65 Princeton RI mods anyone?

[mentoneman]

FWIW, the best things I've ever done to any Fender RI have been to change the tubes to NOS and change the speaker to vintage Jensen. I actually like the new Jensen P12N reissues made in Italy, too, but they are not close to the vintage ones. With a Princeton, I'd look into installing a new baffle for a 12", too, but I'm not sure there's room for just anything in that cabinet. I'm just not a fan of 10" speakers, outside of a Super Reverb that is.

i had a noss’ed up blackie and sf back in the day. both proper. but my friend’s bf deluxe with vintage jensen p12n and a mint 66 bassman head into an old marshall 8x12 were my finest fender moments.

i too had the p12n reissue which was nice but not the vintage butter.

 

[Music&Chaos]

RCA 6V6 smoked glass..

sounds like something Charleton Heston would pour his single malt in. A long slow pull on his 17th century meerschaum pipe…
View attachment 452717

Ooooh man that is an awesome descriptor.

 

[mentoneman]

le Eagle hath landed

between jamming on tylers and bringing home this cool box it’s been a fun guitar day!

 

[Dave L]

I´ve always wondered what the ol´ Paul Rivera mods for the Princetons and Deluxes really were, that is in more detail than the feature set gives away. Don´t know if Paul or anyone else does them these days, but if they were good enough for everyone in the 70s they should be cool today as well.

 

[mentoneman]

I´ve always wondered what the ol´ Paul Rivera mods for the Princetons and Deluxes really were, that is in more detail than the feature set gives away. Don´t know if Paul or anyone else does them these days, but if they were good enough for everyone in the 70s they should be cool today as well.

i had a fender harvard reverb II ss combo in 84 that was designed by rivera. hit it with a yellow dod od 250. super fun!
later got a rivera TBR-1. wasn’t my thing for crunch/leads but the cleans were nice and the features were plentiful. used it as a stereo power amp.

based on playing their production stuff, pretty sure guys like roy blankenship or andy fuchs could mod this princeton into sparkling perfection.

 

[Music&Chaos]

le Eagle hath landed
View attachment 456817
between jamming on tylers and bringing home this cool box it’s been a fun guitar day!

That's a great amp! Buddy has one. Really fun to play.

 

[Music&Chaos]

I´ve always wondered what the ol´ Paul Rivera mods for the Princetons and Deluxes really were, that is in more detail than the feature set gives away. Don´t know if Paul or anyone else does them these days, but if they were good enough for everyone in the 70s they should be cool today as well.

I love my Rivera amp like no other. If he were still doing mods - I'd send mine to him right away.

 

[The~Kid]

There is a mid control knob mod you can add...... I've heard of that. Maybe there is a Master mod too.....

Maybe in a sense an Ironman ll is sort of like a mod. Its pricey but its there and you can use it without altering the amp really.

This is why IMO it would be cool for Fender to offer modules like that or something to mod then or to be done by a certified Fender tech. I think people would pay for it.

 

[mentoneman]

I love my Rivera amp like no other. If he were still doing mods - I'd send mine to him right away.

He came to our church to see Doyle Dykes play when he was a Rivera endorsee using the Sedona. I was mixing that night so I made sure Doyle was pumping!
i had the TBR-1 at the time as well and when Doyle brought him over to my FOH world to chat i kinda fanboi’ed him
super nice guy and obviously a wizard.

 

[The~Kid]

le Eagle hath landed
View attachment 456817
between jamming on tylers and bringing home this cool box it’s been a fun guitar day!

Congrats OP, wow what a combo.


Sweet *_*

 

[mentoneman]

Congrats OP, wow what a combo.


Sweet *_*

no better place to have a fender butterscotch/ seafoam green tele, surf green case, and 2 tone surf blue amp than the islands!

although the tropical storm/hurricane weather was awful and expecting more this weekend

the surf has been killer!
caught some epic waves boogie boarding off Waikiki last week (me on the outside wave)

and about 10 min from my place on Tuesday (i took this shot before paddling out)

interesting how the gear shots sorta match up with the water colors

 

[VonBonfire]

no better place to have a fender butterscotch/ seafoam green tele, surf green case, and 2 tone surf blue amp than the islands!

although the tropical storm/hurricane weather was awful and expecting more this weekend

the surf has been killer!
caught some epic waves boogie boarding off Waikiki last week (me on the outside wave)
View attachment 457009
and about 10 min from my place on Tuesday (i took this shot before paddling out)
View attachment 457010
interesting how the gear shots sorta match up with the water colors

Awesome shot bro!

Have to agree with you on the water colored gear. The Gracey's rattle can Taos Turquoise comes out pretty nice:

 

[The~Kid]

no better place to have a fender butterscotch/ seafoam green tele, surf green case, and 2 tone surf blue amp than the islands!

although the tropical storm/hurricane weather was awful and expecting more this weekend

the surf has been killer!
caught some epic waves boogie boarding off Waikiki last week (me on the outside wave)
View attachment 457009
and about 10 min from my place on Tuesday (i took this shot before paddling out)
View attachment 457010
interesting how the gear shots sorta match up with the water colors

Dude......


Surfs up



Sweet scenes and as sweet as the rig/gear *_*

 

[japetus]

I will admit, I like my Blues Jr with the Jensen better. Princeton 65 RI does sound amazing, but there is something about how the EL84 in the Blues Jr pushed with a boost that sounds good to me. It's not as "traditional Fender" but retains that nice crystaline Fender sound gained down. It's kind of strange, it's like an American clean/pushed Vox chimeView attachment 452687

I am gonna double down and say this amp sounds more alive and thicc, whilst being EL84 it gets chimey and fat with the speaker, can make it smooth and nice

 

[Fiesta Red]

le Eagle hath landed

between jamming on tylers and bringing home this cool box it’s been a fun guitar day!

Not much you can do to get that amp to sound any better because it sounds pretty awesome stock. I tried a Celestion Gold 10 and an Eminence GA10-SC64. Both sounded great, just different hues of an incredible amp.

 

[The~Kid]

I had one cranked up on my back porch the other night. Not a ton of headroom but it's plenty loud to feel it, and obviously nobody is buying this to be a volume lord. Great sounding amp, great sounding cleans. Just a nice sounding Fender amp overall. I can't comment on any mods for it. View attachment 452628

Hey I got one just like it

 

[The~Kid]

Id say probably a mod that kind of isn't a mod is simply taking it to a dude or if you know what you're doing rebias hotter or colder. Its simple but it has a huge impact and it's something you can do without having to change any circuitry.

Playing a lot of these, IME, aside from the components and the tolerances from amp to amp, speaker to speaker etc etc the bias probably has one of the largest impacts on tone. The tubes are fine IMO but JJs ain't bad for the power section IME and probably a bit more robust than the EHX/GT OEM but OEM sounds slinkier/brighter for lack of a better term and JJ sounds more dark/warmer.

 

[Floyd Eye]

Yeah, bias them hot. Now there's how you smoke a tranny,

 

[The~Kid]

Yeah, bias them hot. Now there's how you smoke a tranny,

Playing a couple some were biased differently hotter or colder.....

I preferred the slightly hotter ones and ended up getting one of those. The power section reacts differently as does the preamp in a sense. Mine came slightly hotter than normal from the factory and it was off in that sense but it something I appreciate about it.

Must have played like 6 or 7 different ones. Also in general there is a tolerance of capacitors and speakers to speakers and all that but the bias is one of the main factors that is easier to control and doesn't change anything on the circuit itself.

 

[mentoneman]

i think i solved my main issue regarding wanting more blackface sparkle and that extra touchy bloom and dynamics that the amp seemed to be missing

i fired up my cali 76 stacked compressor to throw into the mix and man did it work well with this amp!

gtr->comp->dd-2->amp was a winning clean tone formula for sure and made me very content.

i also tried different extension cabs and they all has their pros and cons but for the pure fender clean i’m good with the stock jensen loaded in there and over time it will keep getting sweeter.

but i’m still hoping a tube change and rebias down the line will make it ever nicer sounding.