ShortScale.org

Remember the HH VS Bassamp 100 115 Combo
So I've been asked to play bass tonight. I've been and bought a sack barrow so I don't have to carry it everywhere: I found when I plugged it in after a few years in the garage that it was noisy and a bit dodgy. I sprayed all the pots and jack sockets with Servisol and that fixed most of the dodginess, leaving me with noise like a Fuzz Face through the high gain channel of an amp turned up to 6. None of the controls made any difference, so I tried plugging in to the Echo Return and putting a plug in Echo Send to disconnect the preamp. No difference. So all this noise was coming from the power amp board. So, remembering that I have had the odd noisy op-amp in an HH before, I suspected the 741, IC1.
Fortunately, I had an NE5534 low noise drop-in replacement and an 8-pin turned-pin socket, so I fitted those. The NE5534 also has a slightly higher maximum supply voltage, which gives me a bit more safety margin when the rails are +/- 18 V
Result; I wasn't sure the speaker was plugged in until I turned the master volume up full and heard a faint hum. Amazing. I might do that on all 3 of my other HHs.

It performed fine all night (the organiser brought a class D head just in case) and drew several comments. Despite being "only" 100W it was more than loud enough for a pub gig.

I guess it's back in the garage for another few years now

Even though I don't totally understand the science behind this sort of stuff, I love these kinds of posts. Good stuff Nick. find more excuses to bring it out.

Fucking love a HH, love that you're saving one from the scrapheap.

(If you ever see a L100, let me know; I need a backup)