What's On The Workbench?

I originally found this little guy stuffed under a workbench in my Sweet Little Wife's garage when I first moved in. The garage had been a "Man Cave" type place, with carpet and old couches, a little fridge for beer, big TV set, etc., etc, etc. Her first husband would hang out with his buddies after work and sometimes they'd get the guitars out and jam.

This is what he used, a Valco "Supro":

A very simple little "5 Watt" class amp with a single 6V6GT output tube, which is kinda the "little brother" to the ever popular 6L6GC. I showed it to her, and she almost cried, remembering the jam sessions, so I carefully put it away so I could see what it needed to sing again.

Fast forward about 10 years, and I decided to dig it out (she didn't remember me saving it) and give it a good going over. Over the years I collected all the information and schematics I could find for these small Valco amps, so I'm fortunate to have a schematic that matches the chassis 100%.

I flipped it around and pulled the chassis out:

And set it up on the bench:

Yeah, pretty crusty! I got out my EICO tube tester, and checked the three tubes. The rectifier tube appeared OK, but the 6V6 output tube had "shorts", as did the 6SL7GT dual triode input/driver tube.

And it's a "gimme" that the electrolytic capacitors are leaky, as are all the notorious molded paper capacitors, which are all those pink cylinders:

And to add a fourth 1/4" jack input, they removed the fuse holder, stuck in another jack, and scabbed a 4 Amp breaker in there:

Yeah, it's a mess:

Le Sigh.....

So I sent an order off a week or so ago to "Antique Electronic Supply", one of my go-to places for tube parts. Great service, fair prices, and wide variety of parts catering to old tube amps as well as "Luthier" supplies for old guitars, and things like correct replacement Fender knobs. Got three new tubes, some capacitors and odd resistors, fuseholders (I have fuses), and a new leather carrying handle and hardware for this little guy, as the original leather handle had disintegrated long before I first met him.

All I've done so far besides take the chassis out is to brush the dirt off it, and then wipe it down to get the nasty stuff off.  I pulled the "extra" instrument input jack and put a new fuse holder in there. I'm also going to install a proper 3-wire grounded cord on it a bit later. I cleaned the volume and tone controls, 1/4" jacks, and the tube socket pins with some Caig D5 DeoxIT. And I ordered a replacement 8" speaker tonight, as the old one is just too fragile after all these years.

It'll be interesting to see how it sounds after I finish it. Other than the new handle on top, I'm going to tray and leave the cabinet pretty much alone. I'll clean it and trim/reglue any loose covering, but I'm not going to recover it.