Fender Vibro-King Repair Part Two 

Hi Chris, Denmark on the line....this were very informative videos for me, as I have two of the original Vibro-Kings that I try to maintain myself. They're both with 6V6 reverb drivers but born with different speakers (one Blue Eminence, the other Jensen Reissue) and there's small differences in the circuit, as they were revised a few times over the years...one only came with a single button footswitch for FAT, not a button for vibrato as the later versions. I have recapped both with F&T's all over the place and had som serious battles with hiss and noise at higher volumes, and various... The Vibro-Kings are like race cars and you need to keep an eye on them all the time - and quite some even give up on them because of reliability. But when they work, they're about the best sounding amps ever made...touch sensitive, three dimensional sounding and a reverb to die for. I also have two '66 Super Reverbs, Super Six Reverb, Dual Showman etc... and I know my way around in those classic amps, but like you show here, the Vibro-King is another animal - so for a guy like me that are not very good with schematics, your explanations of the circuit was very velcome, and I'm glad that I came across your videos....even though, I don't have any problems right now :-) But it made me want to open them up just to check some stuff.... Oh, and I also have one of the matching 2x12" cabinets.... but to me the 3x10 combo sounds better on its own... Thanks, Bjarne

Thanks Chris, wondeful video about an amzing amp.

That was an excellent outcome for the VibrKing, Chris. I missed Harley's cameo appearance this video. I might have to start a campaign of "Bring Back Harley" supporters.

The surf look suits you. I had a tremelo that ticked like that in a Fender amp , at the time I did'nt use it much but it bugged me . Thinking it sounded like it was picking up noise from the room lights I got a piece of a bicycle inner tube rubber and made a cover for the opto coupler out of it and gaffa taped it together and I never heard that "tick" again. Don't know what I did, I thought the rubber coat might keep the light beam isolated from external interference(I was 17 and back then the books just said "replace" the faulty part)? Great sound , a reverb system like that should sound amazing, I think those 3 spring smaller size tanks actually work a lot better( aa long as you match the Ohms), your vidys are a treat!

Worth it for the excellent impression of the 440Hz Sine wave.

In regard to the tremolo issue. I have found that on a vintage bandmaster AB 763 you can greatly reduce tremolo ticking by moving the wire to the #3 pin of tremolo tube closer to the chassis. It must pick up interference if it’s not grounded well. That sounds like it might be the culprit on your Vibro King.

About your views on reverb. A very good guitar player that I am lucky enough to play music with, says quite simply, "the room is the reverb and that's enough".

Great follow up video Chris 👏👏 Amp sounded great so well worth all your excellent work 👌👌 I now have some ideas to try to get rid of the ticking from the tremolo on my Davoli Show II amp. Thanks a lot 😉👍

Great job! I’ve been tweaking mine in anticipation of part 2. Lots of good info. Also I tried something that I had seen years ago on the tremolo tick on a different amp and it worked. I always felt that it had something to do with the ground from the tremolo to the chassis making the tone stack susceptible to picking up that tick. If you disconnect the leg of the 100k resistor on the speed pot from the chassis and the connect that leg to the 2k7 cathode resistor(R55) in the phase shift oscillator. I think that was on a BF Twin, the VK is configured much differently so maybe that could work? Looking forward to more! Harley’s opinion would be helpful too.

👍🙏

That jungle of wires is not the way it was supposed to be

Isn't this reverb design just the old stand alone reverb unit built into these amps?