A Checkmate amp post on the My Les paul forum and some internet searching afterwards got me stumbled onto this cute little guy. Bought it off Reverb from a very nice seller who bought it non-functioning and decided to pass it on after 12yrs of holding onto it and never getting around to fixing it. Besides not working, it had very old dried up masking tape stuck to the top of it, a dent on the top and face plate with tolex damage and peeling tolex on most of the corners. The back cover had a combination of both missing and stripped screws holding it on. Needless to say, I bought this more for the fun of fixing it up and seeing what it’s like than any profit I’m getting from doing this. My hourly rate is crap. Good thing this is just my hobby. haha
What was done…
The potentiometers were cleaned with De-oxit. All lights, jacks and nuts were polished with a felt bob on a dremel to get rid of oxidation on the contacts and make them shine
A 3-prong power cord was swapped in for safety reasons and the power wires moved away from the signal wires and controls.
All the capacitors were swapped with capacitors with lower esr values than the originals. Those original Orange capacitors were way out of spec. Polypropylene film caps were swapped in for electrolytics where possible. All carbon composition resistors replaced with 1% metal film resistors to reduce hiss.
Thermal paste was added to the output transistors and heatsinks. A fuse block was added to provide some protection to the amp. Two new 8 ohm 15 watt speakers wired in series. The original speakers will be included if they are wanted.
All the tolex was thoroughly cleaned and any lifting or tears glued back down with CA glue. CA glue was wicked into all the wood joints to reinforce the cabinet. I cleaned the grill cloth with some cleaner and a toothbrush. Yes a toothbrush! The control plate was straightened out a bit and polished as well as the control knobs.
Guitar-Restos 