How to Build a Fender Style Amp Head Enclosure 

Excellent work! I love the look of the natural wood on Fender heads and cabs.

so cool to see when someone has exactly the same hobbies. Great job👍

The amp head turned out great! I'd vote yay on making the matching speaker cab if you have the time to do it.

The old and used grill cloth looks great!

The project came out looking well made. You definitely did an extraordinary job and the use of the discarded Ikea furniture piece along with using what you had on hand is both brilliant and economical. I’ve done similarly recycled sourcing of materials for a few of my own projects that I refer to as Home Depot Specials. At least the first two or three projects I did of this nature utilized left overs from other projects where I’d purchased the materials primarily from Home Depot and to a lesser extent Lowes. My favorite was a 1x18” air suspension bass guitar speaker cabinet that had an 8Ω, 18” Celestion bass guitar speaker that I bought new for about $75. Paired with a 8Ω, 2x10” bass guitar cabinet, another Home Depot Special build, and a 500 watt Ashdown bass guitar amp head, there was some serious air being moved. When completed, I had enough extra cash to buy a used MIM Fender Precision Bass Guitar. I think retaining the current grill cloth is a good idea. The front panel of the amp definitely looks like it’s a veteran of many, many beer bar battles and club campaigns. Having the grill cloth sporting the same kinds of gigging war wounds complements the aged front amp panel and does not cause the newness of the cabinet to stand out or be as pronounced. Of course that’s just my opinion. A question for you. You called the cabinet joinery technique you used, “Box Joints”. I always called what you utilized, “Finger Joints”. Are there any differences between Box Joints and the Finger Joints? You know more than I do. I’m mostly self taught, having only the basics taught to me by my father and his knowledge gained working in and later with the trades as the Expediter for my uncle’s company. My uncle built large tract home developments in the Denver area in the 50’s. Yes on the speaker cabinet. I learned what I know from watching others and I’m sure you employ better ways (I’m thinking it depends on the scope of the project) to build speaker cabinets than what I do. I have one method as opposed to other methods I’ve seen you rely on in your other videos of builds.

Awesomeness in your face....That was really nice. Please build a cabinet....the amp deserves that

your channel is so underrated ! awesome ! I also love destroying ikea furniture :) I also like the fact that you did a Mathias Wandel style jig and you're not all smug about it

Sweet method for the box joints! Very helpful video, thanks!

Awesome job as per usual, man! Came out really nice, and I'd love to see a speaker cab build!

Thanks Merwin, I hope my current cabinet build turns out half as nice...

Looks good, sounds good. You have a great amp there now. Good job sir and thanks for sharing.

New sub here! This channel needs to get huge! Such quality and interesting videos :p thanks for what you do ✌️😊👍

Excellent video! Wish I'd had a shop teacher like you.

i think the grill cloth looks fantastic personally, has a good story coming from the original enclosure you got it in, i'd leave it. Besides, great build really enjoyed it

Awesome job!

Thanks for this! I’m thinking of breaking my Twin down into a separate head and cab, so this is super helpful. Awesome box joint jig! 👍

above and beyond. good work

Excellent job! Very motivating!

Mate, that’s brilliant. You know, I always wanted to turn my little U.K. garage into a woodwork shop with kit like yours inside. Then I’d start up a small business custom making wooden cabs for individual customer’s amps.

Pretty good for scrap from the garbage. I like it

i like the grille cloth as youve done it - nice build!

Definitely make an accompanying cab, it'd look great! I think this looks fantastic and I also wouldn't change the grill cloth :-)

Nice job. Very instructive. I might have sold the old cabinet and bought some serious wood to build the top from... maybe. Now you ve got that ikea look.

Wow, really nice work! Inspired.

Beautiful.

Looks good!🤘🏼 Wish Fender made something like this!...

great work and video. thanks for sharing. 👍🏽

Enjoyed this build

Well done, looks amazing!

Good job!! I like your idea! I love too recycle old forniture...👍👍

Well done!

Beautiful

The old cloth actually matches the scratched front panel! I'd say leave it.

Beautiful job!

Nice job!

Looks fantastic 🔥

Awesome video!

Very nice job it looks great!

Yes we want to see you build a speaker cab!

Te quedó de lujo !

Great build and video!

Very very nice work!

Looks good! Go for the matching speaker cabinet for sure.

Feel a bit inspired now. Thanks

That's beautiful

Fantastic!!

Good stuff!,.. I like building amp & speaker cabs also. My latest 2/12 angled british style cab sounds super!

Great job dude, I did something similar with an old combo too.

Dig the finger joint jig! Pretty cool. Amp came out nice I think 👍

Wow !!!! great Job bro...keep it up...

Looks awesome man!

Nice video , reqlly well done

Nice work! I am actually planning on doing this exact thing with a Peavey amp I got (missing the original speakers, and the cab is in awful shape). I also have a kit for a Vox AC15 style amp that I'll also put in a head.

Ce mec est un virtuose du bois!!!

So cool

That seems to be an original Fender Showman head from the mid-1960s. It was originally in a head enclosure just like the one you made. Looks like one of the owners decided to make a home built combo enclosure for it. Since you restored it to it‘s former configuration, i would love to see the cabinets with black. Tolex

That is a great looking amp head. By the way, that's not a Fender style head. That is a Fender blackface "Showman" likely built before 1965. That cabinet it was in was not the original cabinet. You have a real classic, take care of it.

Very nice.

Great job bro 👍

I love this project. I humbly suggest for the grille cloth. The material that you rejected as being too light in color could be dyed with some cordovan-colored shoe polish. Try it first on a small sample piece.

Looks killer

Nice job!!

Great job!!😀

Good project!

The cloth looks great,...no need to change it because the amp paint is a little tattered as well. Perfect match...

Do it! This was awesome!

This is awesome man. Really wish I had a table saw, well actually not the issue, I just have no space for one. I'll stick to making pedals and small amps for now. Subbed.

Salute from here!!!

Looks good !

This looks so simple and easy to diy! One day I will build my own 2x12 cabinet.. Starting first with a pedal board with a simple hand saw. I need a workplace! But I hate the noise and dust of all that machines, a love and hate connection.

I love it!

I would love to see the matching cabinet beeing build

Молодец, прекрасный столяр!

excelente!

nice, wish i had taken notice in woodwork class now lol

awesome video, fantastic construction as well. as I sat here watching, 1 thought kept flowing through my mind; how about mounting 3-4 speakers behind the cloth, with a bypass switch. thus it becomes a sort of "all in 1" as well as being a driver for an external cabinet.... a little experiment I may take on in the near future....

I enjoyed watching that, thanks. As the enclosure ages then perhaps the cloth will look less out of place against the freshly sanded wood.

Definitely build a matching cabinet for your head

i cant believe someone would throw away such great looking wood.... nice won!

Love it...Would I be sad to say...I’d have made this into a small “Combo” if there were good enough speakers out there to replace the 10” sounding Greenbacks, if any? Great Job, I do like the original cover used. ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

That looks like a serviceman amp made in japan. cool build

Great Job nice Look 🤟🤟🤟🤟👍👍👍👍

I have a Marshall Valvestate 265R combo sitting in my attic that I’m thinking to fit to a head cabinet. Got some walnut sawn down from a large limb of a tree on my property - might be a perfect match...🤔

nice!!

great video! i watched the whole thing to see how you built the back panel as i need to build one and need the dimensions. but you didn't. dang! still fun video.

Great build. How about an array of small speakers behind the cloth ? I think it would make it a great little practice-amp. And with an on/off switch its stil perfect for your bigger speakers.

Awesome

Enjoyable content! Any chance you could make a video showcasing your fancy box joint jig some more?

Looks Good, make a speaker Cabinet to match!

Awesome video. Ive either built or had them built for me, head cabs for all my amps. But a few years ago i got an ORange Tremlord and i cant find anyone who makes a head cab for it. So im gonna have to build my own, so thats my next project. Anyone know anyone who builds cabs for Tremlord ? ;-) But I first started doing this about 20 years ago and i was able to tour with 2 Twin Reverbs with everything separated. I had 2 1x12 cabs and a single 2x12 cab. The 1x12's had JBL e-120's and the 2x12 cab had Jensen C12K's in it. Easy to move and feels like legos when you put it all together on stage, but this allowed me to tour with my favorite amp. Now i use a SMS CTP preamp into ART SLA-1 for my Grateful Dead stuff, but for over 20years I used a Twin Head.

that's a pretty Neat apron edit: you could trim off some of the frayed grill cloth and use some spray dye to get a more solid color on it

a review on this amp, please !

You need to put holes in the front panel to allow air to circulate and cool the tubes.

Love this video. I vote yes for matching speaker cab.

"old groupie's lipstick..." that's someone's grandma you are talking about, dude. Be respectful... LOL

I guess I would have put some openings in the front (hidden by the grill cloth, eventually) to enable some ventilation to the amp. We all know how hot tube amps tend to get while being played.

Красота!

Great Job, I need the exact dimension 24 inch wide to build an extended cabinet for my Vox AC15HW. Thanks

When you go to make another cabinet remember to paint the wood black and then put the grill on it and try to see the way you can put the chassis with screws from above the cabinet. only cosmetic improvements for me 😁

It may be helpful if you staple a metal screen on the underside of the cabinet where the handle goes just to keep any RF from coming in. 😉