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anonymous 22 March 2007

OK there this bass head at my church. this is all the info i know. It's a fender head. On the back it says Fender 100B or fender 100 bass. model no. 1001852.

Also it was being used with a Voice Cab Model V418, 4 ohms. Made by Thomas Organ Co. Westminister

That's all the info I have on both of those pieces. Anyone know anything about any of it? Thanks!

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Davedog Thu, 03/22/2007 - 18:33

It is what it says it is. That is a Fender Bassman 100. Its nominally 100 watts, all tube, and was made starting in the seventies. It probably has a 'silver face' with turquoise letters. The cabinet is a made in USA Vox and the head for it would have been a solid state around 100 watts. It could be as old as the late 60's. If I remember , the 418 cabinet has an 18" speaker...but dont quote me on it.

Both should sound very good as far as tone but will not be a lot of power. Probably plenty for the gig they're on.

Why do you ask?

moonbaby Fri, 03/23/2007 - 07:12

The amp head sounds like a newer vintage solid-state amp-all black, like the Rumble, which at one time was designated "100-B". The silver-faced Bassmans that I have seen were the Bassman 50 and 70, and the SUPER Bassman 100 and 135. These are, like DD said, a tube amp, easily ID'd by looking into the rear of the chassis. But you need to investigate this, because if it IS a silver-faced Fender amp, they can be a real gas and relatively cheap to own. Modding them out makes them a screamin' demon for guitar, too. Been there, done that.
The Vox Westminister was the larger bass cab from "Tommy-Vox" (the other being the Essex). It had an 18" Goodman speaker, and is to be avoided at all costs. The Thomas Organ-manufactured Vox gear was pretty much crap, even in those days, and the Goodman could barely reproduce a fart, much less a musical tone. Attempting to replace the speaker in that cab may prove futile, as most of the Tommy-Vox cabs had particle board baffles that crumble from age. Can you say "boat anchor"?

moonbaby Fri, 03/23/2007 - 12:50

Dave was correct- it was probably made in the mid-late '60s. Around 1970-71, I had a couple of Thomas Organ Vox amps (a Royal Guardsman Reverb Twin and an Essex bass amp) that I had acquired used. Maybe I was a bit hard on the criticism of the cab. After all, I STILL have the Essex cabinet that I gutted the crappy electronics out of and re-loaded a 12" Celestion GB and a 10" Eminence Li'l Buddy into it. It makes a great-sounding studio cab with any head. But it IS uglier than the devil and SHOULD be a boat anchor :lol: With the exception of the front baffle, the cabinet is hardwood and well-machined.
BTW, ask your mom if the cab is in a chrome stand/w casters. I believe the Westminister had this (my Royal Guardsman did). This was a fancy chrome stand that surrounded the cab like a "cage", and was attached to the cabinet on its' sides, near the handles. You could tilt the cab up or down to "aim" the sound. Pretty neat feature, and that REALLY adds to the value of the cabinet, because many of them are missing. Anyway, the cab alone might be worth $100.00 if its in clean condition, the stand could easily double or even triple that! Let us know...

moonbaby Sun, 03/25/2007 - 12:20

OK, I gave you some info on the amp head on your other post. Here's the Vox:
You do have the chrome stand, and like my Essex, it is more like a cart with wheels. No tilting like the Super Beatle or Royal Guardsman. Too bad the cab itself is so tattered, also like my Essex. Not surprising, the covering is not like the Tolex Fender used. I did notice that there appears to be a shiny metal dust cap in the center of the speaker, barely visible through the grille cloth. Definitely NOT an original Goodman speaker-good! It could be a number of things- CTS, Eminence, Altec, and JBL all made models with a metal dust cap. In fact, the speaker may even be a 15" instead of an 18" now. It really isn't hard to modify a baffle to handle a different-sized speaker. You will have to open up the cabinet and investigate this to know for sure. Let us know what you find if you do this...

Davedog Sun, 03/25/2007 - 21:36

I finally got to see the items in question. You have gotten pretty accurate info about them both. The head is a dog....wait....not even that....more like the dogs ass.

Having the cart for the Vox makes it more 'valuable' but wont make it sound any better. If someone has changed the speaker to something that sounds decent then you might have something there.

A good speaker in that cabinet with a nice little Workingmans 400 SWR head would handle about any small club thing for bass.

I wouldnt play guitar through either unless forced at gunpoint and that would be debatable if I thought i could get the drop on the gun holder.

SonOfSmawg Thu, 04/12/2007 - 22:06

The head doesn't have enough power to do much but bedroom practicing, IMO (100 watts into 4ohms).

You'd be surprised how much some people will pay for an old Vox cab. Some consider the beat-up vintage vibe to be very cool. I think it looks ... groovy. :roll:

All of the Vox bass amps had POS drivers. Given the small size of the aluminum dust cone, I'd bet money that it's a CTS driver, and it actually may be the original. CTS were known to be cheap and to blow easily (resisting the dirty joke here).

With a little modification, an Eminence Gamma 15A-2 driver would work well in that cabinet. You'd just have to run the driver specs and the cabinet size through WinISD to determine the port size.

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