I did something irresponsible... Soon to be NBAD

[MadAsAHatter]

This one might make the bass guys a little jealous. I snagged a Trace Elliot V4 Mk1.
From my research and understanding not a whole lot of these were made. Between the V4 Mk1 (200 watts) and V6 (400 watts) not many were made total. These 2 amps share the same preamp, but different power sections. There's also hybrind & SS in this series which all share the same preamp. I can't find reliable enough info on production numbers. Best I could research is a couple hundred of the 4V & V6 and not sure about the hybrids. There's also a V4 Mk2 and a V8. They share the same preamp and similar but different power sections. Supposedly only 25 of the V4 Mk2 and maybe 100 of the V8 were made. Of that whole series less than 1500 total made; so not exactly one sitting on every street corner.

The difference between the V4 Mk1 & Mk2 are in the preamp. The Mk1 is single channel where the Mk2 is 2 channel; clean & overdrive.

Moving on... This amp comes with a quick but interesting chain of events. I've had a V-Type preamp (fairly rare as well) sitting in my Reverb watch list for like the last 6-8 months. Never did anything about it because it was listed as local pickup only. After the holidays I was going to message the seller to see if he'd be willing to ship. It ended up selling one day last week... oh well.

Since that one sold I poked around over the weekend to see if anything else was available. I came across a shop selling NOS Trace Elliot parts. They have a V4Mk2/V8 unpopulated preamp board, unpopulated V8 power amp board, and a couple V6 OT's & PT's. So I thought maybe I could build one myself from the NOS parts Spent some time over the weekend researching this and how I could work the power section and/or find suitable transformers. I thought of something to look up this morning and when I got on the computer to search.... low and behold a V4 Mk1 was listed overnight. Told my wife about it and she says it's your money, if it's not sitting on a credit card do what you want. Dammit all if she isn't an enabler LOL!. Anyway one irresponsible decision later and I clicked buy it now.

Specs on this guy are:
-Listed as never gigged and rarely used. It's an earlier production model that has the green rat fur which from pics looks to be in pristine condition.
-Preamp is based off a fender tone stack (I think) with Gain, BMT, Master Volume, along with deep & bright switches and a pull mid shift on the Mid knob.
-Active & Passive inputs and pre/post EQ DI out.
-FX loop
-2 12AX7 preamp tubes
-4 KT88 Power tubes for 220 watts
-4/8 ohm output.

Side note, Trace Elliot never made a Mk2 preamp only the full amp. So I'll likely get one of those Mk2 preamp boards and build a rack preamp out of it. Pair it with the Mk1 amp and be able to have both.

Borrowing one of the listing pics for now. I'll replace it with my own once the amp is delivered.

 

[JackBootedThug]

Nice I never realized how expensive bass stuff was until @Juggernaut gave me the rundown on bass equipment… I thought guitar shit was pricey….bass stuff is nutz….

 

[MadAsAHatter]

Nice I never realized how expensive bass stuff was until @Juggernaut gave me the rundown on bass equipment… I thought guitar shit was pricey….bass stuff is nutz….

Bass gear can be pricey depending on what you're going for. You can get some lower watt class D power stuff for a decent price. Once you move into higher wattage Class D and brands like Mesa, Orange, Aguilar, Darkglass, Fender, Ampeg, etc. stuff gets pricey. It can jump up more if you're wanting to go all tube. Then throw in all your high end FX and compressors.

There's not a whole lot of all tube bass amps out there in current production. It's all moved to light weight class D and DI to Foh. That's all everyone wants. I guess over time bassists turned into pussies. WAAAHHH!!!!, my 300 watt tube head and 8x10 cab are too heavy. Suck it up! You play bass, heavy gear comes with the territory.

Edit: The V4 wasn't too bad; right at $1600. Looking up past sales it's not too far off from pre-covid going rates. So, pleased to see sellers haven't been price gouging on this one.

 

[nightlight]

That looks interesting, post some clips. I've seen some of the smaller Trace Elliot stuff, but really have no experience.

I'm in the process of restoring my Warwick Vampyre to factory spec, and it cost a lot to get the preamp, and is likely to cost more to have it installed. But I don't have a lot of bass gear other than that and an Ibanez SR5000. The only bass amp is a Darkglass Microtubes 900.

I really want to get a tube bass amp and cab, but it's highly unlikely as my guitar stuff takes too much space,

 

[rsm]

Trace Elliot was top tier gear back in the day, too expensive for me since I needed both guitar and bass gear.

Nice find. That amp you have is some of their older rare gear before the SM and SMX gear when bi-amping became popular.

This was the Trace Elliot bi-amp rig I wanted back in the day:

I went all in on ADA for guitar and bass back in the day. My main bass rig back in the day was ADA; MB-1, B500B, 2x10 and 1x15 cabs, with MIDI floor controller.

I wanted a full Trace Elliot rig (see above pic) but it was expensive. I had a few pieces of Trace Elliot gear, including a GP12 SMX preamp which I miss. I sold it for a MP-11 MIDI preamp which I still have.

Trace Elliot MP 11 (no pic of mine, it's in storage); I don't have the MIDI controller

I still enjoy bass, and my current main bass rig is finally Trace Elliot, into a PA with subs

 

[Juggernaut]

Nice I never realized how expensive bass stuff was until @Juggernaut gave me the rundown on bass equipment… I thought guitar shit was pricey….bass stuff is nutz….

Yeah, some of this stuff gets CRAZY expensive.

 

[MadAsAHatter]

Trace Elliot was top tier gear back in the day, too expensive for me since I needed both guitar and bass gear.

Nice find. That amp you have is some of their older rare gear before the SM and SMX gear when bi-amping became popular.

This was the Trace Elliot bi-amp rig I wanted back in the day:

I went all in on ADA for guitar and bass back in the day. My main bass rig back in the day was ADA; MB-1, B500B, 2x10 and 1x15 cabs, with MIDI floor controller.

I wanted a full Trace Elliot rig (see above pic) but it was expensive. I had a few pieces of Trace Elliot gear, including a GP12 SMX preamp which I miss. I sold it for a MP-11 MIDI preamp which I still have.

Trace Elliot MP 11 (no pic of mine, it's in storage); I don't have the MIDI controller

I still enjoy bass, and my current main bass rig is finally Trace Elliot, into a PA with subs

I wasn't into bass back then, but I remember if people weren't dragging an SVT and 810 around it was Trace Elliot rack gear. Once I started acquiring a little bass gear I knew I wanted something TE. Their current line like the Elf didn't impress me much, but remembering their older gear was considered top notch kept them on my radar. One of the GP preamps were on my list until I discovered the tube V-type. After that it was a waiting game for one to be available AND I had the funds to buy it. Things finally lined up.