A poor man’s Dumble? Kitty Hawk Standard 

Thank you for your comment. Yes they stole a lot from Mesa. And I’m a little bit jealous, cause I never ever had the opportunity to play or service a Dumble. Pretty rare even in the states, but here in Europe almost not existing. And back in these days in the eighties Mesas where hard to find in Germany, too. The answer to that problem was: Kitty Hawk! By the way, here’s another one, that might be interesting for you: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-rODHzxWEh60.htmlsi=Nf8YypczpdGfBVon Greetings

​@@martinstubeampworkbench2299 , Sprague orange drop caps shoehorned into tight spots and glued down with silicone is a hallmark of Mesa Boogie amps. Also note the blue tantalum caps at about 5:30, those things are bad news, especially the one located right behind a voltage-regulator heatsink, exposed to lots of heat. When it short-circuits it will likely do further damage. Bending the tube socket terminals all the way back like that is a terrible way to install sockets; ideally the terminals should be able to move a little and self-align with the tube pins when you plug a tube into the socket. PCB-mounted sockets in general are a flawed design, but this is worse than most.

​@@martinstubeampworkbench2299 , highly flammable carbon comp resistors used for the power supply and tube screens is another stupid design flaw.

@@goodun2974 As always, a very informative statement. Thank you. And yes , this amp is full of stupid design flaws. I wouldn’t trust that thing, if I was a working musician. It’s not reliable. I have a Mesa Cal. 50 on my bench now. The same desaster : burnt traces, leaky caps, drifted carbon comp resistors . No fun at all. By the way, a lot of components don’t belong in a tube amp: ic’s, op amps, relais. Makes no sense to me. No need for all that, to have a good sounding amp.

Thank you , dad!

😂😂

Schematics of Kitty’s are a good kept secret. The rare ones in the www are handdrawn and hard to read. I never had an M 1 on the bench, but I put a link down below to a video I did last year about a KH Custom, a pretty desaster, too. If your tremolo is weak, my bet is on the driver tube. These poor little suckers have to stand a very high voltage in these reverb circuits, that shortens their life . If you want to have an overall stronger reverb, try a 12ax7 in case you find a 12au7 there. Higher gain-stronger effect. Greetings from Germany ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-rODHzxWEh60.htmlsi=ts2lZ_gW-DBZWhJ9

@@martinstubeampworkbench2299 Thanks for your reply. It sat for 15 years or so so I pulled the chassis before I fired it up slowly with a variac. all was good, with about 100-130 watts input current and 120 volts. then I found the red sig wire had fell off the return jack of the effects loop that the guy I bought it off of said did not work, so that fixed that I believe, I have yet to test it. I have some tubes to swap around to try for that. Does the M1 have tremolo? there are no controls for it, but you know, it did seem to have a very slight almost vibrato like thing going on, but its very slight. Possibly in that chip on the effects loop board? very Interesting.... other than that it seems worth spending the for the 12 electrolytics (gasp) and other caps (bypass, etc), and 3 or 4 noisey pots. they all need to be changed. it looks like marshall style metal shaft will work fine, I just have to double check the bushing length. it's a kick ass amp and worth saving I believe.

As I mentioned, never had one of these on the bench. But if there is no control knob for tremolo speed and intensity, the amp has none. Interesting problem, a tremolo effect in an amp without tremolo. Probably hard to trace the source of this weird problem. Another hairpuller! Good luck!

Thank you for your comment. I appreciate! Well to give a response: I always test unknown amps with a current limiter hooked up. So no reason to be concerned about the filtercaps. Plugging in a guitar, helps determine failures in many cases, one can HEAR what’s wrong. Components in Kitty Hawk amps are soldered always on top of the pcb. Makes no sense to flip the bord, cause there are no solderjoints on the underside. I mentioned in previous videos to drain the caps, and anybody who sticks his fingers in a tube should know what he’s doing. At least I hope so! Otherwise: don’t touch it. Greetings

I agree! They stole a lot from Mesa. But soundwise? I never played a Dumble. So…….who knows?! Maybe you want to take a look at this: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-lXb8J8XgezY.htmlsi=kOFBi0PdK_eUp_5U Greetings!

Awsome video!! Subcribed. I will watch them all, ofcourse. Never played a Dumble or Dumble clone, but I've played Mesa. Great amps, pretty rare in my country.

@@robertenache8463 Welcome! I hope you will enjoy the videos, like I did working on these pieces of musical history .