidekick was

voiced, originally more like a "blackface" Fender, and the BJ has more of the earlier "Tweed"

(albeit "boxier") voicing. So, there is some difference, right there. Still, they both

held their own! So, it was interesting, and helpful, regardless. :)

 

CB

[badbluesplayer]

Here's a good place for lots of info. Bill Machrone is the big expert on these.

 

http://billmaudio.com/wp/

[bluesguitar65]

Here's a fully tricked out Blues Junior. It has all the bells and whistles and it's a good example of what you can do to a blues junior.

 

 

An upgraded speaker will cost a hundred bucks or so. A full sized tweed & oxblood pine cabinet is about $250.00. This amplifier also has about 200 bucks worth of work done on the chassis, including converting it so it has a 6V6 output section, bigger trannies and a choke. The full sized cabinet will allow you too use a long reverb tank, which is much more lush. The amp weighs less with the additional iron and the big cab that when it was stock.

 

The blues junior is a $500.00 amp. If you put another few hundred bucks into it, it will sound like a boutique amp. You won't find a better sounding amp than this one right here, period.

 

Believe me - You can't "Rest in Peace" until you're in a pine box!!

Impressive work there. Thats no longer a blues jr, its a "badbluesplayer mojo" amp [thumbup]