NAD: Fender Bantam Bass Amp or WTF did I just buy?!

[HedonismBot]

I've been semi-actively looking for a used tube amp for the last year or so but the pickings are slim in my price range. I decided to check the local CL a couple weeks ago and saw this beast for a very reasonable price and jumped on it. Apparently, this model was made 1969 through 1971 and is the direct predecessor of Bassman10 (except 30w with a 1x15 speaker and a tube rectifier instead of ss). The stock speaker... is a Yamaha speaker. Yes, apparently, Fender had a contract with Yamaha at the time. These speakers were made of styrofoam and got blown easily, that's one of the reasons that this model was discontinued in 1971.

Anyway, enough history. As I did my research on the internet, I learned that there's not a whole lot out there on Bantam Bass Amp and I'm a total dummy when it comes to amp electronics. Removing a chassis is just about the most complex amp maintenance thing I can do and I wouldn't ever touch anything inside with a ten-foot pole*. I'm curious to know more about this amp, though, so I would like to pick the collective OSG brain. But first, the pics! I'll ask questions / make comments as I go.

* I only decided to take out the chassis because I needed to clean the cab. Previously owned by a smoker so a long cycle of scrub-a-dub-dub awaits



I think the date stamp on one of the transformers dates it to October '69 but I can't make out the date on the other one (there's a solid drop of shellac right in the middle of the stamp).


The amp came with a replacement Jensen Concert speaker. I have the original speaker as well (see 3 images below).


I'm not sure how to date this Yamaha JA4001 speaker.


Any idea how to decode these two stamps? Maybe, January 1970?



Sovtek tubes stamped 0803. Were these made in 2008 or 2003?


The chassis code reads A 03282 which makes no sense to me. I tried a few online decoders and they all showed 1964-1965. I guess this isn't that surprising for CBS Fender. I read that the chassis is the same size as Super Reverb’s. Could be their usual grab-whatever-is-in-the-leftover-bin approach. Otherwise I have no clue. Also, what do the codes on the stickers mean?


The chassis. Full view. Does it look relatively unmolested? Any good / bad news?


The closeups in sequential order:






Please share any ideas you may have on how to date the parts of this amp. Also, any tips you can give me about the circuitry (any weird looking capacitors, anything that jumps at you, etc.) will be most appreciated. The guy I bought it from said that his tech friend recently had a look at it and said that everything was original and in prefect working order. Which seemed weird to me. The amp does sound good, though, and there is barely any background noise even when cranked all the way up. But aren't you supposed to service amps every 10-20 years? Would the caps from 1969(70) even be reliable at this point? Thanks!

P.S: any advice on removing cigarette smoke odor will be greatly appreciated as well. So far I've been keeping the amp on my back porch to air it out and gave it a thorough cleaning with a dishwashing liquid-baking soda solution today. This did help greatly, but the smell is still there. I'll keep washing it every few days but I'm willing to try other remedies too.

[JSett]

Sounds like you've looked in all the usual places for dates. Maybe pot codes would be worth a look but those are often all over the place. 69/70 seems about right though.

The insides do indeed look pretty untouched. A cap job is definitely in order, regardless of sound.

Congrats on getting hold of such a rare beast

[HedonismBot]

Sounds like you've looked in all the usual places for dates. Maybe pot codes would be worth a look but those are often all over the place. 69/70 seems about right though.

The insides do indeed look pretty untouched. A cap job is definitely in order, regardless of sound.

Congrats on getting hold of such a rare beast

I’m guessing the stamp on the Yamaha speaker means January 1970 although I wasn’t able to confirm this yet. I guess I’ll call it a ‘70 then. Does it look like the “death cap” is still in there? Should I be concerned? Also, may be worth mentioning that the chord has a 3-prong plug.

Thanks man! I am excited to give it the play time it deserves after it is approved to enter the house.

[JSett]

I'm pretty sure there was no death caps in any of these but I can't see one either. They're usually down by the power switch and fuse and pretty obvious

[HedonismBot]

I'm pretty sure there was no death caps in any of these but I can't see one either. They're usually down by the power switch and fuse and pretty obvious

Was it just a BF pre-3prong thing?

[JSett]

I'm pretty sure there was no death caps in any of these but I can't see one either. They're usually down by the power switch and fuse and pretty obvious

Was it just a BF pre-3prong thing?

No, I've seen SF amps with a death cap. It's normally attached to the ground switch to the chassis iirc. Normally blue. I can't see one in your pictures but it is kinda shadow in there (and I'm out in the sunshine so my screen only goes so bright).

If you take a look in there you should be able to see if it's there...it's not a small cap.

[DeathJag]

Was that the one in the New Orleans CL? There was one there and I was checking it out a few times. I wondered what the heck it was! The listing is gone now so I guess that was your amp! Congrats!

[HedonismBot]

Was that the one in the New Orleans CL? There was one there and I was checking it out a few times. I wondered what the heck it was! The listing is gone now so I guess that was your amp! Congrats!

No, I’m located in California. I know, I was skeptical at first too but after spending a little while looking it up I realized that it wasn’t a bad amp (less the speaker), just an obscure model. Well, I guess the price and the fact that the speaker was already replaced, conveniently for me, ended up being the deciding factors.

Thanks! So far I like everything about it other than the faint but persistent cigarette odor and, maybe, the lack of a reverb tank. But hey, that’s what the pedals are for.

[sessylU]

Didn't know these existed.

Keep reading the thread title as "Fender Batman."

[s_mcsleazy]

ok. so i can kinda help you date this.

usually silverface fender amps have a stamp on the inside of the chassis with a name and a date on them. for example. my bassman has "castillo" as the person who made it and "may 10 1972" ive seen these appear everywhere in sf fenders. mine is near the bias pot.

[HedonismBot]

ok. so i can kinda help you date this.

usually silverface fender amps have a stamp on the inside of the chassis with a name and a date on them. for example. my bassman has "castillo" as the person who made it and "may 10 1972" ive seen these appear everywhere in sf fenders. mine is near the bias pot.

This does help, thank you. Mine has no stamp, instead there’s T-67 4 70 written in marker near the power chord. This must mean “completed by tech #67 on week 4 of 1970”. Makes sense.

[Sauerkraut]

Cool amp! Quite rare I'm guessing. How does it sound? I like that it has a mid control on the normal channel and none on the other, so you can probably make the channels sound distinctly different from one another.

I'm no expert, but it looks mostly or all original to me. I guess by 1970, they were already using 3-prong plugs. As for obvious things to check: I'd take a close look at the grid stopper and screen resistors. Those are the resistors on top of the output tubes. Check them for visible signs of overheating/burn marks and/or measure resistance to see if they're still in spec. Personally, even if they're fine, I'd still replace them with metal film resistors just to be sure they'll never cause any issues (plus it won't affect the amp's tone anyway). As mentioned, a cap job is definitely necessary, considering its age. BTW, have you checked inside the dog house? If the filter caps are still original, I'm willing to bet it's never been serviced.

Edit: read the OP's post more carefully. I think it's possible that it still works fine after all these years if it's been used regularly but not too much. I think the filter caps would be the first thing to cause problems, they may be close to leaking at this point. If so, they'd still work, but it would be advisable to change them to prevent damage.

[Veitchy]

So it's a Bassman combo with a 1X15? Frigging sweet!

Nice work - very clean inside.

[hulakatt]

It used to be a 30 watt Bassman with a foam, trapezoidal (typically) speaker. The speaker directly kept sales very low. That said, now I'm keeping an eye out for one. I'd love a 30 watt, tube rectified Bassman and I'd love it in an open back cab with a 15" speaker and there's a few mods I want to try on one of these old SF amps with the VTMB stack.

[redchapterjubilee]

It’s not exactly a 30w Bassman nor is it a quieter Super. They sound more like a Bandmaster or a Tremolux than that, but stiffer. They used to be awesome sleeper amps for guitar but the word is out now. The stock speaker is almost always blown on these but if intact it’s fine for guitar. Someone did the 1x15 baffle already on this one which is usually what people do, or 2x10, 4x10, etc. it’s not the best fender you’ll hear but when they were $500 amps they were more than fine.