New Vintage Guitar & Amp Day - Vox/Roland Content

[UlricvonCatalyst]

So, for some years now I have coveted my old friend and bandmate's amplifier - a fairly humble and not exactly highly sought-after Roland CH60 Cube Chorus from the early 1980s.

This amp was used on all the demos and probably the few singles we made in the band we played in at the tail end of the '80s, and I always loved its feature set of chorus, reverb and overdrive in a compact package. I know that the overdrive gets comprehensively dissed online, as does the (apparently minute) reverb tank, but I remember both sounding fairly satisfactory to my ears, and I've always found myself wondering exactly how bad the OD circuit produced by the company responsible for Boss pedals could realistically be.

The main event, though, is the chorus circuit, which I've read variously to be the same as a CE-2 and a CE-1, the latter claim being that it's the same circuitry that went into the JC series combos.

I'm not qualified to judge such things, but I'm very pleased to have finally taken delivery of this amp from a third bandmate's hall cupboard, where it's been languishing since the early 1990s. Consequently, it's very grimy and will need a good clean and a quick electrical check-over before I spark it up and see if it still does it for me. I anticipate more waves of '80s nostalgia than any number of episodes of Stranger Things could ever deliver, and look forward to reprising the line out into a portastudio recording method of yore at some point.

My phone couldn't quite capture the decades'-worth of nicotine and house-dust fug.



Grime somewhat more apparent in this bird'e-eye view.



And there's more....

I got an unexpected bonus as Eugene had also unearthed Kenny's old semi-acoustic, known to us as 'The Toy' due to its diminuitive stature, pared-back appointments, and sketchy set-up. Sadly the floating bridge has gone AWOL, but may yet appear as the hall cupboard empties. In any case, the guitar needs a good clean, especially the fingerboard, which is a petri dish of dead skin and what-have-you, with heavily tarnished frets. Could take me a while to get round to as I have more pressing projects on the go at the moment, but it's nice to think of it having a new lease of life at some point.

The Toy: a Vox Tornado from the mid-'60s (complete with hand-painted scratchplate and non-original tuners).



I'm pretty sure these were made in Eko's Recanati factory. The serial number on the trapezoid neck-plate could help me date it precisely, but I'm guessing records were lost when the factory was destroyed. If anyone knows otherwise - I'm looking at you, porkyprimecut - I'd love a link or info on how to decipher the code.

That's all for now. Will probably report back on how the amp sounds before too long.

[Unicorn Warrior]

Congrats. Love that amp. Can’t wait to hear back on how it does. The headstock on that Vox reminds me of the Vox Phantom XII I had for a brief period of time.

[UlricvonCatalyst]

Couldn't wait, and powered up the amp after checking the wires in the plug were all firmly in place. A few of the pots were crackly, as expected, but the volume pot got quite a bit smoother after a few turns to and fro. The input jacks took a bit of wiggling to spring back to life too, but worked okay after a fashion. I'll do a complete disassembly at some point and clean and lube all the pots and jacks along with cleaning up the chassis and cabinet.

Plugged in my Tele and, soundwise, I loved it as much as I expected to. It has a lot of girth for such a small amp, if anything tending towards too bassy, which is somewhat at odds with forum posts I'd read describing it as "fizzy". Couldn't turn the volume up much, but the briefest blast at full tilt suggested the speaker could be the weak link. I think that's been my experience with most small amps I've encountered, though - it seems you really need to run an extension cab if you want the decibels (which I usually don't, I have to say).

Okay, the reverb isn't very versatile, the overdrive is serviceable at best, and the chorus swoosh is kind of noticeable when you stop playing, but I'm already more than happy with this as a living room amp. My avarice for it was based on the legendary Roland clean sound, but I might try pairing it with my Epi Valve Jr. for a dirty/clean or wet/dry set-up. I'm heading out to my friend's country pile through the week, so I'll chuck it in the car and see how his White Falcon sounds through it, turned up as loud as it can stand to go. Might look at swapping the speaker if it really is past it. Time will tell.

All in all, I'm very happy to be the new custodian of this wee box of delights.

[Pacafeliz]

Cool!
I had a rare Eko-branded version of this guitar and sold it to Raph here. Pretty cool, and I absolutely love the tornado -shaped headstock.



These old Roland amps are cool too, had one of the orange 20-watters (I believe).

[raphaël]

I was abour to answer "I've bought one from Pat"
This guitar is my absolute #1 since the 6 months I have it.
I'll post a NGD soon.
Those Vox Tornado guitars where indeed made by Eko for the north american market during a short time : from 65 to 67.
If yours is like mine, they have the most exquisite necks. And those Vox pickups are insanly good and full and warm yet quite bright with great definition sounding pickups.

[UlricvonCatalyst]

^ ^ ^

That's good to know. I wasn't expecting to 'inherit' the Tornado, and honestly had no particular expectations of it being any good, as I remember us all being quite underwhelmed by it when Kenny bought it (after I spotted it in a second-hand shop and suggested it might make a good feedback machine).

Back then none of us knew anything about guitar set-up, so even stuff like lowering the bridge saddle, never mind moving it to improve the intonation didn't figure - it literally stayed the way it came from the shop, bar a string change, which I remember K saying entailed removing and replacing each string individually so the bridge didn't fall off.

How did any of us manage before the internet?

[Pacafeliz]

^ ^ ^

That's good to know. I wasn't expecting to 'inherit' the Tornado, and honestly had no particular expectations of it being any good, as I remember us all being quite underwhelmed by it when Kenny bought it (after I spotted it in a second-hand shop and suggested it might make a good feedback machine).

Back then none of us knew anything about guitar set-up, so even stuff like lowering the bridge saddle, never mind moving it to improve the intonation didn't figure - it literally stayed the way it came from the shop, bar a string change, which I remember K saying entailed removing and replacing each string individually so the bridge didn't fall off.

How did any of us manage before the internet?

...still, look for a good floating bridge and you'll be happy with that guitar, I tell you!